14 ms·

Making $60k a month from a podcast on software engineering

252 points by skadamat 9y ago

gmemstr 9y ago
As both a listener and once guest of SE Daily (and now contributor to the open source project), I really appreciate both the content and the community around it. Jeff is fantastic at conducting the interviews, even with people who arent very experienced with being interviewed (e.g me). Glad that it's doing so well. Would be curious to know how many people on HN listen to it as well.
jackgolding 9y ago
I don't think there are many insights about operating a business you can get from this article but the business owner does have some interesting views on how to handle your personal and professional life. Also its very interesting that so many web entrepreneurs played poker so much in their early adulthood.
- gowld 9y ago
  My theory is that entrepeneurship in general, and lean startups especially, relies a lot on "fake it till you make" and sales that rely on heavy bluffing, and poker players are the sort of people that can do that. In web tech, it's especially true, because "lean startup" theory means that you can sell your product before you build it, but you have to bluff to your customers that you have already built it and investors (if any) that you know how to build it... and free-market competition means that since bluffing provides an edge, you must bluff to keep up with your competitors.
  - crablar 9y ago
    Bluffing was important to the extent that I had to convince the listener that I understood the topics being discussed when I did not. In general, I would discourage bluffing in a business like SE Daily. I'm on display for 250 minutes per week. It would be very easy to get caught in a lie.
    - tyldum 9y ago
      A few of the topics I know well myself, like networking, can be a pain to listen to. But the overall quality is great, and I realize that you can't be an expert on all topics. I listen to pretty much every episode and rarely skip one. Even the topics I think are of no interest to me often ends up with something useful and interesting. Doing daily shows also allows for a lot of diversity in topics, letting some episodes go really deep or just have a subject covered broadly and intensely like the k8s. I really recommend it to anyone who wants to keep tabs on what is going on.
  - tyingq 9y ago
    Bill Gates is a good example of someone that gained a lot of success with a hard bluff: http://www.technoventure.eu/valuation/Bill-Gates-Microsoft.php http://www.technoventure.eu/valuation/Bill-Gates-Microsoft.p... (perhaps not the best written retelling, but emphasizes the "bluff" part)
    - sova 9y ago
      Or, you know, just stealing an interface he didn't create and marketing it as his own, but who's here to split hairs anyway? Despite the downvotes, I stand by my statement, as an interface designer that pours years of effort into perfecting the arrangement and composition of elements on the infinite canvas, it's not acceptable to me that such things are not protected or even noticed by others.
      - tyingq 9y ago
        He did buy it, albeit without revealing the potential it had. I can see differing views on that tactic.
  - alaskamiller 9y ago
    At high level, maybe. But poker is really about process and discipline. Playing poker to create income is a grind. You sit there for up to 5 hours and do math on odds and make decisions, hand after hand. Every now and then you utilize bluffing or other techniques to bully to win a pot. Then you keep stacking to get a bank roll going so you can get to the next table, the next tier. The college aged poker kids optimize for it like any engineer. They have spreadsheets tracking EV on time, earnings per hour. But if you have the discipline and dedication to go through that for a year or so, then yeah, you can sit there and code to problem solve or sit there and go through the hundreds of decisions needed to operate a business.
    - ahtu123 9y ago
      Absolutely right. I was terrible at online poker since I wanted to have fun playing it. You can't bluff someone who knows the math in the long run. You'll lose all your money.
pascalxus 9y ago
This part is really critical, and this interview on indiehackers made it easy to find (unlike some of the other interviews): I like how they show how they acquired all their users: Word of mouth! i do feel like we're in some kind of golden age for podcasts, there's so much great content out there. maybe i should dump my netflix subscription and just listen to podcasts?
bankim 9y ago
SE daily is a great podcast with quality content on new topics in Computer Science. Jeff asks great questions and really tries to understand the mechanics of how things work. With an episode every day it's hard to keep up.
sova 9y ago
Hmm, so you make money from ad revenue. Do you sell ad time (and make advert announcements) during the podcast?
- crablar 9y ago
  Yes :)
  - sova 9y ago
    So delighted for your success my friend. Keep inspiring people through your labors! =)
  - inteleng 9y ago
    Should be titled "Wasting >>$60,000/mo of people's time, but getting paid $60,000/mo for it".
    - sooheon 9y ago
      This is one part of the truth, but not all of it. The remaining minutes of the the hour long podcast evidently provide enough value to the listeners for them to keep tuning in, despite the annoyance of ads. As long as his output has value and he charges what the market will bear (in terms of ad time), he should do well. The point is, it's not a net "waste" of people's time, it enriches their lives in some way.
voltagex_ 9y ago
>(Work from 9am to 9pm, six days a week.) Jesus. I'm sure this is small business owner hours but still, this person musn't have a family or any other commitments.
- hawkice 9y ago
  This is a typical work commitment in China. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2016-09/13/content_26779220.htm http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2016-09/13/content_2677... It's not luxuriously easy, but it's not ridiculous, and is microscopically different from _average_ working hours 150 years ago.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - voltagex_ 9y ago
    Sure, but I'm not sure it's something we should be looking to as a healthy model.
  - ptr_void 9y ago
    Here in NYC many regularly does that with 2/3 of the minimum wage.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- marak830 9y ago
  I do that, I'm not the owner either. My wife just had a son, so I definitely have a family. Add on top an hour and a half commute each way and it can be a little difficult at times to have family time I'll admit.
  - Double_a_92 9y ago
    Why would you do that?
  - adrianN 9y ago
scarface74 9y ago
Slightly off topic, but he mentioned that he got his start from the software engineering radio podcast that's been around since 2006. I've been binge listening to that podcast for about two months and it re-enforced two things that I always suspected. 1. I made the biggest career mistake of my life by staying at one company from 1999-2008. I missed out on so much of state of the art technology that I spent the next 8 years trying to get caught up. A lot of the things I was just learning in 2009 were already common place for years before then. 2. As much as people say "technologies change fast", a lot of the higher level fundamental concepts they discussed 10 years ago are still relevant today. Now back on topic... A daily podcast that lasts an hour? It's remarkable that he can keep up that pace. Could he make just as much money from having fewer podcasts? would the scarcity make the podcast more valuable to advertisers? I think John Grubers talk show podcast charges about $7500 per spot with 3 spots during an average 2 hour show per week. There have to be more software developers who would want a high quality podcast than people willing to hear Gruber's ramblings (no offense - I listen to his podcast every week).
- joshvm 9y ago
  > A daily podcast that lasts an hour? It's remarkable that he can keep up that pace. Could he make just as much money from having fewer podcasts? would the scarcity make the podcast more valuable to advertisers? As a listener, you're in a good position to judge - do you think that the content suffers from being so frequently produced? So they're making $2k per episode on ads - would they make $15k if they made one podcast a week? On that time scale, is there a better monetisation model? Scarcity really valuable to me as a listener - I don't have time to listen to an hour a day of a single show. I have an audible subscription (ca 10-30 hours per book, unabridged), shelves of real books, Netflix, Spotify, a list of TV shows and movies, a girlfriend, all vying for ear-time. Some people solve this by speeding up podcasts, but I like listening to real voices. Remvoving silences can work well though. Consider podcasts like http://moviesbyminutes.com/ http://moviesbyminutes.com/ - they look fun, but who has time to listen to potentially 100 hours of content about one film? That's more than all of LOST. Would you rather watch every movie on the IMDB Top 250 or listen to people going through every Star Wars movie minute by minute? I once listened to the complete Wheel of Time - it's over 2 weeks unabridged. Took about 4 months listening to nothing else - commuting, exercise, walking to the shops, flights, trains etc. SED at least offers listeners the chance to skip episodes they don't care about, but podcasts really have to be impressive for me to listen to them.
nardi 9y ago
How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- Spivak 9y ago
  Are you really surprised that starting a business requires upfront capital and an environment where financial risk can be absorbed? Does this sentiment have to be echoed every time someone who comes from money talks about their business. There is a class system in the US, you're only wasting your breath trying to be snarky about it. Business is a mix of talent and chance and people with money can buy more chances where others might not even get one. It doesn't diminish this person's accomplishment.
  - jiggunjer 9y ago
    It is mentioned because it is important to remember. Those successful privileged tend to think it was all their own mental acumen and hard work, so everyone could have done it.
- kristianp 9y ago
  $250k isn't a huge amount of money for a professional poker player. I few successful and/or lucky years and you can build up quite an operating fund.
  - bastawhiz 9y ago
    As a 19 year old, at least in the US, he'd have had less than two years to win a quarter million dollars. I doubt that happened.
    - mark_element 9y ago
randomsofr 9y ago
The site feels so buggy to me, that weird css load and the logo carousel behaves so odd (not to mention the wrong hover on the left/right arrows), i just can't stand it. https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/ https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/
- crablar 9y ago
  Check out softwaredaily.com
- cynwoody 9y ago
  It appears the old site is https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/ https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/, and the new site ("in early beta") is https://softwaredaily.com/ https://softwaredaily.com/. The two sites appear to contain the same set of podcasts. You can find an RSS feed at: https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/feed/podcast https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/feed/podcast Somewhat confusingly, the new site has a navigation link, labeled "Feed", at the top of the page. But it's not an RSS feed. Rather, it leads to a compendium of links to interesting articles on software engineering from around the web. It looks like the plan is to implement voting for the articles (there is a vote count, but it's empty).
kristianp 9y ago
I wish that hour-long podcasts weren't an hour long. They are often too unstructured and slow paced. I think with some editing for pace they could be winnowed down to say, 20 minutes. I don't have time to sit around listening to an hour long podcast, especially not every day and multiple different podcasts! I remember the old giants robots ruby podcast was about 20 minutes and covered 3 topics (not sure if I'm remembering correctly though, it's around 40 minutes these days). http://giantrobots.fm/ http://giantrobots.fm/
- username223 9y ago
  > I wish that hour-long podcasts weren't an hour long. Or at least that more podcasts were better edited. For example, John Gruber writes a blog, which he edits. Whether I agree with it or not, it's readable and terse. But he also does a podcast, which is him and some other person going on random tangents, pausing to cough or let out the cat, etc. I can't stand it. I guess it's like the difference between talk radio and the nightly news: one is trying to fill airtime, the other is trying to squeeze into 22 minutes; one is meant to be background sound, the other is meant to be watched. I happen to prefer other kinds of background sound, but that's just me.
- joshvm 9y ago
  Structure is an editing problem, but there are lots of people who listen to podcasts sped up, or with silences removed. Apps like Overcast will do this for you. Some podcasts, like Hardcore History, are worth the 5 hour runtime and they're so rarely published it doesn't really matter.
  - criddell 9y ago
    Any recommendations for podcast apps on Android? I'm carrying around my a junked iPhone 5C and using it just for Overcast. I haven't been able to find any podcast players on Android that work as well for me. If I could find one, I could stop carrying two phones.
    - buckhx 9y ago
Myrmornis 9y ago
I don’t think podcasts are for me, but maybe I’m missing out on something. I don’t even really know how to play them. Do you stream them or pre-download? People listen to them on their commute do they, or while driving? So requires a cellphone contract with no download limit? I guess you don’t just sit in your living room listening? And you wouldn’t be able to pay attention while cooking right? I don’t think I can take in information in real time, and I hate meetings, so I’ve always assumed I should stick to reading and writing for studying.
- biztos 9y ago
  I use an app[0] that pre-downloads them, and I listen to them on the treadmill at the gym; while cooking or doing household chores; as background when I'm coding at night; and, sometimes, to help me get to sleep. For every one of those uses except the treadmill I sometimes listen to music instead. Oh yeah, and I sometimes listen to current-affairs stuff in the morning, but owing to time zone differences that can be tricky. I'm sure a lot of people listen to them while driving or otherwise commuting, but my commute is by tram and by foot, and it doesn't fit that well. I don't find it distracts me from cooking, though from coding sometimes yes (then I switch to music). I don't just sit in my living room listening without anything else going on, but I don't think that would be weird. I'd listen to podcasts in the bath if I had a bathtub. It took me a while to find a set of podcasts I really like. This is different for everyone, but I think it's worth spending some time on. I'm still looking for good ones on a few topics that seem under... undercasted? I think there's still room for a lot more good podcasts, and some of them will even make a good living for the host. You can download everything on WiFi if you like, but they're just audio files so it doesn't eat that much out of a normal-ish mobile data plan. Give them a chance, and try a bunch of different ones before making up your mind. I ended up liking podcasts way more than I expected I would. [0]: https://overcast.fm https://overcast.fm
- swyx 9y ago
  you mostly predownload them over wifi. you listen during commute, driving or otherwise. yes you can pay attention while cooking, just depends if you can multitask.
- frou_dh 9y ago
socialist_coder 9y ago
Damn, that is a lot of revenue! Congrats! Can you share some stats about your advertisers? Like, how many advertisers do you have per month? How many per show? What is their average spend? How many months do they usually stay on as an advertiser? Do they normally re-sub automatically or do you have to get them to commit to another month, every month? How do you usually find new advertisers, cold calling them or ? And a personal question, I only listen to US Political podcasts, but I always press the "skip 30 seconds" button on ads. Why do you think there is a button that makes it super easy to skip ads built into the Podcasts app? How do people creating the podcasts feel about that? Do you have any stats on how many people skip the ads vs listen to the whole thing?
616c 9y ago
Just came to say so excited to read this and on the top of HN! Jeff is a hero of mine. Jeff, I once responded to your survey. I lost a ton of weight abroad with nothing going for me bc your podcast and the Changelog podcast gave me the weird fuel I needed to just run but also learn and be engaged mentally. I find your career choice from Amazon inspiring as a transition (not to mention poker) and you always ask insightful questions. I am trying to get into security with dev work on top bc you make me want to be in that culture, after a decade of avoiding it as a jaded IT guy. I have sent every group of developers and tech enthusiasts links to one or more episodes. I need to make time to contribute to the open source SE Daily apps. Just because. Thanks for building me an ethos so I don't have to for myself. ;-)
anthony_barker 9y ago
Great quote: "If I had to start over I would prioritize health — exercise, diet, sleep, socialization, getting outside for fresh air. I would be nicer to those who love me, and try to opt for kindness over cleverness."
anthony_barker 9y ago
@crablar What are your favorite episodes?
yusee 9y ago
Thank you so much, Jeff. I've listened to over 100 episodes. Your podcast is an incredible way to learn about a technology before deciding if it is worth a deep dive. For anyone who likes to maintain a wide general knowledge base to help them navigate the rapid advance of trends and truly transformative technologies, I would highly recommend SE Daily. And once you're hooked on the tech pieces, check out the rare philosophical episodes, like https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12584991 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12584991
Gudin 9y ago
SE Daily gets ~140,000 downloads per week I don't understand how can apps then have 1000-5000 downloads total?
- stedaniels 9y ago
  By using other podcast players :-) Not everyone uses the SE Daily app, they'll be using RSS/iTunes/etc.
roel_v 9y ago
Well they're not 'making' 60k a month - they have revenue of 60k. A small bakery with a few locations has that sort of revenue. They have payment processing fees, accounting and other admin costs, housing, hosting, yadda yadda yadda - not to mention three people on payroll (and not on minimum wage, I'd imagine). It would be much more interesting if they would show a balance sheet and profit and loss statement for the last few years. I've seen companies flaunting much better looking numbers than this and still go bankrupt. The real question is: how much is he pocketing, and how does that compare to say a consulting job? (another way to put my point is 'it's easy to have revenue of 1mm a month - start a luxury car dealership, buy 5 250k Lamborghini's each month and sell them for 200k').
- jacobwal 9y ago
  But the inputs to his podcast are merely time (and one-time equipment costs). As you point out, a car dealership needs to spend a ton of money on the inputs, but that doesn't translate to a podcast business.
  - CydeWeys 9y ago
    You're forgetting salary, admin costs, and office/recording space (if they have one). They have three podcasters on staff.
    - empath75 9y ago
      Three podcasters on staff = $20,000/month for each of them = $240,000/yr . That's a pretty good salary.
      - CydeWeys 9y ago
        It costs a company a lot more to employ someone than the amount that employee actually sees on a paycheck. Also where did you get the $20K/month/podcaster number from?? You're just making stuff up.
        9y ago
poster123 9y ago
The title is misleading, considering what the article says: "Our monthly ad sales have variance, usually falling between $30-60k." If the average revenues are $45K, that number, not the peak number, should appear in the title.

252 points by skadamat 9y ago

As both a listener and once guest of SE Daily (and now contributor to the open source project), I really appreciate both the content and the community around it. Jeff is fantastic at conducting the interviews, even with people who arent very experienced with being interviewed (e.g me). Glad that it's doing so well. Would be curious to know how many people on HN listen to it as well.

jackgolding 9y ago

I don't think there are many insights about operating a business you can get from this article but the business owner does have some interesting views on how to handle your personal and professional life. Also its very interesting that so many web entrepreneurs played poker so much in their early adulthood.

gowld 9y ago
My theory is that entrepeneurship in general, and lean startups especially, relies a lot on "fake it till you make" and sales that rely on heavy bluffing, and poker players are the sort of people that can do that. In web tech, it's especially true, because "lean startup" theory means that you can sell your product before you build it, but you have to bluff to your customers that you have already built it and investors (if any) that you know how to build it... and free-market competition means that since bluffing provides an edge, you must bluff to keep up with your competitors.
- crablar 9y ago
  Bluffing was important to the extent that I had to convince the listener that I understood the topics being discussed when I did not. In general, I would discourage bluffing in a business like SE Daily. I'm on display for 250 minutes per week. It would be very easy to get caught in a lie.
  - tyldum 9y ago
    A few of the topics I know well myself, like networking, can be a pain to listen to. But the overall quality is great, and I realize that you can't be an expert on all topics. I listen to pretty much every episode and rarely skip one. Even the topics I think are of no interest to me often ends up with something useful and interesting. Doing daily shows also allows for a lot of diversity in topics, letting some episodes go really deep or just have a subject covered broadly and intensely like the k8s. I really recommend it to anyone who wants to keep tabs on what is going on.
- tyingq 9y ago
  Bill Gates is a good example of someone that gained a lot of success with a hard bluff: http://www.technoventure.eu/valuation/Bill-Gates-Microsoft.php http://www.technoventure.eu/valuation/Bill-Gates-Microsoft.p... (perhaps not the best written retelling, but emphasizes the "bluff" part)
  - sova 9y ago
    Or, you know, just stealing an interface he didn't create and marketing it as his own, but who's here to split hairs anyway? Despite the downvotes, I stand by my statement, as an interface designer that pours years of effort into perfecting the arrangement and composition of elements on the infinite canvas, it's not acceptable to me that such things are not protected or even noticed by others.
    - tyingq 9y ago
      He did buy it, albeit without revealing the potential it had. I can see differing views on that tactic.
- alaskamiller 9y ago
  At high level, maybe. But poker is really about process and discipline. Playing poker to create income is a grind. You sit there for up to 5 hours and do math on odds and make decisions, hand after hand. Every now and then you utilize bluffing or other techniques to bully to win a pot. Then you keep stacking to get a bank roll going so you can get to the next table, the next tier. The college aged poker kids optimize for it like any engineer. They have spreadsheets tracking EV on time, earnings per hour. But if you have the discipline and dedication to go through that for a year or so, then yeah, you can sit there and code to problem solve or sit there and go through the hundreds of decisions needed to operate a business.
  - ahtu123 9y ago
    Absolutely right. I was terrible at online poker since I wanted to have fun playing it. You can't bluff someone who knows the math in the long run. You'll lose all your money.

pascalxus 9y ago

This part is really critical, and this interview on indiehackers made it easy to find (unlike some of the other interviews): I like how they show how they acquired all their users: Word of mouth! i do feel like we're in some kind of golden age for podcasts, there's so much great content out there. maybe i should dump my netflix subscription and just listen to podcasts?

bankim 9y ago

SE daily is a great podcast with quality content on new topics in Computer Science. Jeff asks great questions and really tries to understand the mechanics of how things work. With an episode every day it's hard to keep up.

sova 9y ago

Hmm, so you make money from ad revenue. Do you sell ad time (and make advert announcements) during the podcast?

crablar 9y ago
Yes :)
- sova 9y ago
  So delighted for your success my friend. Keep inspiring people through your labors! =)
- inteleng 9y ago
  Should be titled "Wasting >>$60,000/mo of people's time, but getting paid $60,000/mo for it".
  - sooheon 9y ago
    This is one part of the truth, but not all of it. The remaining minutes of the the hour long podcast evidently provide enough value to the listeners for them to keep tuning in, despite the annoyance of ads. As long as his output has value and he charges what the market will bear (in terms of ad time), he should do well. The point is, it's not a net "waste" of people's time, it enriches their lives in some way.

voltagex_ 9y ago

>(Work from 9am to 9pm, six days a week.) Jesus. I'm sure this is small business owner hours but still, this person musn't have a family or any other commitments.

hawkice 9y ago
This is a typical work commitment in China. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2016-09/13/content_26779220.htm http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2016-09/13/content_2677... It's not luxuriously easy, but it's not ridiculous, and is microscopically different from _average_ working hours 150 years ago.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- voltagex_ 9y ago
  Sure, but I'm not sure it's something we should be looking to as a healthy model.
- ptr_void 9y ago
  Here in NYC many regularly does that with 2/3 of the minimum wage.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
marak830 9y ago
I do that, I'm not the owner either. My wife just had a son, so I definitely have a family. Add on top an hour and a half commute each way and it can be a little difficult at times to have family time I'll admit.
- Double_a_92 9y ago
  Why would you do that?
- adrianN 9y ago

scarface74 9y ago

Slightly off topic, but he mentioned that he got his start from the software engineering radio podcast that's been around since 2006. I've been binge listening to that podcast for about two months and it re-enforced two things that I always suspected. 1. I made the biggest career mistake of my life by staying at one company from 1999-2008. I missed out on so much of state of the art technology that I spent the next 8 years trying to get caught up. A lot of the things I was just learning in 2009 were already common place for years before then. 2. As much as people say "technologies change fast", a lot of the higher level fundamental concepts they discussed 10 years ago are still relevant today. Now back on topic... A daily podcast that lasts an hour? It's remarkable that he can keep up that pace. Could he make just as much money from having fewer podcasts? would the scarcity make the podcast more valuable to advertisers? I think John Grubers talk show podcast charges about $7500 per spot with 3 spots during an average 2 hour show per week. There have to be more software developers who would want a high quality podcast than people willing to hear Gruber's ramblings (no offense - I listen to his podcast every week).

joshvm 9y ago
> A daily podcast that lasts an hour? It's remarkable that he can keep up that pace. Could he make just as much money from having fewer podcasts? would the scarcity make the podcast more valuable to advertisers? As a listener, you're in a good position to judge - do you think that the content suffers from being so frequently produced? So they're making $2k per episode on ads - would they make $15k if they made one podcast a week? On that time scale, is there a better monetisation model? Scarcity really valuable to me as a listener - I don't have time to listen to an hour a day of a single show. I have an audible subscription (ca 10-30 hours per book, unabridged), shelves of real books, Netflix, Spotify, a list of TV shows and movies, a girlfriend, all vying for ear-time. Some people solve this by speeding up podcasts, but I like listening to real voices. Remvoving silences can work well though. Consider podcasts like http://moviesbyminutes.com/ http://moviesbyminutes.com/ - they look fun, but who has time to listen to potentially 100 hours of content about one film? That's more than all of LOST. Would you rather watch every movie on the IMDB Top 250 or listen to people going through every Star Wars movie minute by minute? I once listened to the complete Wheel of Time - it's over 2 weeks unabridged. Took about 4 months listening to nothing else - commuting, exercise, walking to the shops, flights, trains etc. SED at least offers listeners the chance to skip episodes they don't care about, but podcasts really have to be impressive for me to listen to them.

nardi 9y ago

How to make $60k/mo from a podcast: When I was 19 there was a month when I played poorly and lost ~$250k. I quit shortly after that. It took me awhile to recover my psychological bearings. Step 1: Be super rich.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
Spivak 9y ago
Are you really surprised that starting a business requires upfront capital and an environment where financial risk can be absorbed? Does this sentiment have to be echoed every time someone who comes from money talks about their business. There is a class system in the US, you're only wasting your breath trying to be snarky about it. Business is a mix of talent and chance and people with money can buy more chances where others might not even get one. It doesn't diminish this person's accomplishment.
- jiggunjer 9y ago
  It is mentioned because it is important to remember. Those successful privileged tend to think it was all their own mental acumen and hard work, so everyone could have done it.
kristianp 9y ago
$250k isn't a huge amount of money for a professional poker player. I few successful and/or lucky years and you can build up quite an operating fund.
- bastawhiz 9y ago
  As a 19 year old, at least in the US, he'd have had less than two years to win a quarter million dollars. I doubt that happened.
  - mark_element 9y ago

randomsofr 9y ago

The site feels so buggy to me, that weird css load and the logo carousel behaves so odd (not to mention the wrong hover on the left/right arrows), i just can't stand it. https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/ https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/

crablar 9y ago
Check out softwaredaily.com
cynwoody 9y ago
It appears the old site is https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/ https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/, and the new site ("in early beta") is https://softwaredaily.com/ https://softwaredaily.com/. The two sites appear to contain the same set of podcasts. You can find an RSS feed at: https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/feed/podcast https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/feed/podcast Somewhat confusingly, the new site has a navigation link, labeled "Feed", at the top of the page. But it's not an RSS feed. Rather, it leads to a compendium of links to interesting articles on software engineering from around the web. It looks like the plan is to implement voting for the articles (there is a vote count, but it's empty).

kristianp 9y ago

I wish that hour-long podcasts weren't an hour long. They are often too unstructured and slow paced. I think with some editing for pace they could be winnowed down to say, 20 minutes. I don't have time to sit around listening to an hour long podcast, especially not every day and multiple different podcasts! I remember the old giants robots ruby podcast was about 20 minutes and covered 3 topics (not sure if I'm remembering correctly though, it's around 40 minutes these days). http://giantrobots.fm/ http://giantrobots.fm/

username223 9y ago
> I wish that hour-long podcasts weren't an hour long. Or at least that more podcasts were better edited. For example, John Gruber writes a blog, which he edits. Whether I agree with it or not, it's readable and terse. But he also does a podcast, which is him and some other person going on random tangents, pausing to cough or let out the cat, etc. I can't stand it. I guess it's like the difference between talk radio and the nightly news: one is trying to fill airtime, the other is trying to squeeze into 22 minutes; one is meant to be background sound, the other is meant to be watched. I happen to prefer other kinds of background sound, but that's just me.
joshvm 9y ago
Structure is an editing problem, but there are lots of people who listen to podcasts sped up, or with silences removed. Apps like Overcast will do this for you. Some podcasts, like Hardcore History, are worth the 5 hour runtime and they're so rarely published it doesn't really matter.
- criddell 9y ago
  Any recommendations for podcast apps on Android? I'm carrying around my a junked iPhone 5C and using it just for Overcast. I haven't been able to find any podcast players on Android that work as well for me. If I could find one, I could stop carrying two phones.
  - buckhx 9y ago

Myrmornis 9y ago

I don’t think podcasts are for me, but maybe I’m missing out on something. I don’t even really know how to play them. Do you stream them or pre-download? People listen to them on their commute do they, or while driving? So requires a cellphone contract with no download limit? I guess you don’t just sit in your living room listening? And you wouldn’t be able to pay attention while cooking right? I don’t think I can take in information in real time, and I hate meetings, so I’ve always assumed I should stick to reading and writing for studying.

biztos 9y ago
I use an app[0] that pre-downloads them, and I listen to them on the treadmill at the gym; while cooking or doing household chores; as background when I'm coding at night; and, sometimes, to help me get to sleep. For every one of those uses except the treadmill I sometimes listen to music instead. Oh yeah, and I sometimes listen to current-affairs stuff in the morning, but owing to time zone differences that can be tricky. I'm sure a lot of people listen to them while driving or otherwise commuting, but my commute is by tram and by foot, and it doesn't fit that well. I don't find it distracts me from cooking, though from coding sometimes yes (then I switch to music). I don't just sit in my living room listening without anything else going on, but I don't think that would be weird. I'd listen to podcasts in the bath if I had a bathtub. It took me a while to find a set of podcasts I really like. This is different for everyone, but I think it's worth spending some time on. I'm still looking for good ones on a few topics that seem under... undercasted? I think there's still room for a lot more good podcasts, and some of them will even make a good living for the host. You can download everything on WiFi if you like, but they're just audio files so it doesn't eat that much out of a normal-ish mobile data plan. Give them a chance, and try a bunch of different ones before making up your mind. I ended up liking podcasts way more than I expected I would. [0]: https://overcast.fm https://overcast.fm
swyx 9y ago
you mostly predownload them over wifi. you listen during commute, driving or otherwise. yes you can pay attention while cooking, just depends if you can multitask.
frou_dh 9y ago

socialist_coder 9y ago

Damn, that is a lot of revenue! Congrats! Can you share some stats about your advertisers? Like, how many advertisers do you have per month? How many per show? What is their average spend? How many months do they usually stay on as an advertiser? Do they normally re-sub automatically or do you have to get them to commit to another month, every month? How do you usually find new advertisers, cold calling them or ? And a personal question, I only listen to US Political podcasts, but I always press the "skip 30 seconds" button on ads. Why do you think there is a button that makes it super easy to skip ads built into the Podcasts app? How do people creating the podcasts feel about that? Do you have any stats on how many people skip the ads vs listen to the whole thing?

616c 9y ago

Just came to say so excited to read this and on the top of HN! Jeff is a hero of mine. Jeff, I once responded to your survey. I lost a ton of weight abroad with nothing going for me bc your podcast and the Changelog podcast gave me the weird fuel I needed to just run but also learn and be engaged mentally. I find your career choice from Amazon inspiring as a transition (not to mention poker) and you always ask insightful questions. I am trying to get into security with dev work on top bc you make me want to be in that culture, after a decade of avoiding it as a jaded IT guy. I have sent every group of developers and tech enthusiasts links to one or more episodes. I need to make time to contribute to the open source SE Daily apps. Just because. Thanks for building me an ethos so I don't have to for myself. ;-)

anthony_barker 9y ago

Great quote: "If I had to start over I would prioritize health — exercise, diet, sleep, socialization, getting outside for fresh air. I would be nicer to those who love me, and try to opt for kindness over cleverness."

anthony_barker 9y ago

@crablar What are your favorite episodes?

yusee 9y ago

Thank you so much, Jeff. I've listened to over 100 episodes. Your podcast is an incredible way to learn about a technology before deciding if it is worth a deep dive. For anyone who likes to maintain a wide general knowledge base to help them navigate the rapid advance of trends and truly transformative technologies, I would highly recommend SE Daily. And once you're hooked on the tech pieces, check out the rare philosophical episodes, like https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12584991 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12584991

Gudin 9y ago

SE Daily gets ~140,000 downloads per week I don't understand how can apps then have 1000-5000 downloads total?

stedaniels 9y ago
By using other podcast players :-) Not everyone uses the SE Daily app, they'll be using RSS/iTunes/etc.

roel_v 9y ago

Well they're not 'making' 60k a month - they have revenue of 60k. A small bakery with a few locations has that sort of revenue. They have payment processing fees, accounting and other admin costs, housing, hosting, yadda yadda yadda - not to mention three people on payroll (and not on minimum wage, I'd imagine). It would be much more interesting if they would show a balance sheet and profit and loss statement for the last few years. I've seen companies flaunting much better looking numbers than this and still go bankrupt. The real question is: how much is he pocketing, and how does that compare to say a consulting job? (another way to put my point is 'it's easy to have revenue of 1mm a month - start a luxury car dealership, buy 5 250k Lamborghini's each month and sell them for 200k').

jacobwal 9y ago
But the inputs to his podcast are merely time (and one-time equipment costs). As you point out, a car dealership needs to spend a ton of money on the inputs, but that doesn't translate to a podcast business.
- CydeWeys 9y ago
  You're forgetting salary, admin costs, and office/recording space (if they have one). They have three podcasters on staff.
  - empath75 9y ago
    Three podcasters on staff = $20,000/month for each of them = $240,000/yr . That's a pretty good salary.
    - CydeWeys 9y ago
      It costs a company a lot more to employ someone than the amount that employee actually sees on a paycheck. Also where did you get the $20K/month/podcaster number from?? You're just making stuff up.
      - 9y ago

poster123 9y ago

The title is misleading, considering what the article says: "Our monthly ad sales have variance, usually falling between $30-60k." If the average revenues are $45K, that number, not the peak number, should appear in the title.