Accountants in particular are highly coveted, says Mr. Zion, because employers rely on them to manage their financial systems, file their taxes and handle other tasks that are imperative no matter the economy.

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Presumably, to obtain the design for a widget will be as easy as downloading a song (both legally or illegally) because the design is all software, a small file that a CAD program would handle, for example.

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One main reason: The company had a history of religious devotion to proprietary file formats, and took years to release a digital audio player that could handle the ever-popular MP3 format.

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