Will my dream ever come true?

[martin]

Hi Guys,

For a while I am struggeling with a problem. I will be very honest to you: I hate working for a boss. I'm 37 years old now and until now I never did a job with fun and pleasure. I get depressed and stressed of this.

Two times I tried to ran my own bussiness. That was a great experience because I did what I liked to do (selling Italian music and making megamixes for record companies).

I am a very creative person, my mind needs to get stimulated. Also I am somebody that likes to work alone, I don't need to socialize with other collegues. I have friends for that.

For me at this moment there is only one solution and that is to start again my own company. But what can I do? I don't have money to invest. The only thing I can imagine is trying going to be a freelance programmer. Programming is my big hobby since I was a child (my first computer was a TEXAS INSTRUMENTS TI99/A). But again there's a problem: there's a lot of competition and I always stayed to BASIC languages. And I don't know much about PHP; webservers, etc. Nowadays you must know a lot about other things to satisfy employers. On the other hand I know that I could make really good applications with ThinBasic in the future. But that's not what employers want or know about. They want .NET, C, etc.

What do you people think? Is there a chance for me to make money with programming and how should I start attracting the right customers? I really want to make this dream come true but I don't know how to start.

All suggestions and tips are welcome!

[Michael Hartlef]

Hi martin,

very sensitive topic. I'm in the same boat like you, motivation wise. Thank god I have a good paying job and enough bills to pay
or I would have left already.

Getting self employed is a big step. If you have the funding for at least a year, I would not do it. The best way would probably do it first
part time. It also depends on what you want to program. Games, Applications, etc?

For applications I can recomment http://www.rentacoder.com

But tell me more about what you want to program.

[ErosOlmi]

Great dilemma, martin.

One thing is sure: if you need to make money, avoid thinBasic (and other languages like it of course) for the moment.
I cannot see money with it in a short/medium time window.

Also, for making money with just programming you need a big web of relationships and connection with many people working in different companies. Or you need someone that find the job you will do, a job hunter. In any case it needs time to show your power, your potentiality, your way of doing things for possible customers.

But I'm talking from Italy so I'm looking just a limited portion of the world. Maybe where you stay now is different.

My imagination says that future of tomorrow applications will be just the net in its more wide sense: web, connection, on line, just in time applications. Web 2.0 is just the beginning. All big software houses will port all their applications on the web, even the OS.
Of course there will be plenty of standard applications around but most of them will be free and the one not free will be in the hands of big companies.

I also have a dream to found my own company but I'm still waiting for my brain to find an original idea to work on.
It seems all I can think about is already ... been thought :D

I know, I didn't say much with this post. I'm just navigating a bit on my brain cells.

Ciao
Eros

[Petr Schreiber]

Hi Martin,

thanks for asking this question, I would like to help you but I am in time before making big step in this area so I cannot give you advice based on real world experience.

I only did temporary programming jobs where user said "I want this" and I delivered complete application or library - for such a job, you can use any language, but I am sure this approach is not typical and probably not the most reliable to take care of family / get constant money income.

For whatever you will do, I keep my fingers crossed. And although I do not like working for some boss, I am still sure there exist some people I would be happy to work for. This seems question of luck a bit.


Petr

[Lionheart008]

hi martin, good morning and thanks for the interesting question too :)

I cannot say you should do risk or not for a new part of your life based on highly and wide spread programming knowledge to earn money (regularly!), there are a lot of ways to earn money in this world, but I think it's not really possible to earn it with some of the basic languages, even with c++ or java or other applications.. I can agree in this way with michael, eros, petr... what they told you...

it's not an easy decision you'll take...so I noticed it from friends they are working with 3d graphic plugins development or making 3d scenes and using 3d graphic software to earn their money... they are always suffering from having more than 24 hours-a-day input and the companies has the possibilities to get the "cheapest" solution for their demand...

I can tell you more than five, six stories of my friends, they are really "fit" with 2d/3d graphics and they are struggling day by day (they have a very big knowledge and excellent skills about five, six professional 2d/3d graphic software applications!) to stay / belong to the best one amoung all the other professional IT users...

don't know if you have any good idea... if you have it, follow this idea and see what happens... don't give up... I have managed for two years a newspaper made all with pagemaker / atari and have learned very good things about people, manager, software and companies...

I have at the moment two and a half job and need more than 24 hours-a-day to manage all private and professional things ;) and I like more to work in an engaged team with the same good and positive character profils like me ... must laugh :)

best regards, wish you the best, good luck, Lionheart

[Michael Clease]

I was recently told that a market that independant programmers can go into is software for schools they are usually happy to deal with the guy working from his bedroom who might not be available at a moments notice (so no need to give up your day job, YET) and they pay their bills.

Its an area I am just investigating to see what is being by other people and dont know what will come of it, could be fun though.

[martin]

Hello everybody,

Thanks to all for your kind replies and wise words.

Unfortunately, I don't have any experience with programming games. I would like to make applications for company's and/or individuals. For example converting tools, account sofware, VBA applications, things like that. But there are already thousands of tools on the market and downloadable for free on internet.

Making software for schools is a good tip, but the problem with schools (here in Netherlands) is that they never have money to spend. I also made long ago a program for blind people (by request of the company I worked for). Maybe I should return to that kind of software.

Indeed I could try to do this parttime without giving up my main job. But honestly I don't believe I will succeed.

Hmmm....need to think some more...to be continued... :)

[martin]

Sorry guys I was away for a long time. But I think it's time to let you know that a lot of things happened in my life (good and bad). But meanwhile I still followed this forum.

I decided to follow my heart and started my own company: Martin Verlaan Webdesign & Software www.martinverlaan.nl (http://www.martinverlaan.nl).

I'm also trying to give my old company www.martmixproductions.com (http://www.martmixproductions.com) a second life but that is low priority.

I mainly focus on webdesign and if i'm lucky I will get also customers that need software...which I will program in...THINBASIC :lol: If I will make money with a script I will surely donate a part of the profit to Eros.

It will be hard to get customers because there is SO MUCH competition and my portfolio is too small. But I will do my best to make it a succes.

If I have more time, you will see me more often here in the future.

Martin

[Michael Hartlef]

Hi Martin,

it is great that you are still with us. I wish you the most success with your companies. I hope you will reahc the point
where they will support you and you can make an easy living with them.

Best wishes
Michael

[ErosOlmi]

Good luck
Veel geluk

:aikido: May the Force be with you

[Petr Schreiber]

Hi Martin,

nice to see you back here, I wish you all the best with your projects!
I like your websites, the martmixproductions is very original and the new one has very clear structure and nice layout too.

Maybe, to have larger market area, you might consider making english version of your new website.
I can also recommend coding websites in PSPad (http://www.pspad.com) - it is like in notepad, but with HTML syntax highlighting, checking the pairs of tags match and so on.


Petr

[martin]

Thanks everybody for your kind replies. In just a few months I learned myself PHP, MySQL, CSS and XHTML. And also I did a lot of research about Search engine optimalisation. :read:
I like to make clear, no-nonsense websites, without heavy plugins and shit. In my point of view a website should work on all (modern) browsers, even if plugins and javascript are disabled.

Petr: Thanks for the tip. I will try PSPad. I mainly using notepad, but also WinSyntax, which has syntax highlighting for php, but it works also very fine with css and html.

Martin