Freelancer.com has ruined my life • Hacker News Board

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#181

Post by ryandrake » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:33 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #121

opmac wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Classic victim blaming. What you say is mostly true, but it completely glosses over the potential issues raised by this post. So what if the author made a mistake about using Freelancer.com? That doesn't change the fact that what Freelancer is _supposedly_ doing here is incredibly shady and they should be held accountable. The only real issue I have with the author's post is there are a lot of details missing. What d…

Does anybody have a theory as to why victim-blaming is such a popular response on HN? I don't see it nearly as much elsewhere.

What's with this assumption that victims are always blameless? If I run around the street and get hit by a car, should I not share some blame?

It seems whenever someone points out risky behavior here, someone else calls "victim blaming".

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#182

Post by jimnotgym » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:35 PM UTC

blfr wrote: post #166

jimnotgym wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two things confused here. Lots of people go contracting in the UK because 1) You can earn more. A company will pay more as it can ditch the person at the end of the contract, when it is not a core competency of the firm. 2) There are tax benefits 3) When you contract is over you get a change of scenery Many of those always contract through an agency What you are describing is more like someone trying to sta…

'BjoernKW is describing freelancing. You're describing using it largely as a way to avoid employment laws.

This is exactly the set of issues around the gig economy. Corporations want to treat people as self-employed to save National Insurance, holiday pay, redundancy etc. Some people kind of enjoy moving around jobs a lot. The UK government has had a number of crack-downs on this resulting in

a) a reduction in ability to avoid employment laws and exploit workers or

b) a restriction on a contractors ability to work flexibly.

depending on your point of view. Probably some of each for different people. It is too big an issue for this comments thread.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#183

Post by ensignavenger » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:35 PM UTC

lsmod wrote: post #160

_wmd wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their web application isn't the canonical source of whether they owe you money or not, a court decides that. I don't know in which jurisdiction Freelancer are based, but if there is a low cost small claims procedure, sounds like that would be worth you time. In the UK in a variety of circumstances you can petition a court to issue a wind up ("liquidation") order for a company if it refuses to service its debt to you.

Thanks for the reply. They have a registered office located in Australia. It was a relatively easy job (took me about an hour and a half) and I only charge $75. So, not sure if it'll be worth the hassle.

It may not be worth the hassle directly, but please consider the impact on the economy and society overall in your decision. Jerks like that do things like that because they get away with it.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#184

Post by Udik » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:35 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #121

opmac wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Classic victim blaming. What you say is mostly true, but it completely glosses over the potential issues raised by this post. So what if the author made a mistake about using Freelancer.com? That doesn't change the fact that what Freelancer is _supposedly_ doing here is incredibly shady and they should be held accountable. The only real issue I have with the author's post is there are a lot of details missing. What d…

Does anybody have a theory as to why victim-blaming is such a popular response on HN? I don't see it nearly as much elsewhere.

Maybe it's because, of course, not all those who pose as victims are actually victims.

It's very natural to side automatically with whover complains of an injustice; but people who strive to be rational are suspicious of this immediate emotional reaction, and want to be sure that they're not being tricked into showing an undeserved support.

Finally, the expression "victim blaming" subtly tries to shift the focus from the question "is this person really a victim" to the false question "should this victim be blamed".

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#185

Post by makebelieve » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:36 PM UTC

philtar wrote: post #97

featherverse wrote: post #51

All of those "freelancer" websites are scams. Freelancing is about not working for other men. It's about being your own boss. Those websites are not really freelancing, they're temp agencies hiring out short term contract work. That is not freelancing. Those websites all share specific qualities: The salaries are too low, the service quality is poor, and you'll be outbid by unskilled indian labor 90% of the time. Put…

Freelancing is about being able to work for whoever you want to. A temp can only work for one person at a time. Those websites allow you to work for more than one person at a time. So those people are, in fact, freelancers, not temps. I hire people on upwork. My favorite person charges $40 an hour. His work is great and gets repeat business from me many times a year. I'm not sure what you're referring to as a scam. T…

free means no fees. free roads have no tolls. free concerts do not charge ticket prices. closed markets, toll roads, private venues all charge fees.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#186

Post by a_imho » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:40 PM UTC

robjan wrote: post #99

csomar wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is not slave wages considering the living costs in the respective countries. This pisses me off big time. It is more expensive to live in developing countries than in developed countries. Try to wrap your head around it. These countries are developing , so they don't have infrastructure to support their populace.

I don't think that's true. The cost of food, rent, transportation etc is far greater in the developed world. The cost of living an "expat lifestyle" in developing countries is higher though, but local people typically don't aspire to that.

Many things have globally fixed prices. A car costs the same. Gas is probably cheaper in a developed country especially in the USA. Food is probably on par or cheaper . A $1000 phone is the same in all countries. The PC someone works with costs the same. Software licenses, (e)books, productivity apps e.g. office365 and G suite cost the same or more. A hosting provider charges the same for servers and bandwidth etc.

local people typically don't aspire to that

Yes they do, of course it is not accessible to most.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#187

Post by this_route_ » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:45 PM UTC

sunilkumarc wrote: post #75

featherverse wrote: post #51

All of those "freelancer" websites are scams. Freelancing is about not working for other men. It's about being your own boss. Those websites are not really freelancing, they're temp agencies hiring out short term contract work. That is not freelancing. Those websites all share specific qualities: The salaries are too low, the service quality is poor, and you'll be outbid by unskilled indian labor 90% of the time. Put…

"unskilled indian labour" huh? There are tens of Indian entrepreneurs who have set up Billion dollar companies in US. Don't forget that Microsoft and Google CEOs are Indian too!!

Well, I am doing a remote job since last two year in a UK based company, almost a year ago I was suddenly sacked due to a company policy change, asking why the response was in short, they wont allow any people from India..

Then as a proof I sent them my country Wikipedia link, letting them understand my small country is not a region of India, and India is our neighbouring country.

Then the company apologises by issuing an annual increment...

This thing still surprises me and also i had to face few worst days of my life -_- due to this fact ...

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#188

Post by edoceo » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:49 PM UTC

TrinaryWorksToo wrote: post #171

edoceo wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Refusal to pay is directly related to the lottery "system". Buyer was an idiot. One reason I never hire from freelancer sites. Every coder has been burned by some idiot and it affects my purchase ability.

Where do you go to hire freelancers then?

Local network, same advice others give. Don't need to pick one from 10k ransoms, pick 1 from 5 in extended network.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#189

Post by jondubois » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:50 PM UTC

I worked for Freelancer.com briefly as a software engineer at their HQ in Sydney for about 1 month (that was in the year before their IPO) - I was fresh out of university. The culture within the company was toxic.

They treat developers like crap - Both those who use the platform and those who work at HQ. They fired me after 1 month during my probation because I was too slow to implement a feature because I was spending extra time writing tests. I remember the tech director telling me "That's not the kind of engineering we do here" after I tried to justify why tests were important. Several of these horrible people went on to work for Facebook later.

The CEO of Freelancer.com is a complete jerk. A few years after I had gone, I spoke with engineers who used to work there and there was gossip going round that the CEO had sex with a female employee and she got pregnant. He also hired his friends in top positions; some of which were utterly incompetent. Some of the CEO's favourite employees got drunk during work hours in front of the overworked engineers.

Employee retention was very low.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#190

Post by cjalmeida » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 4:51 PM UTC

klibertp wrote: post #95

GordonS wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why should the number be based on living costs? Because that's basically the whole point of globalisation. Both parties benefit, I don't see what the problem is.

> Both parties benefit, I don't see what the problem is. The problem, as always in this kind of situation, is how unequally the benefits are distributed. If the investor pays 4-5 times (and that's a low end) less for something, while the worker gets 10% more compared to doing the same locally then it's unfair, even if both sides "benefit". It's also natural for investors to seek the lowest prices they can get. That's…

Your observation only holds in the short term. Due to globalization, the avg wage of the "exploited" Chinese workers has grown from 1600 to 67000 CNY in the last 30 years. Even accounting for the higher inflation, the US/West wage gap has shrunk considerably within a generation.

India hasn't seen such growth exactly because they didn't embrace globalization to the same level China did. Indian policies are much more left leaning, market unfriendedly.