Live data from Hacker News

Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

indiehackers.com

31–40 of 150 posts

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#31
post #26
post #16

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

Yeah, because only "super rich" people start successful podcasts, blogs, etc. Like that Neistat guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6Y-ahQFQDA

Exception to the rule and dismissal of the enormous advantage money gives.

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#32
post #16

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

It's quite common for people to start with just $1k and do well and get to that kind of money. I'd recommend doing some research before just jumping to conclusions:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-meyerson-05275716/ - "Parlayed a single small investment into a large bankroll." under Online Poker Player

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#33
post #24
post #16

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

I do feel a little bad about this comment--it's probably overly snarky. Maybe he won that 250 grand playing poker from a small nest egg that he earned at a minimum wage job. And he isn't claiming to be sharing the secret of success--he's just sharing his experience, which is valuable regardless of his beginnings. I don't know. Something about this rubbed me the wrong way, but it probably says something more about me…

I started with $100 and built it up, then lost most of it

But also started with a roof over my head, great parents, an internet connection, etc. I would consider myself a trust fund baby in that sense.

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#34
post #16

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

Hey just want to note that although that sentence makes him look like just some rich kid with infinite resources, I went to college with Jeff and I actually have personally talked to him when he was starting this project. Regardless of what affluence he had in the past/present, he started this idea from near-zero -- the site looked like shit, he worked on it slowly, and from reading the article it looks like he got the right people on his ship at the right time, and kept doing what he was good at.

Also, he's not tone-deaf -- I'm sure it took some consideration to let that sentence fly (I'd be very surprised if he didn't wonder something along the lines of "are people going to think I'm just some rich kid"), I like to think he leaned to the side of honesty.

I can say at least personally that he did NOT have the silver spoon rich kid vibe. Not at all, he was lost just like the rest of us sometimes are, I'm super jealous and happy for him :)

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#35
post #16

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

Hey just want to note that although that sentence makes him look like just some rich kid with infinite resources, I went to college with Jeff and I actually have personally talked to him when he was starting this project. Regardless of what affluence he had in the past/present, he started this idea from near-zero -- the site looked like shit, he worked on it slowly, and from reading the article it looks like he got t…

Step 1. Be super rich Step 2. Still be likable

:)

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#36
post #33
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do feel a little bad about this comment--it's probably overly snarky. Maybe he won that 250 grand playing poker from a small nest egg that he earned at a minimum wage job. And he isn't claiming to be sharing the secret of success--he's just sharing his experience, which is valuable regardless of his beginnings. I don't know. Something about this rubbed me the wrong way, but it probably says something more about me…

I started with $100 and built it up, then lost most of it But also started with a roof over my head, great parents, an internet connection, etc. I would consider myself a trust fund baby in that sense.

See, I knew this was going to happen and then I was going to feel real bad.

One question I do have for you: How did you get Stephen Wolfram, Seth Godin, etc. to come on your early pods?

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#37
post #24
post #16

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

I do feel a little bad about this comment--it's probably overly snarky. Maybe he won that 250 grand playing poker from a small nest egg that he earned at a minimum wage job. And he isn't claiming to be sharing the secret of success--he's just sharing his experience, which is valuable regardless of his beginnings. I don't know. Something about this rubbed me the wrong way, but it probably says something more about me…

I know someone who did this during college.

I had a friend in college — let's call him Sam — with whom I paired on most CS projects. It was useful to find a partner who was as studious as yourself to avoid having to deal with anyone else's potential BS and end up doing all the work yourself. Sam seemed like a completely normal guy where normal is… we share some of the same interests.

Sam wasn't from money, worked hard on assignments, we shot pool and worked on projects together. I knew Sam was "into" poker but I didn't understand the extent. I was "into" lots of things too.

We're hanging out one day and Sam tells me the "funny story" that happened last week where his parents and girlfriend staged an intervention to demand that he stop playing online poker after he had gone on tilt and lost $200k in a single night.

I about lost my marbles.

He then goes on to explain that while he had agreed to quit playing online poker because he valued his relationships, he was of the opinion that an intervention was a bit much since he was still up over $600k and wasn't on tilt so much as trying out higher stakes tables in an effort to make money more quickly than on the low stakes tables he had already found success grinding.

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#38
post #16

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

Hey just want to note that although that sentence makes him look like just some rich kid with infinite resources, I went to college with Jeff and I actually have personally talked to him when he was starting this project. Regardless of what affluence he had in the past/present, he started this idea from near-zero -- the site looked like shit, he worked on it slowly, and from reading the article it looks like he got t…

It's disingenuous to say, "…regardless of what affluence he had." The thing about being wealthy isn't that you don't have to work as hard to succeed at something (well, sometimes it is). The thing about being wealthy is that you don't have to do anything, so you have all this time to focus on what you want to do—and you can fail while doing it without any major consequences. Most people can't do that. Hell, half of the people in the US are scared to take a day off of work for fear of getting fired.

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#39

I wish that hour-long podcasts weren't an hour long. They are often too unstructured and slow paced. I think with some editing for pace they could be winnowed down to say, 20 minutes. I don't have time to sit around listening to an hour long podcast, especially not every day and multiple different podcasts! I remember the old giants robots ruby podcast was about 20 minutes and covered 3 topics (not sure if I'm rememb…

> I wish that hour-long podcasts weren't an hour long.

Or at least that more podcasts were better edited. For example, John Gruber writes a blog, which he edits. Whether I agree with it or not, it's readable and terse. But he also does a podcast, which is him and some other person going on random tangents, pausing to cough or let out the cat, etc. I can't stand it.

I guess it's like the difference between talk radio and the nightly news: one is trying to fill airtime, the other is trying to squeeze into 22 minutes; one is meant to be background sound, the other is meant to be watched. I happen to prefer other kinds of background sound, but that's just me.

Re: Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

#40

I wish that hour-long podcasts weren't an hour long. They are often too unstructured and slow paced. I think with some editing for pace they could be winnowed down to say, 20 minutes. I don't have time to sit around listening to an hour long podcast, especially not every day and multiple different podcasts! I remember the old giants robots ruby podcast was about 20 minutes and covered 3 topics (not sure if I'm rememb…

Structure is an editing problem, but there are lots of people who listen to podcasts sped up, or with silences removed. Apps like Overcast will do this for you.

Some podcasts, like Hardcore History, are worth the 5 hour runtime and they're so rarely published it doesn't really matter.

Post reply on HN