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@ -15,23 +15,25 @@ The suggestions and advice in this guide are from my life experiences. Not all o
I'm currently 32 years old, and I started working with computers at a very young age. I had a very bright childhood friend named `Brian Brennan <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlO2_GecWo8>`_ who although he was younger than I, was my first mentor regarding computers. At age 9 we played lots of video games, original playstation and Nintendo 64, as well as countless hours of computer games on his Gateway computer. At one point Brian learned how to make the computer work for him instead of us working for it. We started learning HTML and Javascript together. I didn't have the Internet on my computer at the time, but my family did have a WebTV so I started building HTML web pages for things I enjoyed and hosted them on Geocities.
Flash forward to age 13, I finally had dial-up. Now we didn't pay for dial-up, in fact my parents didn't know I was "connected" as we used to call it, but I was connected. I had the setup username and password of our regional phone company, I was living the dream free Internet running over speaker wire convertly routed from our closet to the computer room.
Flash forward to age 13, I finally had dial-up. Now we didn't pay for dial-up, in fact my parents didn't know I was "connected" as we used to call it, but I was connected. I had the setup username and password of our regional phone company, I was living the dream free Internet. I covertly routed speaker wire from our pantry closet to the computer room. Yes, I learned early on that in a pinch you can use speaker wire as telephone wire, although I don't recommend it.
I spend my highschool career building HTML pages instead of powerpoints for projects. At home I built my own computers as so many of us did back then and gamed all night during LAN parties where we traded "warez" and "pr0n". I was 15 when we got A-DSL 125kbps down / 15kbps up. I started hosting my websites from my house on a Windows server and later converted it into a FreeBSD server. I educated myself in the computer labs and libraries with my friends. We basically had an informal club. For more details about this era, checkout my long time friend Charles Hooper's `"How I hacked my high school" <http://www.charleshooper.net/blog/how-i-hacked-my-high-school/>`_ blog post.
I spent my highschool career building HTML pages instead of powerpoints for school projects. At home I built my own computers out of parts, as so many of us did back then and gamed all night during LAN parties where we traded "warez" and "pr0n". I was 15 when we got an A-DSL connection running on 125kbps down / 15kbps up. I started hosting my websites from my house on a Windows hiding in my bedroom closet. This server was later converted it to FreeBSD 3. Most of my highschool education was spent figuring out how to get out of class and into either the computer lab or the library with friends. We basically had an informal club. For more details about this era, checkout my long time friend Charles Hooper's `"How I hacked my high school" <http://www.charleshooper.net/blog/how-i-hacked-my-high-school/>`_ blog post.
When I was going to community college for Computer Science, I worked for my parents part time and at Sears in the electronics department, slinging "HDTVs". At the time I was working 40 hours a week and doing 4 courses a semester. I didn't have time for games and I mostly resented Sears. I hated how cruel companies where they actively shit on their employees. I spent my lunch breaks in Boarders reading all the computer books. I started hosting my parent's small family business website which I coded by hand.
When I was going to community college for Computer Science, I worked part time for my parents and at Sears in the electronics department, slinging "HDTVs". At the time I was working 40 hours a week and doing 4 courses a semester. I didn't have time for "fun" and I mostly resented Sears. I hated how cruel companies were and how they actively shit on their employees. I spent my lunch breaks in Boarders reading all the computer books. I started hosting my parent's small family business website which I coded by hand.
In between Calculus and selling TVs, I also found time to building the best damn real estate search engine a local real estate agency in south Eastern CT could buy.
I was taken advantage of. I worked at least 500 hours on that damn site for about $500. I learned a _lot_ about business and tech. I was brave and dumb and took on more then I could chew but it was successful. Hands down it was the best solution on the market for a time well before Zillow existed.
In between Calculus and selling TVs, I also found time to build the best damn real estate search engine a local agency in south Eastern CT could buy.
I was taken advantage of. I worked at least 500 hours on that damn site which was commissioned for about $500. I did however learn a _lot_ about business and tech. I was brave and dumb and took on more then I could chew but it was successful. Hands down it was the best solution on the market at the time, this was long before Zillow existed.
While working at Sears I met George, an IT guy working at Pfizer. George referred me to a job making $18/hr migrating Windows 2000 computers to Windows XP. I accepted the contracting job thinking I was on the top of the world. I did awesome work but what I didn't know joining this cruel world is contractors don't get sick time, they don't get vacation, they don't get respect. They get fed lies and false promises and they are the first to get cut. Contractors are human resources. Its honestly sick.
While working at Sears I met George, an IT guy working at Pfizer. George referred me to a job making $18/hr migrating Windows 2000 computers to Windows XP. I accepted the contracting job thinking I was on the top of the world, I finally had a "real" computer job. I did awesome work but what I didn't know was this world is cruel to contractors. They don't get sick time, they don't get vacation, they don't get respect. They get fed lies and false promises and they are the first to get cut. Managers treat contractors like physical resources. It's honestly sick.
From there I moved to a technical call center helpdesk, also as a contractor, of a contractor, of a contractor of the DoD. If you follow the money, I was making $17/hr but at the top of the pyramid they were billing me out at $55/hr.
From there I moved onsite and successfully cut out one layer of contractors. I now made $18/hr as a desktop support tech, I fixed computer problems whether it was software or hardward. From there I moved to desktop support engineer where I learned how to package and push software to small fleets of computers. From there I moved to Unix server team. Each step was very big promotions as far as responsibility (I was one of two employees who designed and operated a multimillion dollar Hitachi SAN) but my pay didn't budge. People were coming off the street for my job and making more then double I was. At the time I was mkaing $32k a year and people were joining at $65k a year ... After being shit on for so long, this was the tipping point, this is where I started to shift my thinking.
From there I moved onsite and successfully cut out one layer of contractors but I still lacked negotiating confidence and only made $18/hr as a desktop support tech. I fixed computer problems whether it was software or hardware, I was fast and could basically solve anything handed to me. From there I moved to desktop support engineer where I learned how to package and push software to small fleets of computers. From there I moved to Unix server team. Each step was very big promotions as far as responsibility (I was one of two employees who designed and operated a multimillion dollar Hitachi SAN) but my pay didn't budge.
I worked for both the big industries for my region and the both failed me. I felt stuck. I did not want to move but I didn't want to work for companies with shitty culture and obsene priorities.
People were coming off the street for the same or worse position and making more then double. At the time I was making $32k a year and people were joining at $65k a year ... After being shit on for so long, this was the tipping point, this is where I started to shift my thinking.
I worked for both the big industries for my region and the both failed me. I felt stuck. I knew I did not want to relocate but I didn't want to work for companies with shitty culture and obsene priorities.
The only way to move up is to move out.
I started moonlighting on side projects and I had too many flops and failures to count. Finally I launched an idea with traction called `LinkPeek <https://linkpeek.com>`_. During my code development phase of building LinkPeek I started becoming active in the open source community for the web application framework I was using called `Pyramid <https://trypyramid.com/>`. I didn't know what it was called at the time, but I was networking. I started to learn some tricks to `career development </career-development-is-a-game-of-chutes-and-ladders/>` and ended up meeting a hiring manager who liked my skills and wanted to take a chance with me working remote. I flew across the country to Santa Monica had a bit of culture shock and landed the position.
I started moonlighting on side projects and I had too many flops and failures to count. Finally I launched an idea with traction called `LinkPeek <https://linkpeek.com>`_. During my code development phase of building LinkPeek I started becoming active in the open source community for the web application framework I was using called `Pyramid <https://trypyramid.com/>`. I didn't know what it was called at the time, but I was networking. I started to learn some tricks to `career development </career-development-is-a-game-of-chutes-and-ladders/>` and ended up meeting a hiring manager who appreciated my skill and wanted to take a chance with me working remote. I flew across the country to Santa Monica had a bit of culture shock and landed the position.