The Profitable Programmer: Creating Successful Side Projects
Many Rails developers have taken the big step of going out on their own and starting a consulting business. Others have taken the next step of creating web applications that generate at least some part of their income.
A businessperson would need to raise tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to implement an idea, but the Rails developer only needs an idea and enough time to implement it.
This panel features five developers who have created side projects that eventually became profitable through advertising, subscription fees, or buyout.
We’ll talk about creating an idea, finding the time and money to implement it, designing a profitable business plan, promoting your idea, and possibly selling it to another company.
We’ll talk about the skills you have as a Rails developer, and how to get help in other areas.
The panel members include:
- Tom Preston-Werner, creator of Gravatar with over 100,000 users. Sold to Automattic in 2007.
- Chris Wanstrath and P.J. Hyett, creators of FamSpam while consulting at ErrFree.
- Ben Curtis, creator of Catch the Best while operating as a solo consultant.
- Geoffrey Grosenbach, PeepCode Publishing.
People planning to attend this session also want to see:
Geoffrey Grosenbach
Topfunky Corporation
Publisher and producer of PeepCode Screencasts. Host of the Ruby on Rails Podcast. Blogs at Nuby on Rails.
Tom Preston-Werner
Powerset, Inc.
Blogs at Ruby is Awesome.
Chris Wanstrath
Err Free
Chris Wanstrath lives in San Francisco and freaking loves Ruby. He writes for Err the Blog, works at Err Free, co-runs GitHub and FamSpam, and is totally into spinal piercings.
PJ Hyett
Err Free
Err Free – Ruby and Rails Training and Consulting
Err the Blog – Rubyisms and Railities
FamSpam – Keep in touch with the people you love
Ben Curtis
Catch the Best
A solo rails consultant and creator of Catch the Best, a tool for tracking, sharing, and rating resumes from incoming job applicants. Also creator of the Rails plugin directory.
Blogs at BenCurtis.com.























