Tom Wilk

Tom Wilk is a visionary who was my Team Leader. He was a mentor, a father , a brother , a friend. He rattled cages, he walked tall and carried a big fucking stick! ( or paddle) He shook the very foundation of the company I work for! He was let go as a result of god knows what.
Tom,
you gave me pride, you believed in me when no one else would. I am what I am in this industry becuase of you. You are a true warrior and I look forward to eating a great feast with you at the warriors table in Vallhala. or having breakfast with you at the secret bacon spot. You will not be forgotten. Like a fire that races through the inspired, I will strive to be better tomarrow than I am today, because of what you taught me.
You will always have my respect.
David Burns STE

Squad Monkey

When I started in this industry as an STE, I was taught that I was a professional who provided the headlights for a project, I learned how to test using tools, using brain power, using devs. Quality was paramount.
And then my world fell apart, my mentor was let go, my team torn apart and I was thrown into a squad of monkeys to popcorn test. My professional garb stripped from me, I have become what I feared the most , a rabid Squad Monkey tester, bearing my teeth at all those around me because I fear what I don’t understand. Now I am only jumping from one test tree to another, filling out blocks that say "Pass" or "Fail". I fling my bug poo against the wall to no avail. or worse whore myself out to the Nerd Herd because I am shameless and have a mortgage to pay.
Buried alive.........buried alive.......Khannnn!!!!!!!!!!!!
Where are the leaders of this industry? why are they not rallying against the great horde of Borg, ie India. Who are driving our standards down, killing the fuck out of this industries standards! And shame on the companies who use a failing economy as an excuse to do stupid shit to their bread and butter. I hope you lose your fucking seat in Valhalla and are forced to stand in the cold, watching the real Heroes feast at a table of bountiful testing jobs.
I used to think of Microsoft as the land of milk and Honey, a place I was STRIVING to work at some day. Now, they are more like the land of the lost.
I hope this black cloud passes,
What we need right now as an Industry, hell, as a nation is HOPE.
and let the light from my Excel spreadsheets show the way to a land of Quality, a land free from the influence of India and her 8 armed testers, I pray to the tester GODS everyday for this, Until then I will learn to survive in this post apocalyptic world of testing. bleeding from battle every day, I will go home with my head hung low, defeated.