

On eBay: 2-Hour Remote Pair Programming session with Kent Beck - petercooper
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=180375524276

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petercooper
I think this is pretty cool. I'd actually pay good money to have even a two
hour conversation with a lot of the luminaries around here, so two hours of
coding with Kent Beck must be a pretty awesome idea to someone.

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david927
I feel really lucky. Back in 1999, I was working in Zurich and found out Kent
was living there at the time, so I figured out a way to have lunch with him.
He talked about XP with such passion; it's a great memory.

Back on topic, I think it's a fun idea, and the winner will certainly get
his/her money's worth at any amount.

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heyrhett
Kent is obviously not trying to pay the rent with this ebay auction listing.
It's just a fun way for him to market himself. It seems like people haven't
used ebay for cute stuff like this in a while.

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pmichaud
It's really interesting. On the one hand, what a way to capitalize on your
cred in the community. On the other hand, it's risky because it makes him
appear desperate for money. In any case, I wonder if this could be a new sort
of business model for the master developer.

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projectileboy
Interesting point. I wouldn't call it desperation; I think it's more of an
interesting experiment. If you read Kent's blog, it sounds like he's exploring
different ways that programmers can monetize their work. This is certainly one
way for a very capable programmer; I can't even imagine how much I'd learn
spending two hours coding with, say, John Carmack (or even Kent Beck :^). I
could easily see spending a few hundred dollars for that.

I could also see this being a good way for a programmer to make money who
isn't necessarily a rock star, but has deep knowledge of a particular library
or some such. I once had to write a GUI in C#, and after working on it for a
couple months I would have paid a few hundred dollars to spend four hours with
someone who could have answered all of my arcane questions in one fell swoop.

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grandalf
Totally... I imagine I could learn a lot from various HN readers who would
charge about $150 per hour...

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pibefision
VNC + Skype. Any other tool can we add to work remotely?

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Shamiq
Etherpad?

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jodrellblank
What would you aim to get from a two hour programming session with a complete
stranger who hasn't seen your project?

Would you really expect to get useful work done, or would it be an excuse for
you to have a two hour chat with Mr Beck?

