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Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

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bentHnau
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Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#1 Post by bentHnau »

I'm a freelance technical editor and I don't much like it because it requires too much communication with clueless clients and too many ambiguous requirements. I want the exact opposite of those two things. I want to spend my energy doing the job rather than discussing it/figuring it out.

I kinda wanted to be a software engineer because I enjoy coding, but I enjoy the logic of programming more than learning language details, so I haven't been motivated to increase my knowledge or to create anything. I've taken university software engineering courses and programming MOOCs, and they motivate me A LOT. I work hard, I learn well on my own, and I always do well, but I stop once the courses are over, and they don't take me beyond intermediate knowledge anyhow.

I thought about QA, but I don't know. I want to avoid a job that would require me to continually learn tons of new skills/technologies (a small amount is ok). Going back to school is not an option (except maybe community college). I need very little money (way beneath poverty line). I'd rather choose something I can do from home/part time/freelance.

Any ideas?

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GarryRicketson
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#2 Post by GarryRicketson »

Well, I am not sure what a freelance technical editor does ?
This seems kind of contradictory :the title:
Tech Career For A Lazy Person?
and
I work hard, I learn well on my own, and I always do well, but I stop once the courses are over, and they don't take me beyond intermediate knowledge anyhow
Lazy people don't work hard,... ??
The problem here is, a lazy person will not want to do anything, so it might be a waste of time to try to give any ideas.
Any ideas?
Well, you could take the time and make the effort to set up a website, but a lazy person
won't want to do that.
Use the website to show your resume, etc. also as a contact point.
What kind of real experience do you actually have ? All the best courses, and the college education is of very little use, in a hands on "real life" situation , experience is what counts.
Lazy people never get much real experience, they are to lazy to do that.
Stop being lazy.
Just for example, we have many lazy, but educated "super users" here on this forum,
but their schools and high education never even taught them how to use the search engines, and options to get technical information, much less how to to put that information to use.
But occasionally we also do get people that are just to busy, either at work, or running a business, and they need technical support,...out of those, there probably are some that
would even be willing to pay a qualified person, to get their system set up, and working properly, or perhaps write some special application, etc.
I don't know if a "technical editor", does that, or is even capable of doing that.
So after setting up your website, stop being lazy, use the search engines to find forums and sites that are related to what ever "technical editors" do, or related to software engineering, etc.
Use your website to let the world know you are available,and what you can do, etc.
But the main thing is as long as you follow the "lazy route", and just sit there and do nothing, nothing will happen, you might as well just sit in front of your house or apartment
with a tin cup, and a sign "Please donate, I am lazy".
If you stopped being lazy, and go sit in front of the local mall, at least there there will be a few people that throw a dime or quarter in the cup.
Write some good tutorials, put them on your website, maybe also share some real , working pieces of software that you actually have created, how ever if the users need
more detailed technical help, they have to pay,... if you are good at what you do, they will pay, and they also will refer others to you. But first you have to stop being lazy.
There are not really any "careers", in the tech world, IT, or even other types of work and fields, like agriculture, or quarry, (mining, and stone cutting),.. Lazy people just don't get the job done, nor do they comprehend what it really is to "work hard".
When I was a truck driver, I worked 7 days a week, year round, usually about 16 to 18 hours a day, for 10 years, there was a "career" for me.
Later when I got tired of that and went into the stone work, etc,.. similar , worked 6 1/2 days a week, usually about 12 hours, some times more, in some quarries the workers
work 2 shifts, 16 hour a day,... then way back when I was involved in agriculture, worked from the time the sun comes up to the time it sets,... On tractors, often the same as driving a truck, 18 hours , almost around the clock,... but there was a career for me,...
lazy people just have no clue as to what "work hard" is.
Now I am retired, so I pretty much just have fun with my parrots, and with my computer
projects, etc....but I still am not lazy. (I do like to sleep though , as well, my naps seem to be getting longer these days).
Speaking of naps, it is time for one.
Here is some examples of how one can use a website, and make a career, if they are not lazy.
https://www.openbsd.org/support.html
Just take a look at some of the web sites to get some ideas.
This is one I like : http://freedaemonconsulting.com/
Debian.org has something similar,
https://www.debian.org/consultants/
======================================
Now I have a new toy :
New things are fun

deborah-and-ian
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#3 Post by deborah-and-ian »

bentHnau wrote:it requires too much communication with clueless clients and too many ambiguous requirements.
There are jobs where you come into the workplace and just work on something, but even then, there will always be superiors or colleagues to deal with and, even if they know everything you know -- which isn't realistic -- they still might have different ideas than you. Clients will be clueless, otherwise they could save the money and do it themselves. Requirements are ambiguous for the same reason: If I come to you and say that I think I'd like programme foo to do bar, it is also your job to explain to me if foo doing bar is a stupid idea and I better do something completely different. So, all in all, even in the most asocial of jobs, you'll have to communicate with someone. Maybe working on people skills might open other more interesting doors you haven't thought of.
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#4 Post by bentHnau »

@GarryRicketson

Well the thread title was a lazy title. :)

I meant that I didn't have the self-motivation to create any kind of portfolio or personal project, self-learn lots of language details, or keep up with a lot technology developments (all of which I assume is necessary for developers). So I don't think being a developer is a good idea.

I'm trying to start a new career from scratch and wondering which one suits me best. I'm motivated to learn new things on my own, I'm just bad with tons of details and I tend to settle into my old skills without outside motivation (job or course). I don't want to be less "lazy." If nothing suits me, I'll stick with being an editor (I just edit technical documents, by the way).

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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#5 Post by kedaha »

Maybe you could do something similar to this?
My idea was to start by selling a few web services so, I asked in a couple of small computer shops in my town if they'd be interested in selling
1. domains
2. websites (with business options like including dolibarr)
3. email (full encryption with spf, dkim & dmarc).
which I could set up on my dedicated server/s, and they both said yes.
Well, that was quite some time ago and I still haven't got round to it partly due to laziness but mainly I think because:
a) I couldn't provide a proper backup (and I still need to learn how to do this with minimal interruption to services),
b) I still haven't learned how to limit the quota of disk space for both email and websites.
c) My resources are very limited.
d) The potential customers don't have a clue about making their own website so I'd probably have to set something up for them as well, which I'm slowly learning even though I don't like it very much.
e) I refuse on principle to use a third-party control panel which would result in more work if quite a few orders started coming in.
The idea would be to start locally and deal with the customers personally and in the future try and extend it beyond.
I know that there are thousands of competitors out there so what would make such services different?
They would be based 100% on Debian software for a start.
I've got everything more or less in position and one day maybe I'll take the plunge and, with a bit of luck, i might even be able to make some beer money from my hobby. :wink:
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#6 Post by golinux »

Even Dr. Phil couldn't answer your question. That's something you'll have to figure out on your own.
May the FORK be with you!

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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#7 Post by GarryRicketson »

Who is Dr.Phil ?

Now there is a idea, start a "Dear Abby", or "Ann Landers" type forum, Everyone can view the questions, or "story about the problem", however to be able to read the answers, or ask for advice, you must register, to register and join would not be for free, there would be a
low fee.
There may be a lot of other boards, similar and "for free", but they are packed full of advertising, and that is how they make their money.

Did the OP know there also are companies out there that will and do actually pay people
to do searches, ?
But it all boils down to , "One needs to stop being Lazy", maybe a doctor can help with that, first steps are to determine what is causing the person to be "lazy", it can be anything ranging from a vitamin deficiency , to a severe neurological disorder like Narcolepsy and is treatable.
Narcoleptics are often called "lazy", because we need and do take naps, but that does
not mean we are lazy.

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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#8 Post by kedaha »

Someone I know says that in some engineering company, they value laziness because lazy people can be better at finding easier, less laborious ways of doing things; so intelligent people can be lazy. He gave me an example, which was something like this:
A workman kept having to go up and down some stairs to check something; naturally he got fed up with this and found a solution which was to attach a doll to a long piece of string and when it started dancing, he knew it was time to go upstairs and check whatever it was that was vibrating.
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#9 Post by deborah-and-ian »

bentHnau wrote:I meant that I didn't have the self-motivation to create any kind of portfolio or personal project, self-learn lots of language details, or keep up with a lot technology developments (all of which I assume is necessary for developers).
If you don't feel like keeping up with technology developments, I'm afraid you might be entirely in the wrong field. Everything changes rapidly on a 5y basis and I'm afraid that there aren't that many jobs where someone wants you to maintain systems with deprecated or unpopular technology -- as justified or unjustified as this sometimes might be.
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#10 Post by Hallvor »

kedaha wrote:Someone I know says that in some engineering company, they value laziness because lazy people can be better at finding easier, less laborious ways of doing things; so intelligent people can be lazy.
“I choose a lazy person to do a hard job. Because a lazy person will find an easy way to do it.” - Bill Gates.

It explains a thing or two about their products.

:lol:
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#11 Post by kedaha »

When I was a student, there was a subject I really disliked. Our tutor gave us reams of photocopies and bibliography which were impossible to study, let alone synthesize. There were to be two exams, and as they day of reckoning drew nigh, my trepidation :shock: increased; I looked at the pile of course work and didn't know where to begin. Finally I threw all the stuff in the bin two days before the exam and then went to the library and read the article about the subject in an encyclopaedia about six or seven times over (this was in the days before the internet). I took both exams and passed them with flying colours and even got better grades than some of my fellow students. I'm not proud of this "achievement" but I did study for other exams properly where this "workaround" wouldn't have worked. Maybe the result of saving time in this subject resulted in my doing better in other exams so laziness may be a way to save energy. :wink:
Later I mentioned the matter to my uncle who told me he'd once used exactly the same technique saying, "Why bother to make a synthesis of something if it's already been done before?"
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#12 Post by alan stone »

bentHnau wrote:I'm a freelance technical editor and I don't much like it ...
I'd rather choose something I can do from home/part time/freelance.
Any ideas?
How about starting with why?

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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#13 Post by acewiza »

kedaha wrote:Maybe the result of saving time in this subject resulted in my doing better in other exams so laziness may be a way to save energy. :wink:
I may appear to be lazy, but it's just efficiency in disguise. :)
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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#14 Post by HuangLao »

I agree, start with Why? Then also, what do you meany by lazy? When I was in the military we viewed anyone sleeping after 4.30a-5a to be lazy. :lol:

Perhaps, write technical articles, lots of lazy writers at yahoo anymore, also lazy editors. Start a blog, start your own consulting business, set your own hours, all depends on your answer to why, and your definition of lazy.

If you are truly lazy move to a Socialist country and kick back on the pennies they throw your way each month. Food rations and all. :twisted:

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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#15 Post by Gary K »

I thought about QA, but I don't know. I want to avoid a job that would require me to continually learn tons of new skills/technologies (a small amount is ok). Going back to school is not an option (except maybe community college). I need very little money (way beneath poverty line). I'd rather choose something I can do from home/part time/freelance.

Any ideas?
Well, if you don't like learning you could always flip burgers, be a garbage collector, work on an assembly line, etc....

Guess I've never understood people who don't like learning. There is an old saying that addresses this idea: The day you stop learning is the day you die. Sounds as if you're pretty close to dying to me.

I'm an old retired guy, and I still spend time learning: five or six hours every day. I'm physically dying, bad heart, but my curiousity keeps me reading and learning. It's that curiousity about things that most likely keeps me alive. To tell the truth, I pity the person who has so little curiousity about whatever they find in life that learning is something they think is a negative.

Any job that will keep a person's interest over any length of time is going to require learning. Just taking pride in your skill level at that job means thinking about it and thus learning on a continuing basis. An artist, whether they be a musician, writer, or painter, learns until they die. A professional basketball player continually learns. A carpenter is always learning. Anyone who is any good at what they do learns every day. Anyone who takes pride in doing a job well will always be looking at how they can do their job better.

I don't think you know who you are for you seemingly look at work as something to be endured and something you want to put as little effort into as possible. If you knew who you are you would know what you love doing. Find what you love doing and you will never "work" a day in your life, and you will love learning until the day you die.

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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#16 Post by HuangLao »

Gary K wrote:
I thought about QA, but I don't know. I want to avoid a job that would require me to continually learn tons of new skills/technologies (a small amount is ok). Going back to school is not an option (except maybe community college). I need very little money (way beneath poverty line). I'd rather choose something I can do from home/part time/freelance.

Any ideas?
Well, if you don't like learning you could always flip burgers, be a garbage collector, work on an assembly line, etc....

Guess I've never understood people who don't like learning. There is an old saying that addresses this idea: The day you stop learning is the day you die. Sounds as if you're pretty close to dying to me.

I'm an old retired guy, and I still spend time learning: five or six hours every day. I'm physically dying, bad heart, but my curiousity keeps me reading and learning. It's that curiousity about things that most likely keeps me alive. To tell the truth, I pity the person who has so little curiousity about whatever they find in life that learning is something they think is a negative.

Any job that will keep a person's interest over any length of time is going to require learning. Just taking pride in your skill level at that job means thinking about it and thus learning on a continuing basis. An artist, whether they be a musician, writer, or painter, learns until they die. A professional basketball player continually learns. A carpenter is always learning. Anyone who is any good at what they do learns every day. Anyone who takes pride in doing a job well will always be looking at how they can do their job better.

I don't think you know who you are for you seemingly look at work as something to be endured and something you want to put as little effort into as possible. If you knew who you are you would know what you love doing. Find what you love doing and you will never "work" a day in your life, and you will love learning until the day you die.
+infinity

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Re: Tech Career For A Lazy Person?

#17 Post by kedaha »

(This is tongue-in-cheek :wink: ).
I think that running a Debian stable server is the ideal system for a Lazy Person. The only caveat is that getting everything up and running involves a lot of hard work but the reward is that when the initial work is over, then one can sit back idly, for example on a deck chair in some sunny location 8) , while the system just works. Administrative efforts are reduced to a minimum and apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade and backing up the system are at the pinnacle of systems maintenance.
But good things come to an end; current stable becomes old stable or even to oldold stable and "end-of-life" or EOL is reached when the systems administrator must stir from his habitual lethargy and upgrade, which can be a bit of a bummer.
Conclusion: Hint: A Tech Career using Debian stable may well be a solution to the problem.
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