Here is an excellent rebuttal of the whole concept: http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2010/08/16/towering-lunacy/
2,316 karma · joined March 10, 2009
https://github.com/skmtc/skmtc https://skm.tc
1) When someone in early twenties sets up a successful business it is considerably more newsworthy and is far more likely to get attention than someone in say their 40's, thus distorting public preception.
2) Once you get into your 50's your career options narrow dramatically. You become too expensive, less flexible and potential employers may feel that you are 'stuck in your ways'. Therefore entrepreneurship may in actual fact be a necessity.
One could argue that piracy in the above instance causes no economic loss to the producer. If you had to pay for it, you would not have purchased it anyway, therefore the producer is in the same situation in either case.
At the same time companies can hugely benefit from this kind of piracy. In the case of Microsoft, pirated versions of Windows allow them to maintain their dominant position in the market. If the Windows was really piracy proof then the people who could not afford to pay $100(ish) for it would probably switch to an alternative like Linux. That in turn would weaken MS's position since a strong userbase of an alternative OS would develop thus undermining their 'platform' strategy.
I could not disagree more. All people I know with what the author calls MegaJobs have them because they considerably smarter and are prepared to work harder than most. These are the guys that worked 16 hours a day at university and are now doing the same the at their jobs. To suggest that it was due to connections is frankly naive. Connections can definitely help you get in, but they are never a substitute for above qualities.
Also, keep in mind that a startup is really an experiment. Every day you should be learning something new and tweaking your business accordingly. By focussing on revenue you start learning how to make money from the beginning. If your initial focus is on a wide userbase, then you learn nothing about the money-making side which is likely to be very different from just getting users.
It sounds like you are reasonably experienced and that MAY make up for the lack of a degree. Also, in web dev a degree is really not necessary and there are plenty of people in the industry who are self taught.
If you would like to improve your CV, contribute to some open source projects on github on a few weekends. I guarantee that will put your CV on top of the pile if are a decent coder.
Many places will be able to do a first round interview over the phone, which should cut down on travel hassle. Also, if London is too far away there are plenty of good employers in Bristol which should be a bit easier for you.
Anyway, if you need any more help / advice drop me an email on d.grabov@gmail.com
You could not be more wrong. I organise the London Hacker News meetup and speak weekly to people who are DESPERATE to get a good developer. Unemployment may well be high, but there is huge demand for good developers. Unless you have very strong ties to the area I would recommend moving closer to a big city and you'll be able to make considerably more than £17k.
I guess the risk is that when you end up phenomenally successful using a particular method, it becomes very difficult to go against that ingrained culture and try doing things a different way. Best example of a company combating that issue, in my opinion, is the IBM PC, where they gave Don Estridge free reign to carry out the project outside the normal operating procedures of the company which the management realised would have destroyed any chances of the project becoming a success.