Marketing – Software, Fitness, and Gaming

September 15, 2013June 28, 2016

Breaking the $100 Per Hour Barrier

I get this question at least once a year so thought I would write a blog post on it to help others. “How do I make more than $100 per hour?”. I’ve learned a few ways and wanted to share them below. If you want to save time, simply do something other than programming such as flipping houses, investment banking, or being the boss of a mid size company. They make way more money than we do. If you still love programming, but just want to know your options for making more money, read on.

I won’t cover whether money can buy you happiness or not. All I’ll say is that for some people it does, and others it does not.

Many of the financial and tax nomenclature below applies to the USA, but the types of work are the same regardless of country.

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September 8, 2009September 17, 2009

AIR App: Powerz – Play Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition Faster

This is a long post, so I’ve provided a short version, and content links to relevant sections if you want to skip around.

Short Version

I’ve built an AIR application in my spare time using Flex that helps you play Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition faster. It took 6 months in my spare time and cost around $50k to build, and $40 a month to maintain.

See and download it here.

It was created in response to my new players, who are tech saavy, having a slow time getting a game going. I copied the design metaphor used in MMORPG games, as well as creating an online database via Django of user submitted content to help the process go faster, as well as supporting house rules. In doing market research, I found my product is for a younger generation, and this makes it challenging to market. I used an Iterative/Agile development process to ensure it got completed.

The app had 3 goals: make money, make our games quicker & easier, and prove to myself I could execute. I succeeded in the latter 2, and failed in the making money… so far.

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July 18, 2008September 2, 2008

Being Independent & Making Money Using Flex: My 360Flex Speech

…now with 200% more “typically”!

I was originally scheduled to speak about Making Bling with Flex at the 360Flex conference here in Atlanta. I then got the flu, learned I needed to have an organ removed at the emergency room, and missed the entire conference. Doug & Juan filled in for me. Days later after the surgery, upon regaining some semblance of consciousness, I received “get well” cards signed by the Flex community from the conference (thanks for mailing, Leif!).

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March 17, 2008March 28, 2008

Post Microsoft MIX 2008 Thoughts

If you are in a hurry, here are some links with excerpts about the section.

Contents

Introduction – What and Why MIX?
Conference Grounds – Where was MIX and how did it go down
DoubleClick – Syndication ready Silverlight
Have we seen this before? – “Dude, Flash did that years ago.”
Silverlight Adaptive Streaming – Curious about how the buffering works.
Silverlight on Mobile – Same problems as Flash Lite has.
Silverlight for Flash Developers – I do Flash; can I do Silverlight?
AOL’s Silverlight Email App – Enterprise Silverlight
Bloggers Mingling – A-list bloggers, and who I met
Conclusions – What I took away from MIX.
History Repeating – Some of the .NET crew is doing what the Java crew already did.
Force Fed Silverlight – Silverlight is an alternative, not a choice.

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