boopsie

Absolutely agree. My spouse is an active contributor to an open source project. Often, someone will come into IRC asking for help, and soon realize that the scope of the problem is bigger than they thought. Their next idea: "I should hire someone to do this for me." If you have demonstrated your tech skills, ability to communicate, and willingness to help a client... you might get the gig.

It doesn't have to be open source. As long as it's a community of techies working together to solve a problem, being the Helpful Cheerful Person in the Neighborhood can lead to consulting work.

I'd add Jerry Weinberg's _Secrets of Consulting_ to the reading list. It had a major impact on my ability to turn my tech skills into a business. For example, it helped me understand that the right answer to a client request is, "Yes, I can do that. And this is what it will cost."

I totally agree.

You _never_ want to compete on price. Compete on quality. It's a good idea to eliminate the cheapskates ahead of time.

Cold calls rarely work -- unless you are as good at selling (yourself) as you are as a web designer. That's a rare combination.

Word of mouth is the most powerful way to get business, of course. So the first step is to let the people you know know that you're available. Tell the people who might need your skills that you have them; if they don't need you, they might know someone who does. (This is a good use for LinkedIn.)

Have an elevator pitch ready that summarizes your tech specialties (e.g. HTML5, Dojo), business expertise ("have created several websites for realtors"), and a sense of the best match that hints at your rate ("affordable for small businesses"). Have a web portfolio ready. Update your LinkedIn page.

Depending on how much "a bit of extra cash" you can get started with sites like elance.com but my sense is that the money isn't all that great. (That perception might be inaccurate.) If all you're looking for is "a little extra" and an opportunity to expand your skills, it might still be a good idea.

It took reddit down!

Sure, but "asking price" isn't necessarily "getting price." And may or may not have much to do with "actual long-term value." :-)

Well they are ASKING for $1M. Nothing says they'll get a buyer.

Or am I missing something?

I was all ready to upvote this in a passionate YEAH... and then I looked at the link. What's sexist about it? If anything, having a geek chick with a tech book makes it obvious that the company wants to hire women.

Oh _good grief_.

I had one boss for whom I could check mark every one of those 31 signs.

Which apparently people like?

Why?

Isn't the whole point that people can submit what they find of interest and what they believe will interest others? All it takes to "ban" them is to not vote them up.

The problem with such policies is that the definitions are squishy.

How do you define "regular" and "sometimes"? At what point do you decide someone is "participating"?

If someone submits, say, 10 links to other (presumably interesting) sites for every 1 link to his own site, is that kosher? What if it's 4:1? 1:1?

How interesting do the other sites need to be? At one extreme is neat stuff that everyone likes and makes it to the home page (which benefits the "my own stuff" not at all, but certainly helps with karma). At the other is junk thrown in as filler to make that 10:1 ratio.

These are not idle questions. Especially when I think everyone in the HN community is aware of journalists' and bloggers' need to attract attention to their articles (which they, at least, believe are relevant). The question is how one can be an accepted member of the community _and_ also let people know what he created.

Huh? What's the problem?

Appreciate any company that sends you to tech conferences! I know lots of techies who'd pine for that option.

I don't think it's trying to list all the items we miss... the link at the end goes to an article of cool but dead tech. This is looking mainly at the terms that made it into the language (like "dial a phone") that are no longer literally relevant.

+1 for the phrase "gratuitous peacocking of web sites."

Hard to imagine, but true. Largely as a matter of contrast, because Microsoft was _way_ too big for its britches at the time.

I do still have my t-shirt about the flight to Chicago being delayed...

I just hired someone for an internship position -- wholly based on personal networking.

That is, I knew her from active participation in a baseball fan forum (http://www.azsnakepit.com). She was cheerful, courteous, kind, etc. That is, she unconsciously demonstrated everything any sane businessperson would be looking for.

After Liz had a baby, she asked me for advice about how to find a part-time work-at-home job where she could learn a new skill (and avoid going stir-crazy from talking only to the baby). And I said, "Hey, _I_ need someone!" I'm now paying her a lot more money than she imagined, she's doing a great job, and the work is getting _done_.

Therefore, I recommend that you begin rooting for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Only good things can come of this.

>>This story, “Google programming languages failing to gain traction,” was originally published at InfoWorld.com.

Why the heck did someone repost it on their own blog? Was permission granted?

After I wrote my first book, I was told, "Live on the advance. Go to Hawaii on the royalties." By which the speaker meant, "Don't count on success."

I dare say there is a complement in startups.

I've been looking for the same thing. The problem might be that "cloud" is too overloaded of a term.

I've found some good links on dzone.com but since there isn't a tag for cloud (or infrastructure or...) it's a bit of a crapshoot.

Follow people who are interesting and useful -- ideally both.

Look at your competitors, friends, business colleagues to see who they are following. Look at what they say. See if you care.

Sometimes someone "matters" to your business even if they aren't especially interesting because of their position. It might help to know that a prospective customer is in town, so you can tweet, "Want to meet for lunch?"

Think of Twitter as a radio. You can tune in and listen to whatever station interests you.

(Note: I co-wrote a book about Twitter for business. That might make me more reliable... or less. :-) )

I was surprised to see LinkedIn on the list. LinkedIn is _so_ much more than a job exchange. Everything from its Answers (which is often very good, if you scrape off the people who -- for reasons I cannot fathom -- answer 50 questions a day) to its Groups (varying quality, but worth it for the good ones) to just plain old "where's she working now...?" gossip.

Sort of glassdoor for recruiters? I'd be good with that.

From the article: John Doyle, Professor of Control and Dynamical Systems at Caltech, has maintained for years that this analysis was not just wrong, but so “comically wrong” to anyone who knew anything at all about Internet architecture that “most engineers thought it was a hoax.” As Doyle explains, “The irony of the claim is that the Internet is incredibly robust to physical challenges—but it’s terribly fragile to more sophisticated, software attacks that leave the routers intact but send unwanted packets and malware to the users.”

You certainly make me want to know more about heartbyte! :-)

Thanks!

Me too. After all, the employer is likely to hire lots of people. But I have only one life to live and I'm going to spend most of it at work... so doesn't it make sense for me to ensure that I choose the job I most enjoy?