5 ms·
8 months worth of work for only $20k? This doesn't sound like a successful experience - more like you were highly over worked and under paid. It probably would
by codeddesign 13y ago
8 months worth of work for only $20k? This doesn't sound like a successful experience - more like you were highly over worked and under paid.
It probably would have been more beneficial to have marketed your services for 80 hours and be able to land a $20k project as well as a lasting client.
- albedo 13y agoAgreed, and this is basically what we do for devs who want to do contract work -- help find clients that pay well and don't suck. (http://getlambda.com http://getlambda.com)
- shubhamjain 13y agoThere is a difference between contextual self-promotion and irrelevant spamming. What you are doing is the latter. Please limit the advertising, it only hurts the PR with not much to gain.
- albedo 13y agoSorry about that. We'll cut back and be more relevant next time.
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoI feel like you've made too many comments advertising this site ... Seems like spam ...
- codeddesign 13y agoYes. As a daily reader of HN, you guys randomly insert your advertising without adding any true value to the discussion. Is that your normal business practice? To spam but actually add no real value?
- yitchelle 13y agoLol at the thought that spam would actually adds value.
- waps 13y agoYeah, so income on oDesk for hard workers is brutally disappointing. euro 20k/8 = 2.5k /month 1200/8 = 150 hours /month ~= 40 hours/week That's actually not that bad for being a programmer in, say, Eastern Europe, but it's rapidly becoming a rather bad wage even there.
- shubhamjain 13y agoI wonder wht people use it and others at all. * The clients expect insane amount of work at a very cheap rate. * People in developing countries are always ready to charge a lesser amount. * The Signal : Noise ratio is low on both sides. * The commissions taken by site and payment services also offer a blow to the amount earned. IMO, its tough to imagine a situation where a sane client who expects quality would be willing to shuffle through 100s of bids submitted on each project.
- alexdowad 13y agoI think oDesk is a great work platform, if you don't bother competing with the crowd on price and just go for the best jobs (after getting some good feedback and building up a good profile). I bill $40-50/hr and have no problem getting as much work as I need on oDesk. It allows me to travel around the world and work as much as I need to still pay the bills.
- shubhamjain 13y agoWhat was your initial rate when you got started? How much time and effort it took to build your reputation?
- waps 13y agoAre you a dev ? What's your profile ?
- e12e 13y agoActually, 150 hours/month is more like 37.5 hours a week (7.5 hours, mon-fri). IMNHO there's actually quite a difference between that and a full 40 hour week. This all assumes no work outside the 1200 hours, obviously.
- coldtea 13y ago>8 months worth of work for only $20k? This doesn't sound like a successful experience On the internet, which is kinda global, not everybody is paid US/Western EU salary rates, you know right?
- codeddesign 13y agoYes, but that drives me crazy! With the internet you aren't held down by your local economic wage and yet there are people like this guy who works like a dog and undercuts everyone with crazy cheap prices which brings down the global value of developers on sites like odesk. While I am sure he is a great developer, my point was that he could have worked less, raised his prices, gained better clients, and overall built a better business model.
- coralreef 13y agoI'm not sure the economics of the situation are obvious as that. If he raises prices: is he actually going to get "better" clients? He'll have to compete with other high end'ers. What if there competition is too fierce at that price point? What if his skill/quality doesn't match up to that price point?
- jiggy2011 13y agoIt's not worth getting worked up over. If you sell your services for $x there is always somebody willing to sell for $x - 1.
- mkartic 13y agoUSD20k is a very large sum. It works out to just over 1.2million in INR. Now that's a lot. If all it took to make USD20k a year was 40-50hour work week, I wouldn't feel underpaid at all. And I would be living a life of luxury.
- bruceb 13y agoDepends where in India you live. Real estate is not cheap in Mumbai.