Well, time to file my first-ever unemployment claim! (Hmmmm, wonder if Mr. Wallach has any telecommute spots? Ummmm, doubt I'd have the quals even with my freshly printed [insert very small back pat] CISSP. ) I will definitely be working to use unemployment academic/retraining benefits if it comes to that.

Telecommuting to a PhD? No way would that work. Part of the whole point is the camraderie of being in the lab, late at night with a deadline only two hours away, frantically running your latest experiment and hacking the results into the paper before it has to ship. Besides, part of the required portion of a PhD program is being physically present to act as a teaching assistant for courses.

But seriously, if any of you guys want to seriously consider joining a PhD program, e-mail me or give me a call. And, if you specifically want to work on computer security, I know most of the players, so I could help you run down your options (assuming I couldn't talk you into coming to Houston).

Also, there's more than one way to get into a comfy research job. Right now, we've got funding to hire a staff programmer to work on security for peer-to-peer systems, but we haven't started a serious job search yet. If you're comfortable writing networking code, give me a call.