>> Videogames sell a lot, but don't employ nearly as much as such huge an 
>> industry should. 
> 
> It's really not that huge an industry. Even software in general is 
> "niche" compared to, for example, construction or banking.

My sister is an accountant. (Not even a fully-qualified accountant yet.)

One week, they tell her on Monday "oh, by the way, we don't need you any 
more. Goodbye."

That Friday, she's all moaning because she has FIVE FIRM JOB OFFERS and 
SHE CAN'T DECIDE which one to pick! o_O

As in, it took her less than 3 business days to find (presumably more 
than) 5 jobs, apply to them, go to (at least) 5 interviews, actually get 
accepted and get 5 firm job offers.

WTF? I've been trying to get a new job for, like, 2 years, and so far 
I've been to *one* job interview.

On the other hand... every company on Earth needs at least one 
accountant. (This is a legal requirement. IIRC, it's something like if 
you employ more than 6 people, one of them must be an accountant.) Big 
companies need them. Small companies need them. Companies in every 
sector of commerce need them. EVERYBODY needs accountants. If you're an 
accountant, you can work for anybody, in principle.

MOST companies need salesmen. Not all of them, but most of them.

Almost no companies need programmers. MOST companies need computers and 
need software, but MOST companies buy software rather than making it. If 
you're a programmer, you can ONLY work for companies that write 
software, or companies that are large enough to have an internal 
department that writes software.

That's a pretty small market. And obviously, I'm just some random 
computer nerd. There are people out there with actual *talent*. Why is 
some company gonna hire me when they could hire one of the talented guys?

Also, apparently there's some kind of global recession thing happening 
at the moment, so people are currently firing rather than hiring...

>> I don't know, I have a feeling such huge niches do not employ people 
>> by advertising jobs through conventional channels. 
> 
> Most jobs requiring competence don't advertise. It's mostly 
> word-of-mouth.

...and since I don't know anybody, it's not going to be me.

> Plus, it seems most software places are utterly uninterested in someone 
> who could learn to do the job quickly but who don't already know all the 
> skills required. I haven't quite figured that out.  "We need someone who 
> knows Java 1.5.7.  You only list Java 1.5.4 on your resume."

Depends.

SOME people want somebody who can definitely do the job RIGHT NOW. They 
are only interested in what technologies you know (or claim to know) 
right now, and won't look at anything beyond that.

SOME people want somebody who can learn stuff. Some of them are 
explicitly not interested in what you know now, they just want somebody 
who can learn. (E.g., I suspect if you applied to work for Google, what 
they'd be most interested in is that you can learn Crazy New Gizmo X 
really quickly next time they roll out something new.)

Unfortunately, at the moment I'm having trouble finding either kind of 
employer... :-(

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