Re: tlug: Net Day

[Scott Stone <sstone@example.com>]

On Tue, 17 Mar 1998, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:

> >>>>> "Scott" == Scott Stone <sstone@example.com> writes:
> 
>     >> In general, it's a bad idea to charge a fee for anything you
>     >> don't plan to warranty.
> 
>     Scott> Not necessarily.  i've had several people starting up ISPs
> 
> They didn't graduate from the Ed program at Ohio State U., I'll tell
> you that much.  But this thread is not about people who have made a
> hard-headed business decision to start an ISP (and therefore have
> committed themselves to doing lots and lots of technical work and know
> what they're getting into), it's about people who want their hands
> held to navigate a Web page.
> 
> I take your point.  In the attempt to create a kotowaza, I left myself 
> open to misinterpretation.  Sorry 'bout that; there is a huge
> exception, the one you pointed out.
> 
> But for "Net Day" and the like, it's still a bad idea.

Well, this being Japan and all, if we sysadminned for free it might lessen
our value in the eyes of other prospective clients/employers.  I'm a darn
good sysadmin, and my time is worth good money, and I intend to make
people realize that :)  I have a propensity towards poor people skills, so
I have to dazzle people with my ability rather than my smooth talking in
order to earn my dinner (ie, I have to be more like Reagan, who did a dang
good job of keeping us from being nuked by the soviets, and less like Bill
Clinton, who likes to go around screwing every a** in DC and taking credit
for the reforms passed by the republican congress) :)

Which isn't to say I wouldn't like to also be benevolent and work for real
cheap to set up or even maintain one or two servers for a school, because
that looks good and it makes people like you because you're a nice guy,
but at the same time they don't think you're a bum who wants to just mess
with their systems.  If you charge SOME $, they think you're more of a
legitimate sysadmin and not just some guy who likes to push buttons and
drink lots of caffeine.

maybe I'm not conveying my point correctly here, but does this make any
sense at all?

--------------------------------------------------
Scott M. Stone <sstone@example.com, sstone@example.com>
               <sstone@example.com>
Linux Developer/Systems Administrator for Pacific HiTech, Inc. 
http://www.pht.com		http://armadillo.pht.co.jp
http://www.pht.co.jp	        http://www.turbolinux.com


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