Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

blog.pragmaticengineer.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 123 posts

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#51

Post by amelius »

bolt7469 wrote: post #11
sakopov wrote: post #3

I've been wrecking my brain how to make $10 on anything online for a good part of the past 10 years with a couple of failed startups and even more side projects that went nowhere. I envy anyone who can do this and I think it is truly an immeasurable amount of effort to make any kind of side income let alone something that replaces your salary. But I think articles like this one advertise it like it's something you ca…

The classic YC advice is "make something people want." This video dives into how that looks in practice: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C27RVio2rOs The guiding principle is simple, but in practice it can be hard and complex.

> The classic YC advice is "make something people want."

Ok, I want to make compilers. People want them but don't want to pay for them ...

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#52

Post by ldoughty »

throwaway202288 wrote: post #27

Just a word of caution from someone who paid a ton of money to a lot of the people mentioned in the article in the last 2 years and was part of more than a few of these communities. Note these are my observations and opinions. - Read any testimonials these people out with a dollop of salt. Success rates seem to be around 1-2%(if you are lucky) with most of the others leaving or barely getting by. Easier to make way m…

> - Assume you are being marketed to with any content they put out

"Man, I really want to make some side money"

"Good news! Look at my book|podcast|article|youtube|etc on how to do that!"

It's like writing a "how to get rich book" explaining you should write a "how to get rich book" to get rich... an informal/unstructured pyramid scheme.

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#53

Post by suslik »

msadowski wrote: post #36

I think this post is a treasure trove of good advice. I’ll have to do some deeper reading of this as the advice seem solid. Since I’ve quit my last job in 2018 I feel like I’ve tried it all when it comes to revenue sources: * consulting - still my main source of income * writing a newsletter - brings about $400-$600 a month but there are some dry days on the horizon * selling newsletter merch - I’m in red every month…

How do you find consulting gigs? I have no idea even where to start.

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#54

Post by p0nce »

sakopov wrote: post #3

I've been wrecking my brain how to make $10 on anything online for a good part of the past 10 years with a couple of failed startups and even more side projects that went nowhere. I envy anyone who can do this and I think it is truly an immeasurable amount of effort to make any kind of side income let alone something that replaces your salary. But I think articles like this one advertise it like it's something you ca…

That point is adressed under the "Become more product-minded" sub-point.

My advice is to remember the situations where _you_ have spent $10 online and just analyze what was in place to help you spend that money.

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#55

Post by jsemrau »

jerrre wrote: post #49
jsemrau wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been doing that for the last 12 months and tbh, it does not work unless you already had an audience before. Highly likely I am the worst social marketer on the planet. But in terms of RoI your advice doesn't work for 99% of the population.

Interesting data point. How close is your approach to what they described, and did you actually make That would make it a lot less enticing :)

That's pretty much exactly the playbook that I am using.

If you don't have a following you don't have social clout. If you don't have social clout you are in that bottom tier where people don't see the need to engage with. I don't expect that high clout people like Jim Cramer or Elon Musk engage, but in general especially Twitter is a black hole. I had good experience with getting followers on LinkedIn and Medium, but that was mainly based on a lot of work that I had put in to engage with people and write content. At some point in time, I was in the top 5% business writers in the world. Yet, from a monetization perspective that was a flat 0. So given that experience, I might be the worst social marketer since I am not being able to earn 10 bucks on common social media.

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#56

Post by thenerdhead »

I tried this for two years and even wrote a book to help people get into tech. I realized I didn’t want to be another person who gives generic advice and I decided to make content and write books for me instead.

I think the main thing the author leaves out in the article is that building the audience is the more important thing when starting. Once you have enough “webs” out there via articles, videos, interviews, freebies, newsletter, meetups, etc then you can consider building products for your audience. Arguably you can start as soon as your audience shows interest, but you need an audience first to know that.

I’m a nobody in the social media world and I was able to sell a $200 course to many people. I ended up refunding everyone because I realized I didn’t want to be a tech influencer/guru/coach/etc.

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#57

Post by Jimmy »

jsemrau wrote: post #17
asicsp wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've been wrecking my brain how to make $10 on anything online If you are really serious about $10 (and not some other larger number), here are some tips: * Pick a topic you know really well (programming, cooking, sea diving, whatever) * Make an infographic (get started on the topic of your choice, some specific and useful practical tip, etc) - picking a template from free tier Canva will go a long way in producing…

I've been doing that for the last 12 months and tbh, it does not work unless you already had an audience before. Highly likely I am the worst social marketer on the planet. But in terms of RoI your advice doesn't work for 99% of the population.

I think asking some basic troubleshooting questions is helpful.

Is your product worth paying for? Is it even worth someone’s time to look at it or download it for free?

Is it the type of thing that you yourself have paid for in the past? (E.g. if you’re making infographics about cooking, ask yourself, when’s the last time you gave someone money because of their cooking infographics). Would you pay for your own product?

If you can’t imagine a scenario where you would pay for your own product, then why would anyone else?

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#58

Post by adrianN »

amelius wrote: post #51
bolt7469 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The classic YC advice is "make something people want." This video dives into how that looks in practice: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C27RVio2rOs The guiding principle is simple, but in practice it can be hard and complex.

> The classic YC advice is "make something people want." Ok, I want to make compilers. People want them but don't want to pay for them ...

Make a compiler that supports a modern language for an obscure chip that is used in industrial machines that is also compatible with the dialect that the vendor's compiler speaks.

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#59

Post by fxtentacle »

amelius wrote: post #51
bolt7469 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The classic YC advice is "make something people want." This video dives into how that looks in practice: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C27RVio2rOs The guiding principle is simple, but in practice it can be hard and complex.

> The classic YC advice is "make something people want." Ok, I want to make compilers. People want them but don't want to pay for them ...

I'm a paying customer of the Intel Compiler Suite. And I have been for many years. And I'm well aware that Intel is f-ing over AMD with vendor flags. But there simply is no alternative to MKL.

So if you release something competitive to TBB+MKL for AMD, then you're in business ;) But be warned, it's like millions LOC and 500MB of pure compiled binaries to get to that level of functionality.

Re: Becoming a Full-Time Creator as a Software Engineer

#60

Post by fxtentacle »

throwaway202288 wrote: post #27

Just a word of caution from someone who paid a ton of money to a lot of the people mentioned in the article in the last 2 years and was part of more than a few of these communities. Note these are my observations and opinions. - Read any testimonials these people out with a dollop of salt. Success rates seem to be around 1-2%(if you are lucky) with most of the others leaving or barely getting by. Easier to make way m…

Fully agree. I know a completely non-famous #1 bestselling author for courses on how to develop iOS apps. 99% of the revenue is coming from the books and courses. 1% of the revenue is cheap app re-skins + good marketing. In the early days, they actually used course revenue to subsidize their app operation to keep it afloat.

So yes, they teach you how to build iOS apps. But those apps have a negative ROI.

Post reply on HN