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Comment by neilv | Hacker News Reader

> There are a lot of forces that will lead you astray when you're trying to figure out what to work on. Pretentiousness, fashion, fear, money, politics, other people's wishes, eminent frauds. But if you stick to what you find genuinely interesting, you'll be proof against all of them. If you're interested, you're not astray.

Money is an insurmountable objective barrier for most people, and seems it's just slipped into the middle of a list of things that are more likely overcome by merely strengthening one's character.

So this sounds like wealthy person saying "don't concern yourself with money; just follow your heart".

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No, he addresses that. Get a day job. Then do your project on nights and weekends, or else manage your manager into making it part of your job.

The problem with moonlighting a meaningful side project is that any marketing you do will alert HR to the fact you are moonlighting (HR in large corps pay to have employees' social media scanned).

In most cases you'll either be told to stop or in the worst case your employer will claim they own it.

PG did not use the term moonlighting for the fact that you don’t have to.

That is unless you agreed to a contract that forbids from holding multiple jobs.

40h/week paying the bills leaves plenty of free time to do something on the side when you don’t have kids / a family to take care of

> 40h/week paying the bills leaves plenty of free time to do something on the side when you don’t have kids / a family to take care of

Show of hands: How many others feel this way?

Personally, I can barely muster the energy to do much hacking after a normal job. The only way I've found to do work I've been known for is by blowing off my other responsibilities (sometimes to the annoyance of various people).

So sounds like you are one of the lucky folks who is excited and really enjoying their day job that you dont need a challenge after work. I once heard that those who are very stimulated at work actually spend a lot of energy and need cool down "after work". I (like many I know) can't wait to get home after a soul crushing day (at a pretty well paying job) to work on exciting things! Depends on factors that energize and motivate you I guess!

Or, you know, some people don’t want to continue doing the same thing all day. For whatever reason.

There are also people who hate their day job, and after dealing with food, chores, and physical fitness, just want to spend their last waking hour or two relaxing before starting over.

I have also become known for what I do, in the last minutes of odd hours, to the neglect of my responsabilities. While I do "make time", and could probably do so more effectively[1], I certainly do not have "plenty" after 40 hours.

1: One needs downtime, and can't expect perfect utilization even after planning for rest.

This isn't the norm in Silicon Valley. Most companies will agree to exceptions to their Assignment of Inventions agreement if you ask, as long as it's not directly competitive.

If you work for a large company anything you do in software is directly competitive.

I understand the concern, but frankly don't think this is the case.

Nobody really cares about you in the org and in the world in general.

There is a legal implication on side projects on everyone's contract -> so the solution here is to just have an alternative profile on social media...

Oh and don't add HR people on your linkedin.

No family or other responsibilities. Also say goodbye to your health. Not widely applicable advice.

This is terrible advice imo. It entirely hinges on being able to work ridiculous hours, which most people just can't do either due to burnout, family, or both.

Program what makes you happy, everyone else is already programming the rest.

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