
The entrepreneurial adventures of a coder living in a tent in the forest - alexholehouse
http://thomasbacklund.com/
======
thomasbacklund
Hi peeps,

This was a nice surprise getting on HN =)

First of all, I was a weirdo before I moved to the forest. But now I'm a very
happy weirdo.

I do have 4G (LTE) broad band, so Internet is almost everywhere I go.

I come from Stockholm but I live now on a trail called Sörmlandsleden, it's a
1000 km long trail and for the moment I'm pretty far south from Stockholm. But
the trail never goes out "into the wild".

I also think that there is a right time for things. What I need now is to
blaze forward with the coding. That's this phase.

I take swims in the lake and keep clean, shave once a week. Wash my clothes..
So when I do go into town to buy food or meet someone, I do not look like some
troll. So meeting potential customers is not a big problem. I just have to get
up really early in the morning to get there.. =)

I'm happy so many both here on HN and on The ListServe are interested in
coding in the forest and giving support.

When winter comes I do not know what I'll do, but coding in the snow is not an
option. But I will not surrender to any "normal" life until the startup begins
to move, according to my earlier pledge.

Thanks!

ps. there are no bears around here.

~~~
Joyfield
As soon i get my moped i am gonna go you. /John from Funplanet :)

~~~
thomasbacklund
Welcome :)

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mtrimpe
Somewhat off-topic; but if you're wondering how this became a story on HN: it
was submitted to the ListServe a bit over an hour ago.

The ListServe is a really cool email lottery where every day one person wins
the chance to send an email to everyone else on the list, and the results have
been nothing short of mesmerizing so far.

<http://thelistserve.com/>

~~~
zdw
Given that they have >22k subscribers already, the chances of actually getting
to say something in your lifetime are pretty low - assuming nobody else joins
and there are no repeats, it would take over 60 years for everyone to get to
post once.

That said, it sounds interesting, as a "15 minutes of fame lottery" at least.

~~~
mc-lovin
Someone should create something like ListServe, where there were that many
subscribers, but I had a higher chance of getting selected :-)

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grecy
I spent two years driving from Alaska->Argentina, living in my tent and
cooking on my little camp stove.[1]

I'm a Software Engineer, so I did a few freelance projects along the way. It
was perfect to get online somewhere, get all the stuff I needed, then drive
out to the wilderness for a week or more while I coded everything up. I'd come
back into a town, upload what I needed to and continue on my merry way.

[1] <http://theroadchoseme.com>

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virtualwhys
In another life, long before taking up coding, I spent 6 months in the
mountains of southern Spain (near Grenada) living in a Rainbow community where
tepees were the lodging of choice.

Amazing experience, obviously not much "work" getting done ;-)...except for
this English guy, lived in a crude stone structure on the range across the way
from where the community was situated. Somehow he had electricity, either
through solar panels or running a mega cable to the small village higher up
the range.

Anyway, he was a programmer (this is in the mid-90s, BTW) working for a bank
in England -- would mail floppy disks to his employer.

Looking back now, I salute him deeply, living on the edge (literally of a
mountain range) hanging out with a group of 200+ crazy pot/shroom/lsd huffing
hippies -- how he got any work done is beyond me ;-)

Time flies...

~~~
jonah
I had childhood friends living way out in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas.
They had electricity and telephone service. On a pole at the bottom of their
pasture was a directional antenna connected to a cordless telephone base
station. One time we took a hike down the mountain, along the creek and up the
other side. There was the homestead of the family who's telephone that was.
They lived in a hexagonal treehouse and an old school bus. They had solar
power and the handset connected to another home-made antenna pointing across
the valley. The father was a programmer.

He wrote software for parking meters and used a hand-held GPS receiver to keep
track of the ginseng he had planted in the National Forest.

~~~
sejje
I spent a good amount of time in those mountains, I have family with property
in Mt. Judea.

Wonderful place.

If I did what this man did (which I often contemplate), I would likely do it
on their property--I have an open invitation.

------
cygwin98
So instead of _ramen profitable_ , we have _tent profitable_ now.

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jhuckestein
I'm sure it's possible to sit in isolation and create a livable startup. In my
experience, though, the best things professionally, such as bizdev deals,
finding people to work with or making large sales, come from personal
connections. That is, people that you've actually met.

I love the outdoors and I love to code as well. This sounds super fun and I'm
kind of jealous of that lifestyle, but I'm not sure if it's a sound business
decision.

~~~
duck
Life is full of phases. I don't think anyone would recommend someone do this
for all their life, but for a time and place, it might be the best decision
ever made.

~~~
thomasbacklund
Thanks, thats kind of how I see it too =)

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Arjuna
This is awesome. Personally, I occasionally daydream of "escaping it all" and
coding by the ocean.

This piece reminded me of someone else who "escaped it all": Paul Lutus [1].

In the spring of 1976, he built a 12 x 16 foot (3.65 x 4.87 meter) cabin in
Oregon and developed Apple Writer [2] on his Apple II. He documented his story
in a piece entitled, _Cottage Computer Programming_ [3].

[1] <http://www.arachnoid.com/administration/index.html>

[2] <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Writer>

[3]
[http://www.atariarchives.org/deli/cottage_computer_programmi...](http://www.atariarchives.org/deli/cottage_computer_programming.php)

~~~
thentic
Boats provide some of the cheapest rent and best views in the Bay Area. Paid
less than one year's worth of rent to buy a 42' motor boat and parked it over
by Oakland where my monthly liveaboard slip fee is just over $500/month. If
you need to be in or around SF and are trying to save on rent, I can't
encourage people enough to try it out.

~~~
205guy
When marinas become full of thrify tech workers, slip fees increase, people
bid up any available slip (used boat), and real boaters are forced out, then
you will have encouraged people enough.

------
gizzlon
Wow, props for going "all the way".

I have to wonder though, is this a wise choice? If the product alone, e.g. the
code, is what drives investment it surely is.. But I would guess that's only
one of many factors. People are scared away from others that are too different
when it comes to things like behaviour and clothing.

How long can he live in the forest before he's too "weird" to make meaningful
connections to customers and investors? My guess is 2 days =/

Unless you're running a b2c SaaS, this might not be a good idea.

~~~
vickytnz
He does say "until my startup takes off". I don't think this is really that
much different from the kid who kept sneaking into a big corp's office (was it
YCombinator?) and sleeping under a table in a sleeping bag until he got
caught. He's also wisely doing this during a Swedish summer, where the
daylight hours are so extreme that everyone's behaviour changes anyway (well,
that's what we get here in England anyhow….)

~~~
gizzlon
Well, isn't it hard to make a startup take off without ever physically
interacting with other people?

A few years ago I was writing my master's thesis, and because I was in a hurry
at the end and I didn't have any lectures I was spending a lot of time more or
less alone. After only a few days with limited human interaction I picked up
some strange behaviours. Nothing major. But surely stuff other people with
normal social skills could pick up on. Like humming when I was getting my
groceries and my small talk was way off. Unlike him, I had access to a shower
and clean clothes. (actually, showering each day is kind of a waste of time if
you spend it alone anyway ;)

------
cobrausn
Couldn't help but notice that his April entry refers to 'trying out new
wilderness recipes', and his next May entry refers to 'a rough time with food
poisoning'.

~~~
thomasbacklund
Haha, yeah.. But the food poisoning come from some nasty sliced pepper salami
I had for dinner. (Can't even think about them..) That was one b a d day.....
Luckily a friend of mine did a rescue mission and brought me some coke and
salts in the evening.. =)

~~~
cobrausn
Hah, good to hear it. I've had a similar experience with chorizo... I used to
love that wonderful spiced sausage. We are no longer on speaking terms.

Thanks for the post - it's rekindled my interest in spending some time
outdoors, though I'll have to wait till the temperature returns to something
reasonable.

------
micro_cam
Now my coworkers can't think i'm the weirdest coder ever for moving to
Montana...at least i'm in a house!

Also to offer a prospective, while this sort of thing does change ones ability
to interact personally I've found that it is also a hugh boost for
productivity...I can code for hours, go climb a mountain to clear my mind and
then keep coding.

It also seems like Thomas has found a great way to get publicity depending on
what his target demographic is.

------
kpennell
This is really cool and I'm glad to hear of someone doing this. Having the
time to learn and work is key. It's hard to make any real progress when you're
still trying to maintain a social life and work full time.

An idea: It might be much much easier to simply move to Mexico or Thailand.
You could live on around $200-300 USD per month if you made your own food and
you'd probably be a lot more comfortable than living in the woods (though I
think that's amazing in its own way too).

Does anyone know of any dev boot camps or coworking spaces in the "developing
world" that I should check out?

~~~
nileshtrivedi
Or India. I live in Udaipur and there are many people from US/Europe staying
here for months. $300/mo will take care of both food and stay. You can even
teach language to make some money. I know a few people who have been living
here like this for last 6 years.

~~~
kpennell
Thanks!

------
processing
Get out of the building - love it!

Currently doing something similar - not a coder though, I'm living on Rugen
Island in Germany. Made my first fire last night (embarrassed to say I'm 32
years old) and it gave me a kind of satisfaction I've not felt for a long
time.

Feeling a lot more creative out here - enjoying being reconnected to nature.
Spent 3 months in Brooklyn earlier in the year - the contrast is unreal. For
me living in the city feels so toxic now. I want to make this a more permanent
living arrangement - that's my next goal.

------
tyleregeto
I absolutely love this. I'm jealous. I've been thinking about doing this, even
if just once per year for 1-2 weeks. Some type of personal code jam, a chance
to fully focus on personal projects distraction free.

I just did some research into the solar panels, they look fantastic but
they're a little pricey. (~1000$ each) A little more digging gives me the
impression that one could fairly easily DIY similar solar panels for
considerable less, though obviously at much less quality.

~~~
sadkingbilly
Why not just rent a cabin in the woods with 2 weeks vacation time?

------
INTPenis
Just wait for winter, Thomas.

I'm from the south of Sweden and even I wouldn't like to be living in a tent
come winter. He better stop coding and start building some proper shelter. ;)

~~~
thomasbacklund
As they say "winter is coming".. Yeah, when winter does come it will be hard
using the electronics.. We'll see where I'll go then I guess.

------
volaski
But what about wi-fi? Even if his thing doesn't require Internet, still, no
Stackoverflow?

~~~
sdfjkl
Apparently Swedish forests have 3G coverage.

~~~
hirsch
Our 3G and 4G networks is quite good, I've good connection in both of my
summer houses - which basically is in the middle of nowhere...

------
avalore
The food poisoning reminded me of "Into The Wild"

~~~
ljf
Finally watched that movie on Tuesday night, I loved it, a very interesting
story - made we want to get outside more!

~~~
ciclista
Beautiful movie and soundtrack. There's two guys that rode a lot of the
landmarks of the movie/book on mountain bikes:
[http://forums.mtbr.com/passion/mountain-bike-version-into-
wi...](http://forums.mtbr.com/passion/mountain-bike-version-into-wild-
seriously-422085.html)

------
Mikeb85
Damn, I'm jealous... Coding, writing, or doing any sort of work is always
better outdoors, on a beach or in a forest.

Sounds like an adventure, and lots of fun. I frequently take long trips
through the forest, back-country camping, but we do have bears, mountain
lions, and the potential of blizzards in August (and laws that govern what we
can and can't do in our wild spaces).

I hope your start-up is a success, and if it isn't, at least you'll have had
an adventure and a story to tell (but I hope you success).

------
dharma1
Good luck! I think it's a great way to live close to nature for a while.
Camped once in the forest in Finland near a lake for a week with my gf, eating
fresh fish every day and drinking spring water is awesome, can't wait to do it
again sometime.

I also lived in a tent in London, in my garden, for 3-4 months (weekdays only)
while my house was being renovated and extended - it's fine. I did it until
November, in Sweden you'll want to move back indoors a couple of months
earlier.

------
adlpz
This is amazing, but I can only thing of the terrible screen glare issues from
working outdoors. Yuck!

~~~
thomasbacklund
It is some of a problem. Especially because I must keep display strength to a
minimum to save battery. But it works. I use the colorsheme morning (think its
part of solarized) in Vim and let the sun hit the screen. And then when the
screen gets to hot I move to the shade and use Jellybeans colorsheme.

~~~
dharma1
Really wish there were decent ultrabooks with e-ink displays for working in
the sun. This is the only commercially available product i've seen -
<http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2125333>

------
czbond
I wish more startups would spend all of their time out of doors in outdoor
offices. I keep wanting an outdoor covered workspace here in Texas, even when
it's 100 Farenheit outside. I think offices dull the senses, and separate us
from the world.

~~~
thomasbacklund
Agree on that. There is some overhead in making food and taking care of the
camp but there is also another peace of mind that (we'll see if) could be good
for your creativity.

But in either way, I feel very good on the inside now. No stress. Just
harmony. Still getting a lot of things done.

~~~
205guy
Everytime I see you reply to this thread, I have to remind myself that you are
actually out in the woods right now, probably sitting by that lake as you type
the comment.

------
jurassic
I looked into trying something like this and abandoned the idea after a little
research into the power issues and realizing what an ergonomic disaster it
would be for me. Props to this guy, though, for following his dream.

------
bayesianhorse
Maybe he is taking "Lean Startup" a bit too seriously ;-)

But otherwise great idea. I wonder how far into the swedish wilderness their
mobile broadband extends and how soon someone is going to rob him of his
posessions...

~~~
bergie
There is pretty good countrywide 3G coverage in all Nordic countries. I
remember uploading images to Flickr from tens of kilometres from human
habitations about six years ago.

Also, these countries are very safe. Hard to imagine somebody coming to your
camp to take away a laptop.

------
Sealy
This is so cool. Someone should set up a startup house that is a giant log
cabin in the middle of some remote forest (but with a fiber connection of
course). I would totally pay to be there.

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Tcepsa
Awesome, it's a code camp with actual camping!

On a related note, does anyone know if it would even be possible to do
something like this in the USA (short of buying a few hundred acres with a
lake on it)?

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techaddict009
Wow this is really exciting. After reading his experience via his posts i feel
like at least before i die i wish to experience such thing once for sure.

------
ank286
how do you do customer development in a forest, unless all your customers are
gorillas and bears.

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mtthw
This guy is living my dream.

------
dmitripopov_com
Reminds me of "Doppler" by Erlend Loe :)

~~~
ramayac
For the lazy: <http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1156439.Doppler>

------
Joyfield
A former coworker of mine.

