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Ask HN: Any advice for a high school graduate?

10 points by oneshot 16y ago

Hey HN, Just finished high school a few months ago. I donot have the money for college nor am I motivated to go. I figured out that I cannot work for someone but at the same time I also cannot run a business. I wanted to escape from the tech/freelance/start-up world and have tried many times but some how opportunities come my way and I end up right back in. Now I know the technology sector is where the money and jobs are but I donot plan to sit down and program for 5 hours straight for the rest of my life. Thanks for your help.

guynamedloren 16y ago
5 hours straight? I think you mean 8 hours straight. Or 12.
- nostrademons 16y ago
  I think a lot of hackers may think they're programming for 8-hours straight, but if they actually measured it, it wouldn't be anywhere close. RescueTime did a survey of YCombinator companies once, and nobody hit 10 hours a day of pure, typing-in-editor coding time. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=209195 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=209195 Now, it's now 1:00 AM, and I'm still coding stuff for work, having been at it since about noon. But that wasn't even close to continuous coding time. There was a break for the massage chair in there, and a break for beer o'clock, and a break for snacks, and a discussion with the Dojo guy and the GMail guy and the Docs girl about JavaScript, and a break for air hockey, and a break for chinese take-out & D&D, and a few Hacker News sessions. I find that the most I can do in a continuous stretch is about 2-3 hours. I can fit a few of those into a day, but I rarely manage more than 7 hours of actual coding time per 24-hour period.
  - guynamedloren 16y ago
    Interesting perspective into the life of a hacker!
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pzxc 16y ago
Ha! 5 hours is a taking-it-easy day for me =P. Seriously, find something for you that does the same thing as programming for me, something that gets you excited and passionate, and then you won't have to work for the rest of your life. You'll get paid to play. I'm curious why you think you can't run a business OR work for someone else. What other options are there? You have to make money to live. Besides, it's like life's scorecard -- create value, get rewarded with money. If you really are that clueless about your future that you can't see yourself as an employee or a business owner, then you probably need to be an employee until you figure out something you're passionate about, then you can think about making a business around it. Employment is for people who can't figure out how to convert value to money directly, so they sell their time for money instead. But you gotta pay the bills one way or another.
- oneshot 16y ago
  Yep 5hrs is an easy day. I cannot run a business because I'm too moral. To run a business means paying people just enough to live and not their true value (at least at the start up stage of a company) which screams of exploitation. I have issues with accepting money and I'm assuming its a result from subconscious programming and being very poor. I also feel awkward managing and teaching people three times my age. Sometimes I just want to be a kid again and be around teens my age, ironically I tend to get along better with adults. Then there is always the risk of the venture failing. I cannot have a boss/work for someone because I dislike authority and hate having eyes preying over me. I also like to have a bit of freedom and flexibility and see ways the organization could be more efficient which the boss doesn't see. Great definition of employment and spot on pertaining to the bills. College also feels as if its just a machine spitting out cogs for the system.
  - patio11 16y ago
    Stop thinking like a poor person. Seriously. It will comprehensively undermine your efforts to not be poor. (Learning how to fake being upper class is one of the best reasons to go to college, by the way. I didn't exactly do polo when I was younger, but I've learned enough to hide obvious traces of that in professional situations. Simplest possible example: watch how successful businessmen act when told "No" by someone in a position of momentary authority versus how poor people act. The magic word is "options", as in "OK, what are my options?" There are almost always options, no matter how much the DMV clerk/airline CS drone/etc is saying policy this and rules that.) Running a business is not coextensive with underpaying people. Heck, running a business isn't coextensive with having employees. I've been doing this for a couple of years and nobody but myself goes hungry if I don't make payroll -- when I need something done, I buy it from another small business and at the end of the day I pay them what we agreed on and we're even. On the other end of the scale, there are many people on HN who pay their employees quite well indeed and who still do quite well for themselves. (While they're not exactly as prevalent on HN as they are in the real world, there are a lot of 5 man software companies busy cranking out boring systems which do boring things that make boring seven figures a year in profit and have boring sharing arrangements where the employees make boring bonuses and the principals sleep on boring piles of gold coins.) A talent for obsessive optimization is a gift in running your own business, as long as you also get stuff done. I have known people who are born optimizers and I also know people who are just lazy. If you're just lazy, business may not be for you.
Scott_MacGregor 16y ago
So come up with an idea that will make money and go for it! Maybe bounce some ideas off of people in here. It all starts with an idea.
- oneshot 16y ago
  Great suggestion! I am working on a start up or two but its a bit scary.
startupgrrl 16y ago
Have you considered writing a blog that caters to hackernews' tastes? A clojure-type java-based meta-MVC framework that gets you the A/B testing but this time in the cloud. Money in, Money out. Make the blog, seal the deal.
bendmorris 16y ago
I'm confused...as to why you don't want to go to college, why you can't work for someone and why you can't run a business. For a such young person it seems you've ruled out a few too many possibilities. What else is there...welfare? The fact is, you can do anything if you have the willpower, and it doesn't seem like you've had enough time to figure out your potential yet. What do you want to do? I'd suggest you go to college. If you don't have money, there's financial aid, and you can get a job when you get there. It will open doors for you, you will learn something, and most importantly, you have time to figure out what you're good at, what you like, and what you really want to do with your life.
Zev 16y ago
Find motivation. You're not going to get something handed to you on a golden plate. Suck up whatever it is that you're confusing for pride and go to a local community college. Take some classes there. It'll be cheap. As in, work a shift at McD's once a weekend and you can pay for a class or two. And talk to their financial aid office. I'm absolutely positive they can help you out.
schlichtm 16y ago
It doesn't seem like you really want to be a developer? No motivation to code, work, go to school, run a business, or even be in the tech industry. Go to community college - you don't know what you want yet. In terms of getting a job now - yes it is possible. Although not a programming job - I did go full time at a start up when I was 19. It just takes motivation to learn and improve.
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- deleted 16y ago
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motxilo 16y ago
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1711179 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1711179
skowmunk 16y ago
Work hard enough (and smart enough) early enough in your life and you can have an option of taking it easy later in life. If not, you won't even have that option later. Just make sure that you work hard in an area that can help you make money. But, irrespective of what you say in the post, I think you are already on the right path, you visit HN and you ask for advice, thats definitely a great start. About the part one not being able to run a business, nobody is born with that capability, they learn one way or the other. So if you learn, you can run one sooner or later. If you learn enough and fast enough, you don't have to program for 5 hours for the rest of your life, you can manage others who have to program for 5 hours, for you. Good luck.