[Freedombox-discuss] Paid FB developers

[Michiel de Jong]

Hi!

Good topic, I'll try to give my point of view on commercial vs. volunteer
developer work, for what it's worth. I don't want to talk people into taking
risky decisions in their lives, and there are some preconditions to the
whole 'quit your dayjob' thing:
- not have any kids that rely on you financially.
- have a bit of a buffer of personal savings, enough to live off
for, say, six months.
- care more about (your own) freedom than about stuff that money can buy.

But otherwise, what's the worst that could happen if you quit your job? :)

On Sun, Aug 7, 2011 at 7:52 PM, ya knygar <knygar at gmail.com> wrote:

> - Unhosted developer was being able to leave the previous job and work
> fully
> on the new, social freedoms project, because of social fundraising and
> social promise that project arose.


That's sort of what happened, but not exactly. At the time of leaving my
job, that promise was not at all clear. If we all just sit and wait for the
freedombox foundation to take the lead and hire us, then only very few
people will get a chance to make a difference. I think part of what makes
free software culture so great is that anybody can stand up and make a
difference, without having to wait for a start signal from anyone.

What I did first was to take a three-month sabbatical. A hacking holiday.
It's nice to travel, and even nicer to combine travel with 4 or 5 hours a
day of beach-side programming. I had calculated exactly how much money the
whole trip would cost me, and it was a perfectly safe decision, workwise.
The plan was always to do just a hacking holiday, and then go back to work.
I can recommend this to anyone. And I think a lot of bosses would say 'yes'
if you ask them for a reasonable time frame, and clear return date.
Especially if your boss is someone who has heard about Eben Moglen and
Diaspora etcetera.

Once I was back at work, I decided to quit my job entirely, and try to work
on my project for another two years. As I realised I didn't have enough
money left for this, we set up a donations campaign. The first sabbatical
had cost me about 3000 euros. I've put in another 3000 euros myself (which
is the money I had left), and since then, other people have donated another
4000. It's sometimes scary and stressful to start programming first, and
worry about sustaining yourself afterwards. But so far our boat is still
afloat, thanks to these donators, so that's awesome!

But I think the important point is that money shouldn't restrict your
freedom to work on something you care about. I will always remember these
moments (like seeing your post!) as the most awesome experience ever. Much
better than anything money can buy. And much better than any paid job at a
commercial company.

A lot of people want money, so their peers will say "look, he/she drives a
really cool car! what a successful person!". I'm not saying this is bad. If
you like cars, then there's nothing wrong with pursuing a successful job, so
that you can drive a really cool car. That doesn't make you a bad person.
Don't feel bad if that's what you really want from life. I could have spent
my money on a TVR Tuscan instead of on a hacking holiday, and I actually
almost did that.

The fact I decided instead to spend my money on what I like most
(programming stuff that I hope will be useful if it succeeds) doesn't make
me a better person than the version of me who buys the car. But I can tell
you (and that's why I'm writing this post) that programming on a beach
really is as awesome as it sounds. It really liberates you. And it really
does make you very happy. :)

After this time, you can still decide to go back to your day job, or to make
it into a free software start-up, or to freelance on the side, or to try to
get donations.

I'm quite a mediocre programmer. I mean, I know how to program, but I'm not
the sort of guy who would get hired up front by mozilla, canonical,
freedombox, etcetera. So sitting around waiting for someone else to take the
initiative wasn't an option for me.

Don't wait for the freedombox foundation to be at the center (wherever that
is). They will need the money they raised for a lot of other things. And
they will need the people they hire to fulfill a lot of other jobs than
doing the bulk of the actual development. Just like wikipedia has employees,
but wikipedia wasn't built by those employees. Hiring many developers from
donations money (other than in a sort of 'sheep dog' role) is not really the
right paradigm for this, i think.

My point is: anybody reading this can say "I will quit my job for a few
months, and make this happen". The day you say that, your full-time
occupation will be as part of "the movement", and that's an awesome feeling.
Maybe combine it with travel. I can really recommend it. :)


HTH!
Michiel
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