Originally Posted by
rickair7777
As fas as networking, there will still be jobs but they will pushed to the extreme ends of the spectrum...you will either be one of a few high-end engineers working for the cloud providers (the cloud doesn't eliminate network requirements, it just moves them around) or a low-end onsite employee who manages LAN wireless nodes...basically a PC technician. The high-end guys will have a MS-EE or equivalent education.
No way. The majority of network engineers running the Internet are doing so with high school diplomas. I'd recommend to go to a NANOG and realize that the 20-30-40 year olds there aren't running around with MS-EE degrees. It's experience + clue that makes everything work. Are there folks with degrees around? Sure a few, but you don't need one to get involved in network engineering in a large scale. The nice thing about this country is that at some point, no one cares about what paper you have if you can get the job done right. I can point to several network architects/engineers at Yahoo, Google, AT&T, Level (3), Global Crossing, etc. as examples of folks with no degree.
Originally Posted by
rickair7777
I don't think the internet will replace corporate network trunks...it's too unreliable and unsecure, and can have unpredictable bandwidth issues. Companies will want dedicated primary bandwidth, with the 'net as a possible backup.
Cloud computing providers (the good ones) have been known to purchase direct connectivity into enterprise existing L3VPNs or directly into their offices to bypass the unpredictability of the Internet. Remember that one of the best benefits of the "cloud" is the ability for an enterprise to finally retire that 10-15 year old datacenter which has horrible power efficiency. Not to mention, that with Amazon EC2/S3 and other cloud offerings, the IT staff can mimic each server on a 1:1 basis until they're fully transitioned over. In 10 years from now, it won't be able 1:1 server replacement, it will be having all applications within your domain using a small set of 10-15 binaries and just API calls (a la Google AppEngine). But that's still a long ways off.
Originally Posted by
rickair7777
If you want a stable future in IT, take up programming. If you're good at it, you can roll with the changes and learn the new languages and paradigms as they arrive.
I disagree with this one. Right now, there is a huge amount of movement in this country to outsource programming/coding to India and other places overseas. Are there competent programmers in the US who are getting treated well? Yes, but they are also -great- at what they do. It's highly competitive and if you don't have the skill for it, I wouldn't bother.