[quickthrower2]

What I didn’t realise (and to be fair it didn’t exist as it does today) is how much developers don’t need business people to employ them.

If you don’t have many responsibilities (ie no kids, no sick/poor relatives, no serious illness) you are pretty free to spend 5-10 years on starting your own thing.

You might need to give up on luxuries you are used to: living in the city, living alone, take out, regular nights out but surely the freedom is worth it.

For $50k you could probably survive for 5-10 years in a low COL place it the world with a laptop and internet. Have another 50k for business costs to help you scale up.

Or you could plan another sprint, argue with the manager to work on tech debt instead of hack another feature in, and pretend to be “on the same hymn sheet” while angling to learn enough of the next JS framework to get a $20k rise so you can afford COL increases.

[arduinomancer]

Starting your own thing sounds really stressful though

Everyone I know who founded a startup works crazy hours non-stop

Is the lack of balance worth it?

[rozenmd]

VC money isn't the only path worth taking - and there are always ways to make it less stressful: https://onlineornot.com/how-to-handle-monitoring-solo-founde...

[alltakendamned]

It is only crazy hours if you go for a start up with a goal of maximizing growth.

It is perfectly possible to start a sane business that focuses on providing its owners with a good life.

The nice thing about running your own business is that it is your own choice, as long as you don’t tie yourself up with large investments.

[quickthrower2]

I hate crazy hours! But I wouldn’t go down the VC root and I wouldn’t be trying to create the next Dropbox.