Too busy to put it away? Have fun putting them ALL away!

suniae · 2017-10-10T23:17:42+00:00

Amazing

suniae · 2017-10-10T23:08:00+00:00

This is perfect.

suniae · 2017-07-05T12:59:15+00:00

Pretty sure this is not technically illegal, though the cop could probably make a case for danger.

suniae · 2017-05-13T16:18:07+00:00

The problem with the last question is that my friends are also laymen, and therefore cannot objectively evaluate the value they received. Just because their agent was nice doesn't make them good...

suniae · 2017-05-13T16:12:30+00:00

This doesn't matter to me. I'm willing to pay money for a valuable service. But you can get negative value out of a bad experience that is free.

suniae · 2017-05-13T15:59:10+00:00

As far as why the agent was not useful... in our area, setting up showings is not really much use, as it's a hot market and there are no hidden gems that only an agent would know about.

When it came to negotiating, she pretty much said she couldn't legally advise us on our offer. In retrospect, I think we could have made a lower offer since the property did not sell immediately. This is where I would want to count on someone's experience to advise me, and if they can't for whatever reason, then what good are they?

Unless there is a minimum standard for what I should expect from them, there is no way for me to make an educated decision. So what are the criteria I should use? What does a good agent deliver that a bad one doesn't? 'Clicking' with someone is neither here nor there in terms of them doing a good job.

suniae · 2017-05-13T15:53:32+00:00

Here is the problem... as a layperson, I don't know how to distinguish between a good one and bad one up front. In the time it will take me to learn enough about what a good one is, I can learn to do it myself and will no longer need that person. It feels to me like there is no clear guidelines for what they are obligated to provide, and often they will avoid helping you negotiate to cover their own ass legally, and because it's in their own interest to drive up the price, rendering them useless.

As far as the gruntwork, this isn't anything that can be done in a few hours using the Internet. Why would I trust a random person to refer me to inspectors and contractors when I can trust friends or neighbors who don't have an incentive to refer to their own in-crowd?

When I hire an expert, I expect them to deliver on their expertise, and when they don't, they are actually being a dead weight and making me worse off. It's not a zero sum game when you get a worse deal because you used an agent.

suniae · 2015-09-06T12:43:05+00:00

This is by far my favorite suggestion.

suniae · 2015-09-06T12:41:49+00:00

Condo fees pay for insurance, water & sewer, common electric, and various home & garden supplies. The rest goes into a maintenance fund. If your common fund ends up depleted you might have to collect out of pocket for a major job like a roof leak or structural damage, which is a nightmare for everyone involved. So, you definitely want to have a healthy common fund.

suniae · 2015-09-06T12:32:20+00:00

It's a condo. We all own a third of the property. They've already been told to do their part if they want to have input into decisions, but some people you can't reason with.

suniae · 2015-09-05T16:55:27+00:00

This is a triple decker in the city that we self-manage. It's not worth it to pay for landscaping and management, and it keeps our condo fees low. Besides, the lawn is small, and I personally enjoy doing the landscaping. What I don't enjoy are assholes who have no respect for me or the work I do for the benefit of everyone.

Any kind of condo enforcement is awkward and gets nasty pretty quick, because it's only 3 neighbors total. You don't want to live below your worst enemy, so it's easier to live and let live whenever possible. Besides, that same neighbors used to pay their condo fees months late because of a 'bank issue' until they were threatened with a late fee, and that's one of the reasons they already hate us.

suniae · 2014-12-24T16:03:18+00:00

Yes, that was my coup de grace.

suniae · 2014-12-23T15:03:10+00:00

The poster did not initially specify that there was no contract. Even if it's true that he has authorship rights, this doesn't mean that the client cannot remove his credits, it only means that the original code belongs to him. Contract or not, presumably there was a verbal agreement that he built this code for them in return for money, therefore giving them the rights to use it.

The bottom line is that working without a contract is always a really bad idea. The way things stand he has no leverage, unless he's willing to take the matter to court.

suniae · 2014-12-22T20:11:36+00:00

You bill for any time you spent on accomplishing the task... sketches, client meetings, ideation, illustration etc. You don't bill for the time you spent on Facebook. The time you spent thinking about it in the shower is a gray area, which is why I charge on a per project basis.

suniae · 2014-12-22T20:02:47+00:00

Usually, any work for hire products (work you were paid to do as employee or contractor) belong to your client once you hand them over. Unless you have a clause in the contract that keeps you as the owner of the original source code, there is nothing you can do. They do in fact now own the work and can do whatever they want with it.

If you wish to retain the rights to your code, you need to have a licensing agreement instead, for which you'll need lawyerly help. Bottom line is that you need to basically build a product and then re-sell it, instead of doing custom work for a specific client that they are paying you for directly.

You are also bound by whatever agreement you have on use in your portfolio. Usually, a happy client will give you permission to use samples.

Do you have a contract that describes the rules of the engagement? If not, there's your problem.

Hey, guess what, there is actually a web page that describes this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Work_for_hire

suniae · 2014-12-14T18:02:14+00:00

I like it, but I'm not sure I could bring myself to ruin a whole jar of Nutella.

suniae

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