Don_Wallace

Imagine a Beowulf cluster of those.

It seems that lowering the cost of software development as a key driver of startup success is being emphasized.

A few things:

One could argue that if the business case for the startup were strong enough, the cost of development would be almost (within a very wide band) irrelevant or at least you could more easily justify the expense. An example would be having already-signed-up beta users and having a mailing list of interested prospects in hand.

Secondly, does anyone not care about new versions, maintenance and ongoing support? If you are truly operating a business, then having the ability to support the product is key. An outsourcer can leave the business or the team can disband, so you have no control over the institutional knowledge. (The "outsourcing core competencies" issue.)

Last, the title "outsourcing startups" seems a bit misleading, almost as though an entire startup can be outsourced like a commodity. We're still talking about outsourcing the coding.

But maybe the commoditizing of startups is the next natural step in evolution, if it is not happening already.

This article is mean spirited, too serious and not well written.

Bad programmers I have known generally:

- Are oblivious and clueless. They just lack cleverness.

- They lack problem solving abilities and willingness to solve problems.

- They are usually slow witted.

- They are very conventional-minded - external approval means a lot to them.

- They are willing and ready to work too hard at programming for a result.

- They lack abstract reasoning skills.

And most bad programmers don't like Star Trek or science fiction, but I can't figure out why other than simple correlation with the mindset of a programmer.

The first set of six "real" causes pretty much encapsulate 99% of the mediocrity I've witnessed in industry in this field. Bad programmers usually have two or more of these problems. Even one of them is a serious problem if you are looking for a great developer.

All other badness, such as "meal ticket" thinking, usually radiates outward from these things.

I say this because if you lack the quickness and the desire to seek simple and elegant solutions, the work becomes like drudgery and your work reflects the other deficiencies that the article described.

A specific example: if you care too much what non programmers think (including your managers) and if you are a bit of a toady, you will not take the time to learn what is going on in-depth, and you will look for quick solutions. So it's important to strategically ignore your bosses from time to time and if you are trying to be politically popular, software development isn't a good place for this.

Another example: if you "want" to work very, very hard, you will not seek ways to simplify the code. You will instead cope with growing complexity and spaghetti.

I question the article writer's programmer instincts because he did not figure out a much more efficient and concise way of expressing the same things. Above all else, a real programmer figures out how to say it just once - not repeatedly cast in different ways.

Asking for a deposit for a project does something very important: it pre-qualifies the party asking for the work in multiple dimensions.

Here's what I mean. If they can get you a check cut for a portion of the amount of the project, then you just learned three important things about them: (a) they take you and the project seriously and are committed to your doing it; (b) they have both the signing and check writing authority to commission the project; and (c) they are able to control their organization from their end in order to make the project happen.

If it is not a major corporation and you don't get a deposit up front and you just start working, then any number of bad things can happen:

- You find out that they never intended to pay and they consider your demands for payment a joke. - It turns out that they are powerless smurfs with no signing authority - It turns out that there is absolutely no support for the project internally

In any event, it then becomes a crap shoot for you. If you get a deposit it is possible that you may be stiffed on later payments, but it becomes highly unlikelier by orders of magnitude.

A signed purchase order from a large company should be enough to go on, I guess. I have always asked for deposits.

Why should someone leave their email address if you don't give them a good reason to do so? That's the main thing your page lacks - some statement of who you help and what you sell. You seem to be saying you covered that already but that material only appears in your title. There's 10 zillion web devs out there and all you're showing is a graphic.

To me, the page looks more like a graphic artist's portfolio view than for a company providing SaaS, cloud and web development services. So from the get-go it is thematically confusing.

The larger question is, what are you trying to communicate with your "coming soon" page? I hope you are trying to communicate something. Web design has become an incredibly generic business format.

You need to actually say something about who you serve, what you do for your clientele, and what makes your services irreplaceable.

Forgive me if that is for the "next version", but there is a culture in some web-dev circles of letting metaphoric images "communicate" ... and they really don't do that very well at all.