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Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#101

Post by sanjayio »

rr888 wrote: post #48

Maybe talk to your wife? Friends, family? Keeping physically healthy and healthy relationships allows you to keep working your 9-5. Otherwise I'd learn new skills, if not tech maybe management? I did an OU MBA online which was fun, I didn't want to be a manager but helped me work more effectively in the organization.

You’re assuming OPs not doing the above. A job is 35 hours a week. OP might want a side gig that gives 20 hours x $200/hour. This means OPs making $4k extra a week and has 55 hours remaining a week to do the above assuming 8 hours of sleep. The few quick judgements in this thread are something else.

Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#102

Post by atlasunshrugged »

There are plenty of more curated platforms out there now like Tribe.ai (more focus on ml intensive projects), not sure if Gigster is still around but they also used to leverage freelancers part-time, and then Toptal. All these let you go the route of being part of a network and getting gigs sent to you rather than going out and trying to find your own.

Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#103

Post by pc86 »

buzbe_uk wrote: post #31
jinglejangley wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm already earning near that compensation, was just looking for something on the side as well :)

This may be unpopular here, but be really clear what you want out of your job. If you're just talking side gigs be really clear this doesn't interfere with your own job performance. The first target you hit because of your "side gig" will be your downward spiral. Now .. running your own business is another option. For me I encourage my staff to have "side gig" of their own business, but will not sign off on them cont…

> For me I encourage my staff to have "side gig" of their own business, but will not sign off on them contracting on the side.

Imagine believing that you have the right to "sign off" on what your employees do in their free time provided they're not directly competing with you.

Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#106

Post by scatters »

cardanome wrote: post #87
CrazyPyroLinux wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm reminded of Margaret Thatcher's response to this: "He'd rather the poor were poorer, as long as the rich were less rich."[1] Every ethical dollar earned is a byproduct of value creation. Maybe you meant something more like "as long as he's not ripping off his customers," but otherwise that's an odd thing to say in response to someone who makes good money but is still looking for side jobs. [1] https://www.youtube…

Quoted post unavailable.

> artificially increasing supply of labor

Say's Law: supply creates its own demand. Or in this specific case, this is the lump-of-labor fallacy.

Perhaps if the left had some basic understanding of economics past Marx, they wouldn't be blinded by their comically unreasoning hatred of Thatcher.

Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#107

Post by jenscow »

tpae wrote: post #96

Can you actually do decent work in the evenings? If you can't commit enough hours to complete projects, don't bother.

Yeh, I wouldn't be comfortable hiring anyone doing this - especially for something critical.

I've worked evenings once. It's always tempting to think "well, I'm doing nothing anyway" but actually, you're recharging.

Even if you're normally coding on your own stuff, same applies.

Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#108

Post by 3pt14159 »

pc86 wrote: post #100
3pt14159 wrote: post #79

Side gigs don't really earn much. If you've got a friend that you've worked with before and they have a startup or something, ask for some peanuts amount of equity as an hands on advisor. It'll do more for your CV than 20 hour side gigs glueing some libraries together. Or pick a well known library / framework and contribute. Or rescue a "looking for [co-]maintainer" library out there.

Somewhat related; how do you find these "looking for [co-]maintainer" libraries?

I took over one because I was using it and it had a giant "LOOKING FOR MAINTAINER" in the README and it was interesting enough for me to want to maintain it.

Basically, look around / do some targeted searches on GitHub / ask in lang discords / slacks if anyone needs help. Lots of work to do out there.

Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#109

Post by ollieglass »

3pt14159 wrote: post #79

Side gigs don't really earn much. If you've got a friend that you've worked with before and they have a startup or something, ask for some peanuts amount of equity as an hands on advisor. It'll do more for your CV than 20 hour side gigs glueing some libraries together. Or pick a well known library / framework and contribute. Or rescue a "looking for [co-]maintainer" library out there.

I am curious about the impact of being an advisor on a CV.

Could you share what it's done for you?

Re: Ask HN: How do you get side gigs?

#110

Post by yojo »

giantg2 wrote: post #25
sirsinsalot wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Making a value judgement on someones financial ambition is a little ... weak. Does it really matter? I'm on £200k gross in the UK, outside London ... but i'm not done climbing that mountain. Of course £200k is "enough" for anyone, but that doesn't mean you can't aim higher. Ambition should be celebrated

"Ambition should be celebrated" I might agree with this depending on what the specific goal is. But why should ambition be generally celebrated? There is certainly ambition that has brought about improvement in life. There has also been ambition applied to the wrong ends or failing that has brought suffering. I'm not sold on the idea that the goal of continually increasing comp above an already luxurious level is mea…

In theory (and in a well functioning system), ambition in a populace leads to GDP growth as ambitious people seek ways to make more money by doing higher value work. This in turn leads to a higher standard of living, possibly for everyone if you redistribute some of the surplus via taxation schemes.

Personally (and more selfishly), I tried to raise my salary to be able to afford not working for extended periods of time.

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