Freelancer.com has ruined my life • Hacker News Board

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#221

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:03 PM UTC

shock wrote: post #145

omegote wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Upwork is a little more protective in that aspect. You can clearly see from the beginning whether the client has a verified payment method.

I didn't find Upwork's contract without signing up, but before Elance merged with oDesk to become Upwork they had pretty onerous terms in their services agreement⁰: 9.Indemnification Contractor will defend, indemnify, and hold harmless Client against any damage, cost, loss or expense arising from a claim, suit or proceeding brought against Client (i) alleging that any Work Product infringes upon any Intellectual Prop…

[deleted]

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#222

Post by Casseres » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:04 PM UTC

watwut wrote: post #165

Casseres wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that smarter people are more likely to victim-blame because it's harder to imagine themselves falling victim to whatever situation. For most problems, they seem like they could have been easily prevented by either being more knowledgeable about the situation or thinking things through beforehand. After reading a lot of the discussions here, and considering that most of us are here for the pursuit of knowledge…

I don't think inability to imagine bad luck or own mistake is proof of intelligence. It is proof of ego or arrogance or an attempt to mask I security. Smart people made mistakes in the past, smart people can imagine situations where they become victims (whether by own fault or not). Some smart people do have inability to imagine themselves in other people's shoose - but dumb people are often similarly disabled

That's why I hate the word "smart" and probably shouldn't write comments first thing in the morning.

I believe "smart" and "intelligent" are two different things: one is having knowledge, and the other is being able to act wisely with that knowledge.

A person can memorize an encyclopedia, but if unable to do anything useful with that knowledge, can be smart but not intelligent.

No one is infallible; everyone makes mistakes. Being able to learn from them and not repeat them is what's harder for most people.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#223

Post by GordonS » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:04 PM UTC

csomar wrote: post #59

literallycancer wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your article doesn't mention how much you paid them. If you are paying someone 5$ per hour, you can't expect much. edit: you mention the prices in the comments, so here they are for anyone curious: Node.js port 155 USD, Android port 789 USD, Website theme 300 USD. It is not slave wages considering the living costs in the respective countries. (sic!) >Node.js port 155 USD This is good for what, 1 hour of work? Pay pea…

> 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.

For an ex-pat who wants to live in relative luxury, sure. Otherwise it is difficult to see how you can justify this claim?

Have you by chance never been to a developing country? Honestly, how cheap some things are would shock you; for example, you can eat like a king in the heart of any Indian city for 1-2 dollars!

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#224

Post by nickjj » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:05 PM UTC

mac01021 wrote: post #202

nickjj wrote: post #195

Like most marketplaces, they are only interested in making themselves profitable. Always remember that. Working at freelancer.com or similar sites is saying: "I should spend a large portion of my life to become an expert in my craft, and then I should agree to have my privacy stripped away from me while I race to the bottom and undercut my competition because I will actively place myself into situations where I have…

So after you take down the number on that ice cream truck you saw driving by, and get back home from your walk and decide to call them, what do you say? Just, "hi! Do you need any software developed"? I've never tried, but it's a little hard for me to imagine ever getting a client this way.

I wouldn't go after the ice cream man, but here's a couple of people I would (and have) contacted: locksmiths, plumbers, lawn maintenance teams, roofing companies, solar panel companies and the list goes on and on.

Then I would either talk to a worker directly if it looks like a decent opportunity. I'm not going to wave down a guy off the roof, but if he happens to be fiddling with something near his van and I naturally walk past, then sure.

If not, then I just call the number they have later. I'm not pitching them right away with "do you need any software developed?". All I do is ask them about their business. My goal here is to get a feel for how they are doing financially without directly asking.

Then I'll guide the call into casually offering them services that could help them grow. Sometimes it's a new website or setting up a landing page. There's honestly a TON of things that almost every business could benefit from and you can comfortably charge $2,000 to $20,000 for these things with monthly retainers on top. That's not even counting custom software gigs that come later.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#225

Post by anandsuresh » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:05 PM UTC

I was a top provider on vWorker (back when it was still called RentACoder) from 2001-2010... consistently in the top 100 for pretty much the whole decade. Never had any trouble getting projects or getting paid. Stopped working on vWorker in 2010 when I decided to head back to school for my masters. So its been a while since I was on there.

It was a great place to start off my career, but sustaining it as a business was always a challenge. Sad to know that it has deteriorated to this point now.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#226

Post by CodeWriter23 » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:06 PM UTC

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…

> It's about being your own boss.

Actually, being a freelancer is about multiplying the number of bosses you have. And reducing the number of rights you have to just one: the right to walk away.

Source: 26 years as a freelancer. One who would never get work through a rent-seeking, blood-sucking platform like Freelancer or Upwork.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#227

Post by ve55 » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:12 PM UTC

Situations like that are, to me, one of the greatest appeals to using cryptocurrencies and decentralized systems or websites. Unfortunately the ecosystem isn't quite there in some areas, so I don't expect these sites to go extinct just yet, but I'm hoping that they do some time in the future.

Freelance.com obviously isn't alone in the way it acts. Fiverr can easily be just as worse, on top of the huge cuts they take from payments (as well as applying their 20% cut to things such as 'tips' you give to workers), it's always clear who is in the position of power and authority on these platforms, and the answer is never the end-user. Go against them and you risk your money, your reputation, and your career. Paypal and other payment systems can be just as bad as well - you've likely read many horror stories about people losing access to 'their' money for months on end.

At some point it's just too much for users to deal with. When proper alternatives are available, hopefully users will move to them as a result of this.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#228

Post by amelius » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:20 PM UTC

I wonder why nobody has filled the gap of a job-agency for smart people (10x developers if you will) that are looking for short-term jobs (e.g. when in between jobs/projects or when their current startup is not ramen-profitable yet).

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#229

Post by Animats » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:21 PM UTC

I once had a disagreement with Freelancer over a few hundred dollars. I was a buyer, rather than a seller, the job didn't get done, and I was trying to withdraw the funds I put in. So, although in the US, I filed a small claims case in New South Wales. This can be done entirely on line. It's possible to request court hearings by telephone. So you can do a small claims case remotely.

Within 8 hours after filing the case and sending the documents to Freelancer, I had been paid by wire transfer. I then withdrew the case.

Re: Freelancer.com has ruined my life

#230

Post by nickjj » Sat, Nov 04, 2017, 6:23 PM UTC

jimothywales wrote: post #204

mac01021 wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So after you take down the number on that ice cream truck you saw driving by, and get back home from your walk and decide to call them, what do you say? Just, "hi! Do you need any software developed"? I've never tried, but it's a little hard for me to imagine ever getting a client this way.

Well you should try it next time because that's how I got one of my first clients on my own. A local food truck showed up to my uni quite often and I noticed their website wasn't great, so one day I walked up to them and asked if they were looking for a redesign. They eagerly said yes and I met with the whole family (it was a family business) 3 days later. It was a really unfulfilling contract but it illustrated to m…

Yeah, this is the type of stuff I'm talking about.

But you can take these things so much further if you branch away from "just development skills" too.

I never talked to a food truck person yet but I bet there's lots of ways you could have turned that unfulfilling contract into something more interesting.

No business owner really cares about a site redesign. They just care about "how do I get more customers?". If you shift your focus from website themes, to delivering business value then suddenly a $1,000 wordpress site turns into a $1,000/monthly retainer because you're creating funnels and pipelines to drive business to his truck.

Next thing you know, he's paying you $25,000 for some crazy custom food truck software that helps automate his business which he has no problem paying because he trusts you and everything you've done for him in the past was amazing.

Fast forward 2 years from now and you have a food truck SAAS that 12,000 other food truck owners are paying $79/month for. Your whole life is changed from 1 conversation and you get to write code (it just took a little exploring to get to that point).