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oDesk to merge with Elance

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Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#61

Post by jfoster »

Iftheshoefits wrote: post #29
pmorici wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you consider a solid income? It seems like the majority of the jobs posted on oDesk are asking for a lot and only willing to pay very little. I wonder how even someone willing to work for 2 bucks an hour could possibly make reasonable money on there.

$2/hr is a lot of money to some people in some places, particularly certain "developing nations". Of course, you get what you pay for. Most people looking to hire on these sites aren't interested in quality; they want quantity at a discount. It works well for both them and the people doing the work at least in the short term. After all, some money (food) is better than nothing. I consider it a pretty base form of exp…

Can you give an example of a place where $2 peer hour is a lot? I often hear this type of assertion being made. I can believe that $2 per hour is enough to live off in some places, but I don't know of anywhere it would be considered "a lot."

Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#64

Post by tamasnet »

tempestn wrote: post #36
Iftheshoefits wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Talented freelancers do themselves a disservice by using either of these "services". The only reason for a talented freelancer to use them is out of a desperate need for even abysmal compensation. This merger will likely make things worse for them (freelancers), not better. Yes, I know there are some freelancers working on these sites who earn a "decent" living. They're anomalies. The vast majority of workers earn re…

So where would you go to find a talented freelancer then? (Assuming you don't have any good word of mouth recommendations.) Not sarcasm - I'm generally interested if you have a better way of finding them that's more reliable that google searches or trolling stackoverflow.

There are a number of second-generation sites/agencies out there now that focus on ensuring a quality of both freelancer and client (e.g. toptal.com for devs), or that simply provide matchmaking services (e.g. folyo.me for designers).

Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#65

Post by mike_herrera »

benhebert wrote: post #31
lingben wrote: post #3

As long as oDesk does not change at all, I'm happy. The only reason I hire on oDesk is because it is NOT elance - have had horrible experience with elance both with providers and the company itself and how it conducts business (or what it calls business). Although this is called a merger, it is only that in name. It seems elance's CEO will call the shots. https://www.odesk.com/blog/2013/12/mergerfaq/ "Who will lead t…

I too hate elance and have been using oDesk for years. The experience at oDesk was just phenomenally better than elance. You're right about ripe for disruption too. I wonder who will move into the space.

I'd love to drink their milkshake.

My friend and I are mid-redesign on a new service marketplace called reBaked. Our innovation is collaboration with many freelancers and paying them proportionally to what they actually deliver. There's also a negotiated minimum payment for freelancers so it's not overly risky for them.

...it's not quite ready for a Show HN, but the gist can be seen at (https://rbkd-staging.heroku.com). I'd love to get your first reaction.

Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#66

Post by Iftheshoefits »

jfoster wrote: post #61
Iftheshoefits wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$2/hr is a lot of money to some people in some places, particularly certain "developing nations". Of course, you get what you pay for. Most people looking to hire on these sites aren't interested in quality; they want quantity at a discount. It works well for both them and the people doing the work at least in the short term. After all, some money (food) is better than nothing. I consider it a pretty base form of exp…

Can you give an example of a place where $2 peer hour is a lot? I often hear this type of assertion being made. I can believe that $2 per hour is enough to live off in some places, but I don't know of anywhere it would be considered "a lot."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nom...

Pick a country in the list on that page where the Per Capita Income is less than ~$4160/year. Most likely, in such a country, $2/hour is very likely going to put an individual at or above the median income (farther above, the lower the GDP Per Capita). $5/hr is a nice wage.

For comparison, the UN ranking of the US in this category is ~$51,000, and the median household income in the US is about $55,000 (per year).

Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#67

Post by d0m »

So, it seems like most people had a bad experience with Elance. I have to admit that I had pros and cons too.. but now that I've learned how to use it smartly it's so damn useful. I think you can find very smart people and if you build a respectful relationship with them, it becomes very handy if you're dealing with multiple projects like I do. I know how I can trust them to do a great work and they trust me back to have quality projects / quality specifications and well paid.

Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#68

Post by sergiotapia »

jfoster wrote: post #61
Iftheshoefits wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$2/hr is a lot of money to some people in some places, particularly certain "developing nations". Of course, you get what you pay for. Most people looking to hire on these sites aren't interested in quality; they want quantity at a discount. It works well for both them and the people doing the work at least in the short term. After all, some money (food) is better than nothing. I consider it a pretty base form of exp…

Can you give an example of a place where $2 peer hour is a lot? I often hear this type of assertion being made. I can believe that $2 per hour is enough to live off in some places, but I don't know of anywhere it would be considered "a lot."

Where I live, a software engineer makes about $500/month. That's $3/hour and some change, I know software developers who make even less. Freelancing for me is basically a no-brainer as I will not work for those wages if I can help it. I have the incredible fortune of being able to speak and write at a native level, that gives me and a few others an edge but most people suffer a lot.

If you land a job making $5/hour, full time 40 hour weeks, that's $800 a month. A LOOOOT of people here would kill for that kind of salary.

Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#69

Post by karnajani »

pmorici wrote: post #25
zackmorris wrote: post #8

I have mixed emotions about this because I have made a solid income at times with oDesk's time tracker, but I don't want it to become the standard way of doing things. That's because majority of the work I do now is on a subconscious level, so I'm basically thinking about a problem all day and it may only take an hour to code up the solution. I guess a workaround is to double or triple hourly rates, but I don't see t…

What do you consider a solid income? It seems like the majority of the jobs posted on oDesk are asking for a lot and only willing to pay very little. I wonder how even someone willing to work for 2 bucks an hour could possibly make reasonable money on there.

I've been living completely off of my oDesk earnings for the last year. My rates are usually between 35-50 dollars/hr

I'm pretty sure there are tons of folks out there just like me living comfortable lives with their oDesk earnings.

Re: oDesk to merge with Elance

#70

Post by bigiain »

loceng wrote: post #54
alecsmart1 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something as simple as the contractor wont provide you with the full code until you leave a 5 star rating.

Or just the final code or maybe have access to your servers or other assets - and without a full security check / wipe, you can't know if they created a way in - or they threaten to release your code publicly, or sell it, etc..

Wait - what?

People actually accept executable, possibly backdoored code and/or assets from random-internet-site-freelancers – then install it on their production sites _without_ security auditing it?

(I know - I _shouldn't_ be surprised, I suspect significant double-digit percentages of WordPress sites have themes installed which have some mysterious " type thing in footer.php…)

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