Tell that to Philip K. Dick, J. D. Salinger, Ken Kesey, Orhan Pamuk, Albert Camus, George Orwell, to name a few..)
Working alone sucks
71–80 of 115 posts
Re: Working alone sucks
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
14x? Where are you living? I understand software developers generally make more than the average, but I've not heard of too many people making 14x (in the US).
^ number pulled from butt for the purposes of comedic exaggeration. But doing a quick order of magnitude check, it's not off by much: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_household_income In the US, that says median income is ~$31k. You'd be 10x'ing that with a $150/hr consulting rate, which is by no means outrageous.
Note to everyone thinking of consulting and doing this math:
The challenge is that when you bill $150/hr you are not billing 40 hour weeks.
By the way, this is exactly why you need to bill $150/hr (or better, a weekly or monthly rate). If you do 40 hour week math, you think you can bill < $100/hr. And then you are very hungry.
Re: Working alone sucks
#73I've been working at home and travelling the world for over 5 years with our whole team completely distributed, managing over 30 people remotely for all of this time. I've seen it doesn't work for some people. If the person doesn't have a partner, is a bit too introverted, they can get into an anti-social pattern and not communicate enough, not get out of the house.
My experience is that this is the minority, maybe 5% maximum 10% of people. The majority love working from home and the benefits of greater flexibility and not having to travel to and from work each day more than compensate for any downside.
Re: Working alone sucks
#74I'd like to consider this through the lens of motivation.
It's a social motivational problem. I experience the same thing is some classes in the case where grades are too easy to get / there's no challenge, and when there's no push for creativity.
When the prof presents a leaderboard or favorite features in projects afterwards, or offers bonus for implementing more challenging additions, it multiplies my own motivation significantly. Even in grad school (CS), most of my course projects have been too easy IMO.
Re: Working alone sucks
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm definitely introverted, but sometimes I do find it helpful to be around other people while working. Which is why I'm starting a coworking space in my hometown.
Have you found any pitfalls trying to start a co-working space where there's a lack of an existing community? Did you do much research?
This remains to be seen. I just signed the lease on Monday for the space and we are doing cleaning and some minimal construction right now.
I live in Helena, Montana. We have a very small startup/tech community here, but we do have a lot of people who telecommute or freelance for out-of-state clients. Ideally, we'll get a mixture of these people. I think the diversity is what's really important.
Outside of Helena, in Bozeman and Missoula, there is a much larger startup community that's really starting to take off. I try to drive down for meetups a few times a month and participate in as many things as possible.
So far, the initial response has been overwhelmingly positive. Rent is really cheap (my father-in-law owns the building, that helps) and I'm not trying to make a living off of the coworking space itself. It won't take many members to get the space self-sustaining and I'm confident that we can get there quickly even with the small population.
Our website just went live yesterday. http://theshophelena.com
Re: Working alone sucks
#76Except for the lack of distractions, I don't like it. Same with working with people, in reverse.
I work as both a programmer and a glass artist, and similar conclusions apply. Working in group environments is inspiring, informative, invigorating and synergistic, but brings up all sorts of problems one doesn't encounter in solitude. I'm trying to find the right balance.
Re: Working alone sucks
#77I met a girl at a party once, and she said something really interesting when I mentioned that I wrote software for a living. "I could never do that", she said. "I could never sit alone all day, staring at a computer and never getting the chance to talk to anybody. It'd be my worst nightmare." I hadn't ever thought about it like that. Naturally, as a developer, I think I have the greatest job there is. Where else coul…
Wait what? Who in the world is using a computer today that isn't constantly interacting with people on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, uh.. Hacker News, even..
I mean, you're doing it right now.
Today's web is an insanely social place. Compare with computers in 1985, yeah, you might have a point about social isolation. But today? Absolutely not, no way.
Re: Working alone sucks
#78I met a girl at a party once, and she said something really interesting when I mentioned that I wrote software for a living. "I could never do that", she said. "I could never sit alone all day, staring at a computer and never getting the chance to talk to anybody. It'd be my worst nightmare." I hadn't ever thought about it like that. Naturally, as a developer, I think I have the greatest job there is. Where else coul…
Wait what? Who in the world is using a computer today that isn't constantly interacting with people on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, uh.. Hacker News, even.. I mean, you're doing it right now . Today's web is an insanely social place. Compare with computers in 1985, yeah, you might have a point about social isolation. But today? Absolutely not, no way.
That still doesnt change "I could never sit alone all day, staring at a computer and never getting the chance to talk to anybody."
Even by using social media, you are still alone in front of your computer.
Re: Working alone sucks
#79This is a pretty clear take on the cofounder debate. Key quote: "I don’t have a CFO, COO or other peers with the same overall picture of the company and incentive structure that I have" In the early days of Quantcast, Konrad (the other cofounder) and I wondered why the employees didn't generally have the same sense of urgency that we did. My friend Bryan asked "so, what do you do when you read an article about a comp…
I am curious to know how you cultivated sense of urgency among employees after this conversation? Did you start sharing more about competition and/or other information? Did you share it directly or massaged the message so the employees don't get discouraged? Or was "we don't want to be discouraging" an assumption?
Re: Working alone sucks
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wait what? Who in the world is using a computer today that isn't constantly interacting with people on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, uh.. Hacker News, even.. I mean, you're doing it right now . Today's web is an insanely social place. Compare with computers in 1985, yeah, you might have a point about social isolation. But today? Absolutely not, no way.
That still doesnt change "I could never sit alone all day, staring at a computer and never getting the chance to talk to anybody." Even by using social media, you are still alone in front of your computer.
That's meaningless. "never getting the chance to talk to anybody"? I'm talking to you, and everyone else who reads this web page, right now.
Just look around you. Look at all the people who are in real world physical social situations and still spend most of their time staring at their smartphone and the stream of social updates from Twitter, from Facebook, from Email...
Staring at those screens is compelling because they are so damn social now. It's not some mythical solitary activity like playing solitaire or reading a book.