Join an open source consultancy like Igalia, Collabora or RedHat. There is basically infinite work in open source.
PS: some resources: https://github.com/fossjobs/fossjobs/wiki/resources
Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
21–30 of 125 posts
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#22I am incentivized by the software that is to be built and not by the money offered. I feel that if someone is motivated by money to create software we will just end up with more Microsoft and less Linux.
my take on this: if someone makes money from my work I feed I should get a fair share...
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#23I guess you already know, and you're asking exactly because you know..
But programming does not create value, it creates programs, which may create value..
Programming is a skill sure, but it does not create value, it creates programs.
Programs may create value, so, the valuable skill is not really being able to create a program, but being able to find some problem, whose solution creates value.
Programming may be required if the problem can be solved by a program, or if a program can solve a problem so much better or faster or cheaper that there is additional value in employing the program..
I'm a programmer, I love programming, but I'm entirely aware that actual programming is not what makes the money. If I had _the_idea_ pop into my head, I'd probably start developing prototypes, that's where my skill would be best applied at that stage.. If they showed promise, I'd likely start full-time development on it, but I'd be looking carefully for the point where I'd be able take on additional programmers and focus more on _the_idea_ and what's around that, I'd definitely hire marketing and leadership too, since those are also not my core competence.. I realize that means that my obvious core competence (programming) is unused, and that's true, my main role would be to try not to screw it up.. Nobody got rich on technical excellence, it's half the time not even a requirement for success.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#24≥ there's social consequences for making other programmers "look bad" and increasing management expectations This isnt that serious, is it? At my previous job (a large company) we even had one so-called 10x programmer (which some people claim doesnt exists, but I saw him with my own eyes), and it wasn't such a big problem overall. He was assigned more difficult tasks or more tasks, and that was it. (Although yes, his…
It depends of the context, as usual. It's usually not a problem for me, but sometimes I ask some of my clients that they do something technical on their part so I can continue my mission. Then someone at their IT department says it can't be done, or say it will take , cost , etc.
My client arm wrestle with them for a bit, then turn back to me and ask if I can do something anyway. So I charge them to do the task that can't be done, and it doesn't take that much time or money.
But I learned to do that with gloves, and tons of ass licking, because it does make the other party look bad.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#25Reframing your perspective may help you here. In your post, swap out all mentions of "programming" with "building construction", take a step back and try to formulate and advice for a construction builder who turned into management.
Sure enough, there are certainly many differences to be found between construction and programming. But testing the details of the method of comparison is besides the point. The idea is to do it on a high enough level which is good enough to drive a point home:
Both construction and programming happen in a broader context. There are reasons why you write code or lay bricks. e.g. you derive satisfaction from the act of making leds blink in certain patterns, you leverage your expertise to scratch your own itch e.g. build your own RSS reader, or solve a problem other people have which you think is worth your while e.g. you build a teaching platforms for students to get access to learning resources. Or in construction: school buildings, library buildings, campuses and so on.
That last part is key. Nobody is going to use code or build walls they have no need or want for. You don't get paid to erect walls or scaffold controllers. You are paid to cater to someone else's need or want. You could directly go to the consumer as a business owner; or you could do it through someone else's business as an employee.
We tend to look at technology as a separate industry distinct from other industries. But that's not exactly true. SpaceX is an aerospace business, Netflix is a movie rental business, Amazon started out (and arguably still is) a book shop. All the cool technology they have developed is subservient to core business goals which are anything but technological.
> It seems like there must be some way of monetizing this skillset, but I have yet to find it.
Looking at programming as a skillset you want to monetize in it's own right, you will always end up at consulting gigs as a freelancer or employee, doing work for disparate customers, problems, industries, etc.
Far more interesting: What's an interesting problem space I would like to get into, providing solutions, and building out a career, through my programming / management skills?
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#26Maybe you should renegotiate those IP clauses or find a new job that doesn’t have them. It seems to be the main blocker for you to do what would make you happy.
How would one sell that / do jobs like that actually exist? I'm trying to imagine the conversation where I would suggest that without the framing that I should be allowed to work on my own projects on company time because I'm not being productive with most of my working hours.
In my experience, if you find a client/company who truly values your skills and ability to deliver, then as long as your "side projects" are not a legal conflict of interest, nor getting in the way of your ability to deliver for your client, they won't care. Actually, many are interested to hear about the other things I get up to in my spare time.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#27Maybe you should renegotiate those IP clauses or find a new job that doesn’t have them. It seems to be the main blocker for you to do what would make you happy.
How would one sell that / do jobs like that actually exist? I'm trying to imagine the conversation where I would suggest that without the framing that I should be allowed to work on my own projects on company time because I'm not being productive with most of my working hours.
I only have 5 years of experience as a dev, but I just never was offered a contract where I couldn’t create side projects on my own time and on my own equipment. I never worked for a company that wanted to have IP of everything I did. So these jobs certainly exist.
When I worked in an office, the “own time” and “own equipment” were pretty much the same, I would work at night at home on my side projects.
Now, with remote, the “on my own time” is more blurry. The OP mentions the they can deliver code quickly. I understand that they could fully deliver what their peers, bosses, PMs, company expected in less than 40 hours a week. And that would free them time to work on their project if not for the IP clauses. On a job without that IP clause, I imagine no one will care if they were working on their own project at 3pm if by 2pm they already delivered what is expected for the day.
In my case, I usually work on my own projects in the morning, sometimes I start a little bit late, but I get the job done and all is good.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
How would one sell that / do jobs like that actually exist? I'm trying to imagine the conversation where I would suggest that without the framing that I should be allowed to work on my own projects on company time because I'm not being productive with most of my working hours.
In my experience, if you find a client/company who truly values your skills and ability to deliver, then as long as your "side projects" are not a legal conflict of interest, nor getting in the way of your ability to deliver for your client, they won't care. Actually, many are interested to hear about the other things I get up to in my spare time.
I should note that you may be required to make a legal declaration about this. Depends on the size of your client/terms of contract.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#29Maybe you should renegotiate those IP clauses or find a new job that doesn’t have them. It seems to be the main blocker for you to do what would make you happy.
How would one sell that / do jobs like that actually exist? I'm trying to imagine the conversation where I would suggest that without the framing that I should be allowed to work on my own projects on company time because I'm not being productive with most of my working hours.
I would argue that this is likely another point in favour of switching to consultancy first - just limit yourself to, say, 3 days a week of client commitments and you should be free to spend the rest building something you think might sell.
Re: Ask HN: What's the best way to monetize actual programming?
#30Can you elaborate on "very prolific programmer" and "very large amount of value per time on the keyboard"? On an agile team once, I was anticipating a vacation before a larger project came up and for whatever reason I completed a bunch of work tasks in a couple days. The PM at the time had said that work was supposed to last the team a couple weeks before the larger project kicked off. So I get the social/team conseq…
"The software development job market doesn't really work that way either where a specific skill, like time on keyboard and programming, is an entire job by itself."
I think this varies a lot. I can be as prolific I like to in my current role, but our team is a bit of a "special case" in the sense we are all acting as individual contributors in a number of mission critical core libraries. For me the dev cycle is mostly about programming, closing tickets, updating unit tests, and releasing. We deploy modules to products, but don't have production systems ourselves. If bugs emerge in production they return to our desk for fixing, but the interval between doing a release in project X does not stop me from progressing in project Y.
I guess we are chugging quite a lot of added value for the org - it's not obvious from the paycheck, but the environment is surprisingly low pressure (we try to hire only high performers hence everyone is trusted). Low pressure from the point of view I can work at the exact velocity I like, that is, and have not heard complaints so far.
The whole setup was "instigated" by a few high performing programmers in the org years ago and since it has produces continuous value ever since I suppose nobody wants to change it much. I presume this is quite atypical, though.