
Side projects are like children - ryanwaggoner
http://ryanwaggoner.com/2010/10/side-projects-are-like-children/
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TamDenholm
If side projects are like kids then i'd be dragged away by social services by
now for total neglect of my 30-40 kids.

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ryanwaggoner
I feel like I did a bad job of explaining the core of my analogy, which is
that creating a child or a side project is easy and fun, but they're
potentially with you for a long time, and thus deserve careful thought before
starting.

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Kliment
Maybe use tattoos as an analogy instead.

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steveklabnik
There's an inverse correlation between the numbers of tattoos you have and the
amount that you care about getting another, though...

On second thought, maybe they are a good analogy.

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kranner
As someone who has had the same attitude in the past, working full-time on one
thing at a time that eventually went nowhere, I'm beginning to think of side
projects as insurance.

Perhaps it is more fruitful to think about how to work more efficiently in the
present and track potentially good ideas for the future, than to keep throwing
them away.

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ryanwaggoner
This is how I previously thought, but I've since reconsidered. The reason is
that you can't split your attention between multiple projects without a loss
in overall efficiency. The amount of attention given to each of n projects
isn't 1/n, but rather 1 / (n^x), where x is some measure of how bad you are at
multitasking. For me, I think x is probably somewhere around 1.5, so if I have
three projects, I end up giving each an average of 20% of my full attention.
The remaining 40% is lost to the ether due to distraction, task-switching
costs, and not having one project constantly be the main thing on my mind.

As a result, increasing diversification results in a lower overall expected
value of your projects, because you're losing more and more of your
productivity to efficiency losses.

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kranner
We might be thinking of different time-scales. I've probably never worked on
more than one thing on any one day, but if I had to do the same thing every
day for more than a month I'd be bored and dragging my feet eventually.

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antidaily
I like the fish analogy better. Feed a little bit everyday. Don't be afraid to
flush 'em and get new ones.

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ryanwaggoner
Does this come from something you read? I really like this analogy, though I
still think focus is really important.

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antidaily
Came from a startup discussion I had a long time ago. We were talking about
Google's 20% idea.

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twymer
I find comparing side projects (something of which we grow bored with a large
percentage of then abandon) to children moderately disturbing.

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dstein
You mean children aren't something that you can selectively nurture or
neglect, at a whim, until one of them becomes a rock star and pays your bills
for you?

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shawnzizzo
I get the gist of the article and can appreciate the message. I fall victim to
this spawning of many projects that I can't dedicate the right amount of time
to and they get some traction, but never really see the light of day. I'm my
own distraction at times; the latest idea takes away from the original
one...rinse and repeat.

I've recently realized this about me and started down the track of trying just
to focus on one or two projects and put the right resources behind them. This
is a recent "a ha" moment, so, we'll see how it goes. Good article!

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raganwald
The core assumption here is that the projects are a means to an end, where the
end is likely one of the "Three Ps:" Power, Prestige, or Pecuniarum.

Side projects are also like plants in your garden. Some people enjoy the
gardening for its own sake, and yes that means they are going to make a lot
less money than someone who ruthlessly weeds out anything that isn't going to
grow into a massive oak.

p.s. FWIW, I think of side projects as attempt to answer questions. I stop
work on them when I think they've gone on long enough to find the answer.

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krschultz
Has anyone ever considered selling their side project?

There is a market here. It is easy to see it from the point of view of someone
working on small side projects around their full time job. The profit of the
side project is not worth the time invested in it, and killing it is the best
course of action. But you have all that sunk cost (time more than money) and
no way to recoup it. Wouldn't you take a few thousand dollars to sell it off?

And on the other hand, if I were to buy up 5 or 10 promising side projects and
run them concurrently full time, I might be able to lower costs (economy of
scale) and extract some greater value from each one and the profit will be
greater than the sum of its parts.

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thibaut_barrere
I wouldn't kill or sell my children, but I definitely did so for side-
projects. As well, children don't bring me money (at least currently), whereas
the projects do.

That said I really like considering both as organic: you plant seeds, take
care of them and they hopefully grow.

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brlewis
My side project scratches my own itch. There's no way I'd want to kill it.

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mian2zi3
One drunken night and you're stuck with them for 18 years?

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fablednet
from what I can tell, side projects are much better than children! :)

