greendot

So, if I built out 10 RPi based thermometers, that would be $40/month just to get a quick API?

If I added a humidity sensor, that would add another $50/month?

That's pretty steep. Granted, you could be targeting corporate and this starts to make some sense. That kind of pricing really does make it impractical for home users. You're already targeting an audience with some tech savvy and it doesn't take much to write a Python app to serve an API.

About 10 years ago, I was looking to switch careers and wanted to jump to my 2nd love - flying. So, I went and interviewed flight schools. I was talking to the owner of one school and the topic of military pilots came up.

It was mentioned that in the current model the only military pilot that will be hired by commercial carriers are the cargo pilots - the guy who can fly heavy. Helicopter pilots make an easy transition but that is not a "commercial" job like we normally think but it is well paying and almost impossible to get into. Fighter pilots are a different breed and do not transition well into commercial piloting.

But, to answer your real question - YES! Absolutely you can. It is hard work. You can go different routes. Ignoring the military option, you can go directly to your commercial license or go to a university that has a flight school. The benefit of the university option is that you have a real degree that goes along with your commercial certification. Both options cost a ton of money. Planes are expensive. Fuel is expensive. There are loans.

Going direct for your cert can also take different routes. You don't have to go to a big-name school. There are a lot of schools that offer a fast track. You'll get your private in 6 weeks the commercial some months after that and the entire time you're building the hours you need. Some will help find you a job after. If you have the option of living at home, you can get a commercial license yourself. Find a local flight school and just go at your own pace. Get your private license first and see how you like it.

For me, I had to stop midway through my private license. I loved it but becoming a commercial pilot is a choice for the young. The union/seniority/salary structure of the airlines doesn't lend itself to older guys switching over. I had a family to take care of the the benefits and money wouldn't really kick in until 5-8 years down the road. Plus, my wife was freaking out big time about me plummeting to my death.

I always wanted this to actually function correctly. It worked great on my Android phone but syncing locations with my wife on her iPhone was problematic at best. It never worked. G+ between the two is also "iffy".

One side of me admires Google for all that they do for "free" but I sometimes wish they would put the phone users in the customer role and maybe these products would evolve.

Am I the only one that would like to see a shared platform with documents, messaging, and location?

I would GLADLY pay a monthly fee to sync up our family between Android,iPhone, and web. Things like, grocery lists, to-do lists, events, photos, reference documents, and the ability to see where we are so we can plan the day w/out having to ask "Where are you?" or me sending a text every day, "OMW home". They're all there now, with things like Google Docs, Evernote, Dropbox, etc, but with kids and a non-tech minded wife, the pieces don't fall into place easy.

I've left because of managers. I've left because of the company.

When a company cuts my salary by 30% while jacking up my benefits payments by 300%, it's usually time to leave.

But, on to the article at hand.

As a manager now, those statistics at the end really kind of tick me off. It feels very one-sided and the following text is just me rambling on... somewhat trolling.

39%: Their supervisor failed to keep promises

How many of these employees fail to keep theirs? How many of these broken promises were based on things promised to the manager? How much of it was in their control? When kept at this simplistic level, this one seems like a third-grade problem.

37%: Their supervisor failed to give credit when due

This perception of credit and recognition is one sticking point in our team right now, especially with the people born after 1980. They want credit and recognition for every single thing they do. If they manage to successfully eat a meal without choking on a bone, they want public recognition for it. The older guys on the team, we sit down and do the work because it is our job. That's what we're here to do. The old guys can sit around and come up with ideas and realize that together as a team we designed something. The team gets credit. No one person gets the credit. The kids, if they have one key idea at any point in a process, they want to be held up high. Oh and damn if their idea comes early in the discussion and is never used directly but expanded upon and changed, hell they think they were the sole party responsible for all ideas and all further ideas were stolen.

31%: Their supervisor gave them the “silent treatment” in the past year.

Yes, I do this. I usually do this when I am trying to decide what to do with spoiled or "entitled" employees. If I have asked somebody to quit looking at StupidVideos.com for 3 hours a day and they persist while their projects back up, I'm going to be silent for a while while I try and come up with a plan. I'm not going to sit and try to motivate them. Motivating geeks is a pain-in-the-ass. I'm not allowed to fire anybody or put them on disciplinary action w/out months of paperwork, especially when they know how to talk to HR and convince them that they are doing the best that they can.

27%: Their supervisor made negative comments about them to other employees or managers.

Agreed, this one is bad no matter how you slice it.

24%: Their supervisor invaded their privacy.

Again, if you're looking at Facebook and not getting your work done, you need to get over it.

23%: Their supervisor blames others to cover up mistakes or minimize embarrassment.

Yeah, this happens. Sucks. Lucky for my team, when I lie my eye twitches so there is a built-in lie detector. :-)

http://www.capta360.com/ doesn't really look like a copy of your site. Neither does http://www.creativegerms.com/ or http://pearlwebstudio.com/.

Granted, a lot of those do copy your design but if you're trying to claim the above three do, you're a little overzealous.

How many plain old PMs know how to code? How many plain old PMs mentor the developers and lead the code reviews?

That sounds like a rather sad state of affairs. What kind of company do you work at anyway?

Yay, site's dead. Anybody have a mirror?

> According to a 2004 study, the average life expectancy of a non-instrument-rated pilot who flies into clouds or instrument conditions is 178 seconds.

That is a chilling statistic.

As a VFR pilot, I often wonder what would happen inside a cloud to make me react and rip my plane apart in under 3 minutes.

I have to help "stupid users" in both the PC and the Mac world. There are "stupid users" everywhere and not more on one side or the other. I look forward to this new Windows Explorer. You would be amazed at the things regular people just do not know. MS is putting that all up front, in their face. They see it, they know where and what the commands are. It matches what their version of Office looks like. They will probably be able to figure it out instead of calling me to go show them how to do something, that as a nerd, deem "easy".

Plus, I agree with the other users. Our viewpoint is skewed. We are top tier users. We're not the ones that need disclaimers on the side of our hair-dryer that says, "Do not user while bathing."

Thanks for talking about AppHarbor in your blog post. I'm developing an MVC 3 site and planned on deploying it on AppHarbor and was always curious how well it worked.

I agree with this. I have a 2 year old and a new one on the way, so I am somewhat familiar. It is tough to beat all the free stuff you get from friends and family. Also, consignment sales are a hit with moms. They go NUTS for them... and for $49, they can walk away with 10-15 items and not have to worry for at least 2-3 months.

I'm in north Dallas and unless you pay for regular extermination visits, roaches are a way of life if you live near open areas. I have a 10 acre ranch behind, two parks within a half mile, and a creek a few hundred feet away, and roaches and mice just love to cool off or warm up in the house, depending on the time of year. Although, this year it is rats and spiders, go figure.

I'm impressed. Definitely an upvote.

I use 99designs, mycroburst, and crowdspring because I can't afford a real designer now. I'm not "cheap". I understand the trade-off. Once my startup is making more money, I will invest in a more expensive design but right now, I just cannot afford it. The same goes for programmers. I will be programming as much as I can by myself but outsourcing programming tasks to help get the site done in a reasonable amount of time. Local designers and programmers really do not want to help out a bootstrap startup. I do not see any alternative at this point.

Because I have a need and there is nothing out there to fill that need, so i am making it.

Plus, I'm old and bored of working for other people and I have 0% chance of buying that Lamborghini making $100K/y with a family and kids.

My mid-life crisis is approaching soon so I need to get prepared. :)

If this did Vietnamese, I would probably go buy 8 new iPods to run it on and pass them out to my family.

Woot! That Revenge of the Titans looks fun.

I hope the DX will drop in price too.

If you were a carpenter and all you used was a hammer then it would make sense to call yourself a "Hammer Carpenter" to distinguish yourself from other well-rounded carpenters.

Go fly in a private plane and leave your cell phone on. I do not fly IFR so I haven't had to rely in my ILS but it does destroy radio communications. Have you ever heard your GSM based phone pulse and cause noise on a close by speaker? Imagine that being pumped into your radios and into your headphones. It is painful to hear. If I was landing when it went off, it could cause me to react badly at a time when I couldn't afford it. Also, I could miss a call that there is traffic around.