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Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

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Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#251

Post by ta1234567890 »

DamnInteresting wrote: post #229

I established DamnInteresting.com in 2005, a place where myself and handful of others produce original long-form non-fiction in article and podcast form. Despite plenty of traffic, it didn't reach the break-even point for several years, because I despise advertisements and I refused to add them to my site. I funded the project in other ways, such as donations, publishing a book, licensing content, etc. Nowadays it st…

Kudos and thank you for resisting advertising and figuring out an alternative business model. It would be awesome if there was a whole alternative Internet like this, where ads (and selling user info) was forbidden.

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#252

Post by holoduke »

I started creating apps when the first store was opened. It makes almost 10 m times more than my normal job (team lead, developer). Still I have no desire to quit my day job. If I manage to keep this going for another 5 years I will reach a point where I have enough money to live my life without any financial issues.

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#253

Post by kpgraham »

I raise bees and sell the honey. Good for a few thousand a year and the money makes up for the stings. I have a couple of dozen chickens and sell the eggs, but this makes very little money since eggs are so cheap in the super market. It pays for the feed and that's it. I wrote an Amazon book on how to play harmonica in the style of Sonny Boy Williamson II that sells steady and makes me beer money. I sell a couple of my Science Fiction short story collections on Amazon. "Error Message Eyes" and "Frogs in Aspic", but after a good first year they sell only a couple of copies a month. I sell four or five Science Fiction stories a year, but only occasionally do I get pro rates. It's nice to see your name in print, though.

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#254

Post by grecy »

iheartpotatoes wrote: post #117
grecy wrote: post #94

I've written a couple of books that sell on Amazon and Apple iBooks - it takes zero minutes per month work for me, but brings a nice little side income. I won't get rich, but it's nice to have the money come in for doing nothing after I hit the "publish" button. Even the printed books cost nothing. I'm about to hit publish on a photo coffee-table book from my three years around Africa, and I'll write an Africa guide…

VERY COOL! So many questions: Do you work on the road or take off years at a time? Are you armed, or do you just avoid central conflict areas? I take it no family? (hence the 'solo' bit) or are they undersganding?

> Do you work on the road or take off years at a time?

For the first one (AK->Argentina) I just took time off and lived off my savings account. For around Africa I wrote my first book and I write for multiple magazines while on the road.

> Are you armed, or do you just avoid central conflict areas?

Crossing an international border with a firearm will result in instant jail time in virtually every country on the planet. No, it would be impossible to bring a firearm. You might be surprsed to know I have never heard a single gunshot in three years around the continent, and Ethiopia was the only country I ever saw regular people with firearms. In every other country it's only the police/military, who are extremely professional.

> I take it no family? (hence the 'solo' bit) or are they undersganding?

No kids or wife. I did have a girlfriend with me for some of the Africa Expedition - living in the Jeep proved too much for our relationship.

If you do have a family, don't let that stop you, I've met plenty of people on the road with families, ie. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sc61AxCQQR4

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#255

Post by cdata »

gottebp wrote: post #32

Breville coffee grinders are impossible to get internal parts for. I designed a 3D printed upgrade for the main wear-part in their BCG800XL and BCG600SIL Grinders. The storefront is through ShapeWays[1] and I use iFixit[2],[3] to drive the traffic. It passively makes enough to cover my own coffee needs forever. I spend about 20 minutes per month fielding questions. This all happened because my grinder failed and I co…

Just wanted to jump on the bandwagon and say that you saved us from buying an entirely new grinder about a year ago. Thanks so much!

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#256

Post by grecy »

le3dh4x0r wrote: post #189
grecy wrote: post #94

I've written a couple of books that sell on Amazon and Apple iBooks - it takes zero minutes per month work for me, but brings a nice little side income. I won't get rich, but it's nice to have the money come in for doing nothing after I hit the "publish" button. Even the printed books cost nothing. I'm about to hit publish on a photo coffee-table book from my three years around Africa, and I'll write an Africa guide…

Did you write fiction or nonfiction books?

Nonfiction about my adventures or guide books. I find it much easier than fiction, though I'm an Engineer and not overly "creative" when it comes to writing.

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#257

Post by singingwolfboy »

MarceColl wrote: post #243
singingwolfboy wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually dealing with stress, anxiety, and low self-esteem. Sometimes helping people change habits: work out more, lose weight, etc.

I'm going through some really tough times and I'm very interested in things that can help me change my behavior. How would you describe what hypnosis does to a person to help them overcome these things?

Check out my website: https://www.quietstrengthhypnosis.com/ The “Learn” section has some good information about hypnosis.

I’d also be happy to chat more about this one on one, if you’d like. No obligation to actually schedule a session; I don’t charge for chatting and answering questions. :) Shoot me an email: david@quietstrengthhypnosis.com

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#258

Post by grecy »

gulleyd wrote: post #209
grecy wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. A friend buys and restores old Porsche 911s. He will pay anything for custom made parts that are rare as hens teeth. As an example there is a housing around the main cooling fan that seems to be titanium or aluminum or something very exotic. [1] A company does sell a replacement, which he paid a fortune for, which had garbage tolerances and we spent weeks modifying it until it fit more or less well enough. I su…

I would actually like to hear a little more about why the tolerances were poor. Were the major diameters the issue here? I could see a lot of adjustment happening on a car-to-car basis to get concentricity between the alternator fan and the shroud just right. I have very little experience with Porsches, but am a coordinate metrologist for a major aerospace parts manufacturer. I don't see something like this being a h…

You're right, it was a cast part that had been machined, and (from memory) the machining was not precise enough to locate the alternator (and thus the fan) in the exact center. It kind of seemed liked a backyard job, but the price was anything but.

I think from memory the inside of the circle (which was cast) was not perfectly round. From memory the original Porsche part was titanium, and this replacement was aluminum. But I might have that backwards.

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#259

Post by pmorici »

nlh wrote: post #170
pmorici wrote: post #41

I taught myself circuit board design and found a niche market that I designed a few products for that sold like gangbusters with zero marketing for a few years until the market cooled off and low cost knock offs started entering the market. I also found that you could use the same CAD program that I learned to design PCB's to draw outlines to cut out on the laser CNC machine at the local maker space. I ended up findi…

This is super cool! > I taught myself circuit board design and found a niche market that I designed a few products for that sold like gangbusters with zero marketing for a few years until the market cooled off and low cost knock offs started entering the market. Can you elaborate a bit? Did you teach yourself literal circuit board design (but already had a background in electronics/hardware)? Or did you start from sc…

It was a bit of both, My degree is in CS, I only took one EE/hardware class in school that was more about programming CPLDs than anything else. These days really all you need to know math wise to build simple stuff is V=IR and P=IV, things everyone learns in high school physics class. Everything else you can usually get by looking at the reference circuits in data sheets or looking it up as you go. The hardest part for me was finding the time to get over the learning curve of the PCB design software, in my case I learned EagleCAD. After I did that and formed good habits with how I used the software I now able to do some pretty complex stuff. The limiting factor now is probably that my ambition has outgrown the software I learned.

The niche was building adapters for old server power supplies so you can re-purpose them for use as general purpose 12 Volt power supplies. It was a thing in the RC community for a while to charge batteries but it got really big in the 2014 - 2017 time frame due to the Bitcoin mining industry needing low cost high wattage PSUs.

Re: Ask HN: What is your money-making side project outside programming?

#260

Post by bluche »

polyterative wrote: post #17

Tried everything: youtube channel, multiple tutorial websites, music video making/videography, photography, for artists and bands, and finally sound design and mixing The last one is the only that is actually working somewhat

How did you start with sound design and mixing? Want to try it myself.
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