Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Hire Programming Tutors now on WageMachine

wagemachine.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 52 posts

Re: Hire Programming Tutors now on WageMachine

#11

Post by wizard_2 »

Estragon wrote: post #8

Every worker on WageMachine is highly talented, industrious, college educated, English speaking, and lives in the United States. http://wagemachine.com/blog/learn_more_about_wagemachine Then why the hell are they working for minimum wage at a deadend job on your site?

Some people don't want more then they need. If Minimum wage is supposed to be all you need to live off of, then you'll find people who like helping others working for about that. I've known teachers who's summer or side jobs made them more money their their primary jobs, yet they still teach.

This site isn't supposed to be a full time job, it's supposed to be a low barrier way to pick up a few bucks for the ride home. While programming might not be the best area for this (not sure about the market of tutors) I love the concept.

Re: Hire Programming Tutors now on WageMachine

#14

Post by felideon »

tentonova2 wrote: post #6

I'd happily solve/tutor a one-off problem for 2 hours at a lower fixed price ($100-200), but as much as I like the idea of one-off tutor sessions, I can't get behind a minimum wage rate. At my usual $150 hour rate, it would take 17 hours on WageMachine to match one hour of work . I could just as easily spend those 17 hours finding that one hour of work (and it wouldn't be just one hour). [Edit] Thinking about it more…

Maybe you are in a good position to find that 1+ hour of work any time you want, but this may not be the case for everyone. I wonder how easy it is to win a contract on elance, etc. if you're a college student or have little experience. Similarly, a lot of people don't have time for full-fledged contract work.

I see it as a good way to earn some extra pocket money, as another commenter said, "for the ride home."

Re: Hire Programming Tutors now on WageMachine

#15

Post by tentonova2 »

felideon wrote: post #14
tentonova2 wrote: post #6

I'd happily solve/tutor a one-off problem for 2 hours at a lower fixed price ($100-200), but as much as I like the idea of one-off tutor sessions, I can't get behind a minimum wage rate. At my usual $150 hour rate, it would take 17 hours on WageMachine to match one hour of work . I could just as easily spend those 17 hours finding that one hour of work (and it wouldn't be just one hour). [Edit] Thinking about it more…

Maybe you are in a good position to find that 1+ hour of work any time you want, but this may not be the case for everyone. I wonder how easy it is to win a contract on elance, etc. if you're a college student or have little experience. Similarly, a lot of people don't have time for full-fledged contract work. I see it as a good way to earn some extra pocket money, as another commenter said, "for the ride home."

That's true, but are "unable to find better work" and "expert tutor" largely disjoint sets?

Even those who don't have time to contract will generally have more productive outlets available (... which is often how they became experts).

Re: Hire Programming Tutors now on WageMachine

#19

Post by jmatt »

cellis wrote: post #5

I wonder if hours are the best metric? All of the advisors i've had outside of school have rarely spent a whole hour with me, but still managed to help me a lot. Unless you are a complete beginner to programming, I suspect that a lot of the problems you have are of the "how do I do x in language y" sort. So maybe it could be priced by question, or by problem?

I agree. Experts may be interested in answering questions for wages around 10 dollars per question or problem. As you pointed out most questions and explanation sessions will not take a full hour.

In general I agree with tentonova2. Going rates are 10 to 20 times minimum wage. It's scary to imagine what sorts of people you'll get for minimum wage.

All this being said, If it's well organized and non-for-profit I would be interested in volunteering to work one on one with students. I am a strong believer that mentoring is a great way to train inexperienced programmers.

I imagine most of us have, at one point or another, ended up helping someone with their Math assignment at the local coffee shop. It would be nice to provide the same help to inexperienced programmers with the same casual relationship.

Post reply on HN