141–150 of 207 posts
* http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/ - great weekly podcast with a transcript.
* Nice, focused, friendly forum: http://discuss.bootstrapped.fm/
* Book by the guys who did the podcast above that I would highly recommend to pretty much anyone: http://www.amazon.com/Start-Small-Stay-Developers-Launching/...
Those should be enough to lead you to other resources.
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A couple of thousand? 9k won't even allow you to retire in Afghanistan. :-)
Retiring at 30 = being a boring person for your 40s, 50s, etc. I think a better situation is to be financially secure by your 30s (be completely out of debt, pay off a mortgage, have money for children, etc.) and then have the ability to start companies or work freelance for the rest of your life rather than being a slave to the 9-to-5 grind. I do like the concept of getting rich slowly and learning slowly. I would l…
Try to retain your former boss as a customer, likely they'll need you two weeks time.
Can someone explain this more in detail? It's bad ethics to write stuff that only you can maintain, so what other methods can one achieve this/what do you mean?
It's bad ethics to write something only you can maintain for self-interest.
If your boss tells you to throw hacks in or pile up a bunch of tech debt, it's your job to say, "this is ill advised, and here's why", and then do it anyway if that's his or her informed decision. There are often pressing business needs that mean having feature X now, and possibly paying more in the future to clean it up or for other features, is a fine tradeoff.
Lots of code is in the place, where test coverage is poor or there are grungy hacks to make things work, and hence is much more easily maintained by the original author.
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What's the benefit of a startup? Seems like more hours for less pay while always needing to get things done. I fail to see the appeal. They just have lunches and dinners which appeal to people.
Never getting a raise because that's not built into their budget and there's not a system around it. Having to beg for vacation time and getting maybe a week a year. And after a few years or a few ventures, your friends at big corps are already starting to talk about retirement and pensions, and you realize that's an extra million you gave up. But hey, you can wear shorts!
"So I really have two questions. What would you do in my situation (would you stay in a smaller city?), and if you could start over in web development, what would you focus on?" 2 years ago I got laid off from a job I was at for almost 8 years. File for unemployment and make sure that's set. Clean up your resume and LinkedIn then enjoy some time off. For me, it was early July so it was nice to sit outside on the pati…
File for unemployment, yes. Clean up your resume and LinkedIn, fine. Enjoy some time off? Not so much. If I understand correctly, he (she?) said that he only had a 3 month runway of money. In that situation, finding a job had better be your full-time job. I mean, look, take a day off. Take two days. Take even a week. Breathe. Look around. Do a couple things you've wanted to do and haven't had time for. But don't take…
If you want to stay in the midwest and build for farmers, come join us at FarmLogs (YC12). farmlogs.com/jobs
[edit] Found it on the contact page: Ann Arbor, MI
The next one is tomorrow (1 Feb). Make sure you post to them, saying you're looking for work.
And yes, you can get freelance work as a self-taught programmer. Most people I know do exactly that.
If you do Ruby/Rails in addition to Javascript, I might have some work for you. Email's in my profile.
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Can someone explain this more in detail? It's bad ethics to write stuff that only you can maintain, so what other methods can one achieve this/what do you mean?
Of course it's bad ethics to write stuff that only you can maintain. But if you built it, regardless of how well you documented it and how easy someone else could maintain it you're the current expert and by the sound of the OP the rest of the team is not in his league. So the employer thinks to cut costs now that the major work has been done and they're in 'maintenance mode'. That might work, for a while. And then i…
Could be a win both ways in that sense. OA gets a customer with a regular need and existing investment. Former boss gains flexibility and can show headcount reduction.
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What's the benefit of a startup? Seems like more hours for less pay while always needing to get things done. I fail to see the appeal. They just have lunches and dinners which appeal to people.
The real appeal to a startup has little to do with compensation. It's about "benefits" and intangibles. Obviously these will vary depending on the degree to how "start-upy" your company is but I think you can measure it most by the size. In the extreme example, when you start your own company, you own it all. You want casual Fridays? It's done. You want a remote/results-only workplace policy? It's done. Cubicles, pri…
I've never worked at a startup where you can personally chose the staff..
I've noticed people at startups tend to be developers focused on the latest trends, coding fast, the latest js framework etc, less focus on writing clear maitainable code.
Developers at larger companies focus on writing maintainable code, SOLID, TDD etc, less focus on the latest js framework.
What do you want?
Try to retain your former boss as a customer, likely they'll need you two weeks time.
This can work very well (experience + know many who have done this). Make sure to http://doubleyourfreelancingrate.com !