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Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
41–50 of 156 posts
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#42Wow, he might be good at programming, but from his writing, he sure seems like a jerk (Zed Shaw's long lost twin?). I've known many professionals who, being very good at what they do, charge both less and more than $1k/hour, but none of them would ever mention their rate in public, much less feel the need to explain why they deserve it. On the other hand, this is great PR for software engineers: a couple more posts l…
Tangential, but I feel compelled to note that: * I have never met Zed * Like many others I have heard all sorts of stories about him * People are capable of change * In my recent experience Zed has always seemed civil, thoughtful and passionate about code He may have been a jerk in the past, I can't speak to that, but he seems like a decent guy now. Yours, the anti-pigeonholing squad
Err, I meant to make it clear that I'm comparing their public writing style, not how they are in person.
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
> In this economy we need more money being spent. Economic activity is not economic productivity . Spending money doesn't make us richer. Producing does. Encouraging people to work more would help the economy; encouraging to people to spend more would only help to the extent that it stimulates people to produce stuff for sale.
Fascinating definitions but this has more than a whiff of crack pottery. Few things encourage economic activity (and productivity) like a rich person coming with an open wallet. How are people to work more when there's not money to pay them?
You are ignorant of libertarian economic views. You are also ignorant that they are common place here, and held by Paul Graham. It's rude to intrude on a community and call status quo views "crack pottery" just because you've never learned anything about them.
It is your view that people can't produce things of value unless there's enough money being spent that is truly bizarre. New markets can be created. Value drives circulation of money, not vice versa. Money is just pieces of paper or numbers in a computer for the purpose of conveniently facilitating trade.
Ultimately I'm going to produce value in order to use it myself, for fun, or in some way get something useful for it (i.e., I don't want pieces of paper -- those are just temporary -- I want someone to make something useful for me like an iPhone. The more useful products there are, the more I will want to work hard, and the more money I will spend).
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#44If the best are 10x as productive as the mediocre, I don't see a problem with this. Of course, you might say that the $120 bulk of freelance programmers are already a notch above mediocre and maybe $500/hr is more reasonable, but whatever the market will bear. It's a good argument to cut top marginal tax rate so that he has an incentive to take more work than he's willing to at $500/hr after taxes (assuming he's in t…
Marginal tax rates being high is a great idea. I'd be with you if people with high salaries spent all, or virtually all, of their salary. But they don't. In this economy we need more money being spent. When things are doing well again, you could try to make a case for the rich being richer, but it's a strange cause to take up.
Societies don't get wealthy by consuming. They do by producing. As a rule, if something is taxed there will be less of it. High marginal taxes decreases high value work. It is a terrible idea. Immoral too.
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#45gracious |ˈgrā sh əs|
adjective
1 courteous, kind, and pleasant : smiling and gracious in defeat.
* pleasantly indulgent, esp. toward an inferior.
* elegant and tasteful, esp. as exhibiting wealth or high social status
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
Fascinating definitions but this has more than a whiff of crack pottery. Few things encourage economic activity (and productivity) like a rich person coming with an open wallet. How are people to work more when there's not money to pay them?
You are ignorant of libertarian economic views. You are also ignorant that they are common place here, and held by Paul Graham. It's rude to intrude on a community and call status quo views "crack pottery" just because you've never learned anything about them. It is your view that people can't produce things of value unless there's enough money being spent that is truly bizarre. New markets can be created. Value driv…
Wow.
Libertarians are here, sure. However, I'd love to see how many people would really march in lockstep with doctrinaire libertarianism.
I'm not ignorant of libertarian views. Nor, am I unused to tantrums such as your own. I'll leave the vocabulary boot camps to you and Richard Stallman. I have that freedom.
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#47To everyone who thinks he's crazy, a single, solitary counter that is in no way indicative of a trend or a pattern: when it comes time to have someone build our iPhone app, I know who my first e-mail will be.
You wanna know why? I know his rate without having to fill out a goddamn "contact me" form and his portfolio signals that he's worth the rate. Now, I have no idea how many hours it would take to build our app, but you're damn well sure I'm going to ask him to tell me.
You not making as much? You hurting for clients? Well, maybe you should publish a rate and have an up-to-date portfolio on your website, not on Carbonmade or Forrst or Dribbble or wherever the hell the cool kids are these days.
Cause I'll tell you: I've got cash to burn and I'm in the market for great developers and designers right now, and they're impossible to find, vet, and hire.
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#48This is coming from the dude who used to work for free and live in Wil Shipley's basement? Wow.
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
A few? One? I'd venture the guess the number is very small or perhaps even zero. At that rate he'd burn through a reasonable budget for an iPhone app within weeks. And I mean the entire budget, which would normally include graphics design and backend work. I have no doubts he could get an app off the ground faster than most teams - given he lives up to his bold claims, which is entirely possible. But as with every so…
I don't think you're supposed to hire him to build a whole app. You hire him to give advice for an hour or two so you get pointed in the right direction, or review some code, or fix one bug your team is stuck on, or he can help you find the right cheaper person to hire.
He should say he's offering iPhone consultancy then.
Re: Mike Lee on why he can charge $1,000/hr for iPhone development
#50simple supply and demand issue that he's taking advantage of. the iphone is a fairly new platform and i'd say the number of true "platform experts" is very small so anything you can point to that differentiates is a reason to charge a crapton. haven't you seen all those crappy corporate apps? some companies will pay for a track record, and good for them/him.