OpenEuphoria

To Kat

• Posted by Irv Mullins <irvm at ellijay.com> Feb 14, 2002
• 523 views

On Tuesday 12 February 2002 05:35 pm, Kat wrote:

> On 13 Feb 2002, at 14:12, Irv Mullins wrote:
> > Kat: if you could put even that amount of "intelligence" into business
> > software, instead of IRC, you wouldn't lack money.
>
> Not true. No one i have spoken to about a job has followed thru once they
> know i use a wheelchair to get around. Most hung up, or stopped answering
> emails. I stopped trying to get jobs years ago, and i stopped trying to
> volunteer. A computer might hire me, a human won't. Shit, it's assumed by
> most that i cannot write or talk, i am deaf and blind, and have an IQ of
> 50. Even on irc, if they find out, they stop talking to me after a burst of
> pity messages crap. It goes so far as to ask me for code, then we talk
> while i code, and if they discover i use the wchair, they refuse the
> software and disconnect. 

Kat, when I worked for a government agency in Atlanta, the best and 
highest-paid programmer in our shop was confined to a wheelchair. 
No one assumed anything about his abilities or IQ.
Well, maybe they did: everyone knew that he was the one to go to 
when you couldn't figure out some obscure bit of code.

I work for myself now, at home, and I have several clients in 
far-off cities who have never seen me. One I have never even spoken to, 
all correspondence was via e-mail. I did talk with his wife a couple of times 
after the project was finished.  Others I have talked to a dozen times a 
day. In no case have I ever been asked about my means of locomotion. 
That isn't the sort of question people ask when contracting for work, 
nor is it information I would volunteer.

Even my local clients, who can be visited without an expensive plane 
ticket, don't require personal visits but once or twice a year. 

You've certainly got the talent for this kind of work, and you can 
even make the current business climate work to your advantage.

If company X needs some software, they have a choice of:

1. Hiring a full-time programmer, paying salary plus benefits, etc.etc,
   and then keeping her on the payroll with perhaps nothing much to do,
   once the job is finished.
   If business were booming, they could afford this luxury. 
   Now, it's more likely they'll have to lay her off after the job 
   is finished (and say adios to any chance that she'll support the s/w) 

2. Paying a fixed amount for your software, thank you, have a nice day.       
   No layoffs, no hard feelings. Support isn't a problem - you'll be happy to 
   work out the details.....

Just a few thoughts.

Regards,
Irv