1608 hours of work logged since November using RescueTime | Hacker News Reader

1608 hours of work logged since November using RescueTime

ivankirigin.posterous.com

23 pointsivankirigin21 comments

Wow. Pretty amazing to see that post-YC dip (we had 'em too-- I haven't spoken to a YC RT user who hasn't seen a 30-40% drop after demo day-- that held steady). Makes you wonder-- is 3 months the right length of time for YC? What would you get if YC was 4 months? What if YC invested ~$50k and the experience was 6 months?

Of course, if DHH is right, maybe I'm actually getting MORE done. But it doesn't feel like it.

The YC work cycle firstly unsustainable. It's an aberration by design: work like mad to pump something out.

Secondly it's compounded by investor meetings post demo day. They eat up 30-60% of your time.

Ohh and I don't think DHH is right. There is a direct correlation between time spent on apps tagged 'dev' and getting things done. The only question is whether it can last long enough before you burn out. For me, there is nothing too hard about a 45-55 hour work week, and it seems very sustainable.

posted my plug for rescuetime and tipjoy here: http://garry.posterous.com/rescuetime-a-log-of-how-hardco

The dip is pretty big though. After YC you have to worry about a lot of other things. If I could code the same way I did 2 months ago, I would do it in a heartbeat.

Only 15 days with more than 12 hours total put in? What kind of startup are you :~) ?

Seriously, that's some really good real-world confirmation about what kind of time real startups are putting in.

Use rescuetime! You'll be very disappointed that you don't work nearly as long as you think you do.

It's really just a re-normalization though.

> Use rescuetime

Alas, no love for linux...

There is an open-source Linux RescueTime app that that seems to work pretty well for some folks.

https://launchpad.net/rescuetime-linux-uploader

thanks, I'll check it out.

Agreed.

I used rescuetime, or maybe some competitor, for a few weeks.

I spend 60 hrs in the office, and am far more disciplined than I ever have been before in my life...and it was hard to clock 45 hrs of REAL work.

Depressing.

On the other hand, better to do that AND HAVE DATA than to do it and not know the truth.

Data lets you create a feedback loop and improve.

Is there any data available on the avg no. hrs/week [insert type of user here] puts in?

I've been surprised at some of the readings as well.

RescueTime is nice, but if a majority of your time is used browsing a random number of domains (read documentation, blogs for problem x, procrastinate on slashdot etc) it's gets hard to separate "productive browsing" and "unproductive browsing" without going through a large tedious list of websites every day. And even then, the same domain may be productive one day, and unproductive the next. Eventually you just find the benefit isn't really there and stop checking the website. And then eventually you stop the watcher application because it interferes with your computer usage or sometimes pings to %100 processor usage.

If you guys could solve the 200 random domains a day kind of problem (put all domains under 3 minutes in a 'random browsing' category, or you could add a 'i'm procrastinating' button), it might make RescueTime a useful application for me.

I can say for a fact a small minority of my time is spent on domains I don't bother tagging as waste or dev.

If you are spending a lot of time on random domains, I think even considering rescuetime has identified a clear way to, err, rescue time.

SlimTimer is an app that does the same and runs in the sidebar of your browser. You just need a bookmarklet and don't need to install anything. I use it daily.

http://www.slimtimer.com/

Does it track apps outside your browser?

You manually tell the app what you are doing choosing the task on a Firefox sidebar.

RescueTime is automatic, and cross platform.

So a third party website get to track what site I visit and which app I use, when and for how long?

Out of curiosity, why is this a bad thing (if the service allows you to selectively delete data or nuke your whole dataset)? It's not logging keystrokes or doing screen captures... Just start-time and end-time of window/tab focus.

Compare this to a third party website where you store all of your conversations and many of your passwords (any hosted email or chat/IM), and the privacy implications of RescueTime don't seem that painful... Assuming it actually is something that you care about.

Yes, but how do RescueTime make their money?

I see no ads on the site, and the service seems to be free.

Corporate clients.

Future subscription services.

You can also see when you were moving from SF to Boston.

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