Systems administrators have a very thankless job. They work long and strange hours to provide you with the services that make your life more enjoyable. Without sysadmins, Neowin would be offline, your video on demand service wouldn’t work, and your ISP wouldn’t let you on the Internet. It’s a thankless job, but today is the one day to say thanks to those people: The 12th Annual System Administrator Appreciation Day.
The holiday started twelve years ago as a way to recognize the work that sysadmins do. The website tries to explain what IT professionals do in their day-to-day lives, living in cold data centers, running wires from machine to machine, and cleaning viruses from workstations. It’s a thankless job that most people do for the love of technology, but the movement is trying to teach people to say “thank you” instead of “why isn’t it working?” The main site explains,
Let's face it, System Administrators get no respect 364 days a year. This is the day that all fellow System Administrators across the globe, will be showered with expensive sports cars and large piles of cash in appreciation of their diligent work. But seriously, we are asking for a nice token gift and some public acknowledgement. It's the least you could do.
So take a minute to thank your sysadmins, whether they be operating system, network, storage, or database administrators. You want to keep them happy so that they don’t turn into Bastard Operators from Hell.
Update: Thanks to Ben PerLee for sharing this video from Epic Games' Jerry O'Flaherty, art director for the original Gears of War. The video uses the Unreal Engine for its special effects and shows a sysadmin saving the day!
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