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Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

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Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#61

Post by jacquesm »

patio11 wrote: post #51
wglb wrote: post #14

A marvelous post about Patrick's start of his "wee business" and how he got there on the time left over from his salaryman day job with a three-hour train commute to boot. Whether this overall will work for any of the rest of us, given what seems like incredible focus Patrick seems to have, is unknown. And this is not "work four hours per week to gain huge success in life". Like everything else he writes, this is bac…

I bet he now can't help but spend more than five hours per week on it It is a very open question how much I'm going to be working after I go "full time", but I've rarely seen myself do great things after ~20 and that would leave me with plenty of time to catch up on living, so I think I might try that on for size. But hey, if I decide to do more or less in any given week, there won't be anybody to tell me not to.

Start another project.

If you can do this one on average at 5 hours per week, theoretically after the initial burst you could sustain 8 such jobs in parallel.

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#62

Post by jacquesm »

dsspence wrote: post #12

How many articles can you write on Bingo cards? All the power to him however.

This article is not about bingo cards, it is about the 0 to 55 Mph stretch that you face when you're starting a 'side' job, and achieving the point where you can quit your day job.

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#63

Post by garply »

nostrademons wrote: post #41
garply wrote: post #21

I appreciate the point that running a software business is only 10% development and 90% business. "If you want to spend your time writing code, go work for Google." This hits close to home as I am gradually learning that I provide far more value to the world by using my knowledge to have others do technical implementation than if I were doing it myself. For someone who loves code, it's a painful transition. But I thi…

That's a complicated statement. The depth of your own technical knowledge sets a ceiling on the depth of the people willing to do technical implementation for you. After all, most people are unwilling to do grunt work for people dumber than themselves. The main thing your workers get out of it is a learning experience and the chance to be mentored by others more experienced than themselves, so if you're not more expe…

Well, I can measure the value I'm creating (at least in the short term) relatively objectively by seeing how much money I make. And I make more money (and just generally get a lot more projects done) by managing other programmers.

Regarding 'backwater corners' - isn't this article about how to provide value in the backwater corners of the software industry? Printing and generating bingo cards is about as backwater as you can get, but I see nothing wrong with that. I'm also in the food industry and I understand that you don't grow up to be McDonald's (a restaurant which has - from my perspective - provided incredible value all over the world) overnight. Ray Kroc grew McDonald's by serving what was then an expensive burger to a niche clientele. Then he expanded from there. I don't see why a similar strategy isn't sane in the software industry.

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#64

Post by scorpioxy »

dangrossman wrote: post #45
jseliger wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Works for me too. I often spend less than 5 hours a week working, and I have a 6 figure income. My web applications compete directly with Google and Microsoft, among others, so the "no competition" argument is out. I realize that HN doesn't encourage heavy self-promotion, but what is this business? Where is its website? Your story sounds wildly implausible, though it obviously isn't impossible. Still, it reminds me o…

http://www.awio.com or http://www.dangrossman.info/folio/ if you'd like to take a look. I'm extremely open about my business. I've thought about writing this type of article to share on HN before, but it always comes across as bragging instead of sharing so I can the idea soon after starting. This is not an overnight success story. I earned my first paycheck on the internet when I was 15 or so, 10 years ago. I've had…

Don't worry so much about bragging. If you're interested in sharing your experience, then it will show from your writing style.

Personally, I'm always interested in such stories about running businesses on the side or full time. Businesses, mind you, not startups aiming to sell in a year. Those are very different in terms of decisions taken and work style and such.

Plus, if you've got it, flaunt it.

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#65

Post by paraschopra »

sunir wrote: post #56
paraschopra wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, wow, you run W3ROI? Please do write about your experiences. I (and many others) can learn a lot from it. I'm trying to do something similar with http://visualwebsiteoptimizer.com/ - hopefully I will also be able to join the "5-hour workweek" club.

Hey Paras, I'm one of your beta testers. I can assure you that you will go a lot further if you put in a consistent 40 hours a week for the next five years around the core idea of website conversion optimization rather than abandoning the product at some point in the future.

Hi Sunir,

Thanks for replying. Yup, I am committed to the product and thankfully it has been positioned as one of the easiest website optimization products available. What I meant by the comment was that I was quite impressed by W3ROI as a product and thought it was a consistent effort. But when I realized it is a "5 hour" effort, I was really surprised.

Rest assured the product isn't going anywhere. I have built a team (not a single man effort anymore) and is a serious startup now. What I said was a bit like hyperbole, sorry if it came across as I am abandoning the product :)

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#66

Post by ido »

phatbyte wrote: post #20
phatbyte wrote: post #18

"...However, you’ll quickly find that there is literally a world of people out there who are willing to work for $1.50 an hour and would be terrifically overpaid at that price..." That's the number one reason why some clients of mine comeback to me saying their last developer didn't quite accomplish what they wanted. And the reason why sometimes I have to struggle to fix bugs and identification (yes, many low-cost de…

identification/Identation

That's one of those little things that really annoy me- not because they are important, but because it's so easy to get right!

Hell, most IDEs would indent your code correctly for you, I'd have to actually work to override eclipse's auto-indentation!

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#67

Post by lsc »

patio11 wrote: post #52
ja27 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but he's already written large parts of the book on his blog. He could outsource an editor or even ghost/cowriter to assemble it. Could be a possible project for after he quits the day job, but there are probably others that would pay better.

This advice is written from the perspective that writing is 100% of the project. Writing is 10% of the project. Writing a salesletter, a marketing site, linkbaits, and obsessive promotion is the other 90% of the project. That is time debt that I take on as soon as I sit down and say "OK, I'm going be become an author." The upside to it is miniscule: I know I can sell thousands of copies of software for $30, because I…

Now, there's absolutely no money in it, but getting published dead-tree can give you a lot of credibility and publicity, and it's not as hard as it once was (see the bit about 'there is no money in it')

As far as I can tell, writing a dead tree is /easier/ than writing a ebook, and distribution is easier, etc... you keep less of the money, but more of the credibility.

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#68

Post by sekizaru »

Congratulations on making the move to full-time!

At the beginning of last year I made a similar move from being a Japanese salaryman to my own business. I was writing code in a notebook on my 1.5 hour train commute and on my lunch break and then typing it up on weekends. After I went full-time on my own business I found that the scope of what I wanted to do expanded and my productivity dropped. Also, the time-management skills that worked well on a part-time basis didn't work as well when I went full-time. I also found that it was easy to get sidetracked by side-projects and that personal life (time with friends, holidays) became a larger part of my life. I also found that a lot of things that I wasn't so great at (web design, graphics) etc. took up a large amount of my time.

So I would be interested to hear your thoughts on time-management, prioritization and working from home once you go full-time if you decide to do this as a series.

Re: Running a Software Business on 5 Hours A Week

#70

Post by webwright »

Periodic wrote: post #37
eps wrote: post #34

Using Slashdot terminology - Interesting, but not Insightful. Patrick is trying to derive generic advice by formalizing his personal experiences. While it is useful to know what worked in his case, it is still just one project, an isolated experience. I've been in a similar situation myself. I have sold a startup that settled me and my family for life, and things unfolded pretty much as I expected them to from the st…

We tend to have quite a problem with survivorship bias[1] on HN. We like to look at the cases where things went well and we assume that is because they did something right that the others did not, and since the founder believe this, he will list the things he intentionally did that he thinks helped. In reality, it may have been something he was taking for granted, or it may have been that he happened to miss some com…

One thing that he did (dunno if he takes it for granted) is get a URL that matches with the top search phrase. If he'd named his company "GridFriend Creator", we'd be reading a VERY different article. Every time anyone links to him, it's like the George Bush "miserable failure" googlebomb [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_bomb ]... Except that it's not frowned upon by Google.
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