IT Insights Blog — TestOut Pro Certifications

It's been a good long while since the age of imperial Rome, and even longer since the halcyon years when the empire bestrode the ancient western world and the decrees of its rulers were law. The best known of the ancient Romans were figures of enormous historical consequence. Even great world powers only last so long, of course, and the rulers of the late empire were often forgettable in their own time, and have been almost entirely forgotten in ours.

You can't get money for nothing — unless you're the guys who sing that one song from the '80s or '90s or whenever it was — and money usually gets you more than, well, nothing. It's always a good idea, however, to try to get the most that your money can purchase. And, as we all know, the price of most things that you can buy with money is more of a suggestion (ever heard the acronym MSRP, or "manufacturer's suggested retail price"?) than a hard-and-fast rule.

In 1991 Noel Vallejo started TestOut Corporation (not its name at the time) to help computer training companies better market and sell IT certification training programs. As demand for these programs grew, one significant hurdle to get over was that many busy professionals lacked the time and means to attend expensive training seminars.

Goblin Valley State Park at the edge of the San Rafael Swell in central Utah has a spooky, otherworldly atmosphere. The extraterrestrial vibe is so strong, in fact, that the makers of the Star Trek-spoofing comedy movie Galaxy Quest went to Goblin Valley to film the scene where Tim Allen's blithely inexperienced "crew" visits a strange planet to locate and recover a "beryllium sphere" to fuel the Thermian exploration vessel where they have become honored guests.

In my last blog, I bragged about my nascent IT repair skills and offered three reasons why Average Joes should tackle computer repairs themselves. What do you do, on the other hand, when your best-efforts just aren’t good enough? Or when you don’t have time to tackle the job? Or maybe you just don’t want to deal with it.