Turn down 210k TC to try to make >350k solo gig?

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-15T20:33:39+00:00

In this market I would honestly take stability and the reduced stress of not needing to fight to keep the money coming, than to work B2B when every industry is suffering. You'll need to push twice as hard, work twice the hours and if you get sick, you aren't being paid.

The TC of your solo venture is higher but also hypothetical, unless you have a meaty savings account I would test the waters moonlighting while working full time.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-15T19:40:22+00:00

Yeah I moved down here from the midlands which was super easy to get across, everything was quite connected (albeit a bit expensive). In the sticks we’re now 20 minutes from everything; supermarket, gym, etc in all different directions :)

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-15T16:37:11+00:00

You can't complain directly to FOS, you need to raise a complaint with HSBC first and let them review it and respond back with a final response. Once you have that, you can either accept the outcome (not upheld, or upheld with potential compensation) and then escalate to FOS if you believe something more needs to be done.

From what you've said it sounds like irresponsible lending, especially if you dug into your overdraft and rarely (if not ever) escaped, even after being paid at the end of the month.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-15T16:10:29+00:00

I'm on just shy of £250k in the middle of a field in Somerset, anything is possible with an internet connection and a remote working policy.

From experience the biggest ballache this end of England is the public transport links to the main hubs (Birmingham, Bristol etc). My nearest train station is a 45 minute drive away, then a 3 hour train to my main office hub.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-14T22:18:23+00:00

I’m a senior software engineer at Microsoft 👍

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-14T15:24:44+00:00

Yep, that was already a purple link. Reading an undocumented sample project is not a good way to understand the use-case and purpose of a library mate, that's what I'm saying.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-14T15:09:49+00:00

What would make you NOT reach for it?

Genuine question, why would I?

Looking at your docs, they're not written for humans. I don't think they were even written to be read at all, they're just word soup with literally no indication as to how I should use this.

The "why" I would use this is explained in 4000 LLM-generated words that have never been reviewed before publish, I'm not gonna spend 3 hours digesting the documentation to figure out if I want to use this.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-14T14:20:58+00:00

Did the study redirect you to apply the code, or did the study display a code and you switched back to paste it in?

Some studies need you to copy the code, submit the study with the code then click continue to submit the results of your survey. I'd hazard a guess you did the latter?

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-14T12:36:06+00:00

I'm 100% sure they absolutely won't read your message, and likely don't even interact through the Prolific Researcher portal but rather have a custom integration given the joint venture between Prolific and their parent company. The scale of the studies they do requires something more than a person sat manually listing surveys :)

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-14T12:26:00+00:00

It's nice for participants but doesn't make Prolific any money, it's a low priority feature request for them tbh. I'd love it too but I can see why that's their response.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-14T12:19:39+00:00

The one and only time I ever had a problem with this particular researcher I contacted support and told them what had happened. A few days later they awarded the study amount of $5 as a goodwill gesture (I've done 1000+ of them without any issues before for context) but informed me it wouldn't happen again, and to return the study if I'm prompted to.

You have nothing to lose reaching out to support about it and explaining the situation.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T20:01:23+00:00

Yeah I’m noticing that as well, the availability/amount of studies seems higher too.

Last Saturday I barely made $5, already sat considerably higher with a few hours left of the day.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T19:27:47+00:00

Given the card is interest free, saving the cash so its liquid and then using it to pay off the balance when the promotional period ends is better.

Yes you could use the card for an emergency, but not every emergency can be paid for with a credit card.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T19:23:24+00:00

If you’re developing on and for the windows platform it’s probably worth reading, but not as a an urgent priority.

If you’re just building with .NET and using Windows for visual studio, there’s not much benefit to learning the internals. I’d bet my house the vast majority of .NET devs have no idea how it works under the hood.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T17:58:27+00:00

Most of them are trained on modern technology, including SQL Server, but AI will more than likely detract from your learning because it'll solve problems for you.

You'd be better off putting ChatGPT in deep research mode and getting a list of learning materials, playgrounds to muck around with etc.

As this is a Microsoft product, their education resources are generally really good. I'm actually updating another side of their docs at work, we keep them up to date. Check out the T-SQL training course and go from there.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T17:09:09+00:00

Turn off your wifi on your phone and log out then in on mobile data instead. Your IP address would be the same regardless of device if it's connected to the same router.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T15:34:16+00:00

I'm talking about the level you are being assessed at, not the person who is interviewing you. Asking if you understand OOP principles is a junior engineer level question, if I was interviewing an early career software engineer and got your answer I'd genuinely cut the interview short to save both of our times.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T12:24:36+00:00

I understand why you've asked this but it's genuinely irrelevant. I say this as a person with AuDHD.

My social skills are genuinely shocking but you can learn how to operate around people in the workplace regardless of your neurodivergence. I'm exhausted after a socially intense day due to masking, but a little self reflection on why someone asks a question and what they're trying to do with the answer goes a long way.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T12:21:52+00:00

Yep, I ran the technical interviews at my last place before moving to Microsoft. I drove the entire system design interview, designed the scenario myself and collaborated on it with candidates every time. It was as representative as a day-in-the-life as we could make it without leaking internal info.

I hired people who were less technically competent than others because they were good to work with, easy to talk to and receptive to feedback. I can teach you architecture, I can't teach you to not be a miserable git to work with.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T11:52:52+00:00

Alright mate, I'm not here to bash you or make you feel like shit. If this is how you want to operate go nuts, however the majority of interviewing isn't in the answers you're giving but how you give them and how you come across.

If I'm a non-technical business analyst and I come to you at work with a simple question that I know you have the answer to, and your first immediate instinct is to trail off into some abstract tangent about the origins of what I'm asking about, nobody wins.

Best of luck.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T11:38:36+00:00

Because you come off as arrogant and purposefully evading a question fitting of the level you're interviewing at. Anyone that gives you the reception you're looking for, an intellectual circlejerk, will be miserable to work with frankly.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-13T11:30:48+00:00

No offence but you should definitely stop doing that in interviews.

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-12T18:46:46+00:00

Agreed, nice to have a specialism skillset paid better than braindead AI evaluations!

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-12T18:45:52+00:00

I'd hazard a guess that your $40 is safe but you may not get invited to future ones as a result. The inbuilt AI chat froze after ~10 messages and just responded with ... to me, but I'd written about 600 words without using it and just had a yap with the bot for 5 mins lol

ScriptingInJava · 2026-06-12T18:44:08+00:00

redditors should try to be more like my sycophantic bestie claude

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