

Ask HN : Where do you work (if freelance) ? - juliend2

I live and work in an apartment.<p>Most of the week days it's quiet so i can get things done. But as soon as my upstairs neighbor arrives from his day job, i have a hard time to concentrate into my work. I'm very noise sensitive. Even if i listen to music during my work (loud enough) i hear the vibrations from upstairs. The neighbor's sons play rockband on the wii i think and i told them to lower the sound several times but there's nothing i can do about it. I even asked the landlord to warn them and two weeks later, the noises are back.<p>It's a pretty shitty apartment but it's surrounded by trees and near of everything (grocery store, train station, etc) and that's why we choosed to live here. We tought it would be quiet. We hate the city. But we need to be in the suburbs to meet with the clients in the city by public transportation (we hate cars).<p>Where do you work if you're freelance?
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raffi
I live and work in an apartment and my nextdoor neighbors like to kick it with
the good vibrations too. I used to go over there and ask them to turn it down.
I've since given up. Now when I hear them kicking it I just start blasting
some techno or classical music. Overall I'm not that ticked at them because
they keep their noise to their post-work and before-bedtime hours. It still
sucks though.

I like going to a coffee shop or tea house sometimes. There is a nice a
teahouse walking distance from where I live. The only thing is as a
bootstrapped type, I've cut out the luxury of $5-10/visit to the coffee
shop/tea house. When I'm there, the noise isn't annoying and I enjoy being
around the people.

For awhile I was heading to the library of the local University. They're open
24/7 and its a good mix of people and quietness. It was kind of fun taking my
12" PB and hacking code at 2am on campus. :) I'm graduated now but may pick
that up in the future if my ID card still lets me in.

Working from the apartment, sucks, sort of. Try and make sure you're getting
out of it regularly. I go work out almost every day. If there is a gym in
walking distance, I recommend joining it. A regular gym visit does a lot to
help force a sense of routine and it gives me a break to look forward to.

Also,I have two computers I use for different purposes. I use a small laptop
for most consulting work I do. I tend to write specs and whitepapers so this
suits me. I find being able to relocate to my couch, read, write, and take
notes is a nice break from "the office" 10 feet away. I do all my startup work
on my normal computer.

Good luck!

~~~
juliend2
thanks for the advice! It seems that we have the same kind of problem. :-S

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symptic
I'm a student and I live in an apartment near the University of Texas campus,
working just a few feet from my bed. Freelancing to pay the bills, and my
start-up stuff to exhaust whatever surplus I have, which is--thankfully--a lot
more lately thanks to my new niche. Noise is high (especially Thursday through
Saturday nights due to parties) but I like having noise going on most of the
time. If I want some quiet, I can just wake up earlier.

Rent is high, but I see it as an opportunity to find a great way to work that
will provide even more surplus/tangible income when I move to somewhere
cheaper after school.

I focus on speed of production and finding several small gigs a day. As a
designer, it's a lot easier than being a programmer in this regard; lately
demand has been at $400 a day but I am only willing to supply $200-300. I
don't keep a backlog either, so my rates still have room to grow. This lets me
cover my bills and still keep my main focus on my startup (an iPhone app
currently, but I have several projects in line, such as
<http://www.epictee.com>).

Here's my setup. My bed is immediately behind my chair:
<http://i40.tinypic.com/e69085.jpg>

~~~
larrykubin
Your design work is great. I do my freelance work (mostly PHP) over at Cafe
Medici on Guadalupe once or twice a week. I lived on west campus when I was a
student, but was too busy participating in the Thursday-Saturday night parties
to get anything done while I was in school :). Send me an e-mail if you would
like to meet up or need someone to collaborate with.

I work out of my apartment most days, but usually head over to a coffee shop
(Epoch, Spiderhouse, etc.) when I feel the need to get out.

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PStamatiou
I work from home in a highrise condo (that I'm leasing) conveniently located
in the middle of the city. That being said a lot of my neighbors are much
older (35+) than me (22) and don't listen to loud music. It is dead quiet 90%
of the time with a remaining 5% being on the weekends when some neighbors have
guests over and another 5% for when occasional cleaning crews are on the floor
or when the lady above me that wears high heels is home and walking around.

As for when I need a "change of scenery", I sometimes move down to the lobby
floor where there is a secluded library that has the added benefit of smelling
like books.

Granted it is rather expensive and I live by myself, but it helps me to be
very productive and the fiber Internet line is always a plus.

~~~
Jasber
I'm in the same situation. When I need a break I head to the local coffee
shop. If that's too loud I'll head to school or the library. Changing scenery
often helps keep the juices flowing.

I find even moving around the apartment helps. I have a movable desk, so I've
been experimenting with working in different locations throughout the day.

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mattmaroon
Life's rough when you hate both the city and cars. America isn't well set up
for that.

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jayroh
for anyone who lives in the general Boston city limits (including cambridge,
somerville, brookline, jp, etc etc) I highly recommend checking out the Boston
Public Library (right under the Hancock Tower). It's quiet, there's wifi, the
Sebastian's cafe there has great tables and comfy chairs, and in the summer
the courtyard in the middle is absolutely fantastic.

I usually work out of my condo's 2nd bedroom (what we call our office) but
when I have the itch to get out and really get work done I head to the BPL.

~~~
hotshothenry
I work in Boston, live in Belmont, will definitely check out Sebastian's,
thanks for the tip!

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gravitycop
_I'm very noise sensitive._

With new technologies (including viscoelastic dampening compounds) you can
cost-effectively soundproof your apartment. Ted White can help you:
<http://www.soundproofingcompany.com>

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redsymbol
Currently work out of my home office - have for > two years. Regularly go onto
the clients' site, though, which I have found quite helpful in upping my
productivity (breaks the routine, and there's something about meeting people
in person that just rejuvenates.)

At first I was thrilled to work at home, and overall I still appreciate it.
But I'm starting to want to have a separation of work and home environments.
One of my goals for 2009 is to get my passive income high enough to pay for an
office a short walk from my house (I live in a mixed-zoning part of SF, so
this is certainly practical). If I'm going to work at all, that's the ideal
situation, imo - physically separate spaces, but near zero time lost to
commuting.

(Temporary - just until the passive income explodes and I retire to code open
source full time, of course :)

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kungfooey
Usually I work from home, but I also tend to head out to coffee cafes as many
others here obviously do. Unfortunately, I would think that for you the cafes
in general are more distracting than working from home. I prefer a noisy
environment for some reason and find it easier to get work done.

Another thing to check out is the co-working groups in some cities. There are
usually places you can rent a desk, or there are groups of independent web-
workers (like Jelly) that meet up occasionally to work together. There's some
networking involved, but most of the time the meetings are pretty quiet and
productive with everyone going out together for lunch.

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nickfox
I understand your problem with noise. I've had many people suggest that I use
headphones or play music but I find that equally distracting. I learned
something recently that might add some understanding to your problem. It's
called Highly Sensitive Person (HSP), you can read about it at wikipedia:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highly_sensitive_persons>

If moving to a place without shared walls is not an option, you might want to
shift your schedule a bit. Continue to work while they are not home and also
work after they've gone to bed. Then it's very quiet.

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vikram
Google SilentEar its a type of earplug, very effective. About $10 or £5. Not
sure about the vibrations bit, but people have to routinely grab my shoulder
to grab my attention, as I can't hear any noise or voice when I have them on.

~~~
russell
How about noise canceling headphones? Bose makes them, but I think there are
cheaper alternatives. I haven't tried them, but I would be interested in
comments.

~~~
gravitycop
_How about noise canceling headphones?_

1\. They are for use on airplanes.

2\. They do not work.
[http://www.google.com/search?q=noise+canceling+headphones+%2...](http://www.google.com/search?q=noise+canceling+headphones+%22don%27t+work%22)

~~~
mrtron
I went into a Bose booth in an airport (I was bored) and they were showing
people the noise canceling headphones.

The employee would flick a button after you put them on that also turned on
some subwoofer that made a huge amount of grey noise.

Now sure that is somewhat airplane-ish, but that's sneaky.

~~~
mattmaroon
I used the QC2s for a couple years when I was traveling the poker circuit. I
liked them a lot at the time. They do greatly reduce certain types of noise.
(You can Google for why anything sucks or doesn't work and find results, it
doesn't mean much.)

Then another player introduced me to Shures. I've now owned a few sets (most
currently <http://tinyurl.com/8eyhck>) and I would never go back.

The best way I can quantify how much better they are is to say that on a
plane, with the QC2s, I would have my volume at 17 (out of 20) but with the
Shures it's at 10. And the difference when considering non-ambient noise is
even greater. With these in and no music, you can't hear people talking to you
from the same room.

They're also significantly less bulky, and more durable. The QCs crack easily,
and really require a hard case if you're traveling with them at all. I did
have a pair of Shures where the earbuds separated, but they honored the
warranty even though it was a year out of date and even sent me a newer,
significantly more expensive model as a replacement.

On the other hand, I also had a pair fall out of my pocket, which is $400 lost
in an airport.

~~~
rms
Hearing people talking with the QC2s is a feature -- they equalize the noise
canceling to cancel out engine noise but allow you to still hear people.

What the QC2s have going is comfort. The high end earphones, namely the Shure
and Etymotic and at the highest end, custom in-ear monitors offer superior
noise isolation with sound quality comparable to the best in existence.

You can get Etymotic ER-4Ps for $174 on Amazon. They're comparable to the
highest end Shure earphones. The Ety's will have less visceral bass.

~~~
mattmaroon
The Etymotic's just don't have the range that Shures do. With the Shures, it's
a little jarring to hear that sort of bass without simultaneously feeling it
in your gut, the way you would from a speaker. It's that great.

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bkj123
When not working at a client, I work from home. I tried renting a very small
office but almost went crazy from the isolation and it was not cheap. Now,
when I need to get out of the house, I hit the library, coffee shops, or a
Jelly (<http://wiki.workatjelly.com/JellyinColumbus>). Jellies/co-working are
a great option. See what you think.

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jmtame
I wrote an app called NoisePact that makes it simple to tell your neighbors to
turn down loud music. I'm not really sure how far I got, but the idea and most
of the functionality is there. If you want the source, I'll be happy to give
it to you to improve upon (uses code igniter).

It works like this: you sign up, print off an invite sheet, stick it on your
neighbor's door. They sign up, and you can login and alert their phone via SMS
when it gets too loud. It virtually requires zero human contact, which is
nice. But like I said, I'm not sure how far I got this. I did it on a Saturday
afternoon to see how much code I could do in one sitting.

<http://phunctional.biz/NoisePact/?welcome>

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tptacek
Before we had an office, the three of us worked in the Oak Park Public
Library, which was excellent. Free wi-fi, very quiet, nice desks.

~~~
hugs
Wow... so did I (another Oak Parker!)... but OPPL blocks all outbound ports
except 80 and 443. So I couldn't do alot (like SSH admin of remote servers).
However, I did create an EC2 instance once where SSH was running on port 80 --
and that worked splendidly. :-) But I can't do _all_ my work that way. Did the
blocked ports bother you? Or did you get around it?

~~~
tptacek
Not to get too far off track for HN (and hey, why don't I know you? Should get
coffee some time.) but OPPL doesn't block SSH outbound, and I use Meebo for
IM. I still go there every once in awhile; our office is getting crowded.

There's a whole other conversation to be had about why libraries have these
crappy security gateways. Blue Socket randomly locks me out for "bad
behavior", but forgets about the lockout if you browse directly to the logout
handler. I keep meaning to go find the library IT guy and demanding that they
allow AIM.

~~~
hugs
(I just updated my HN profile with my contact info... Let's meet at the Buzz
sometime!)

Hmm... I think I was trying some wacky ports like "4444" (Selenium) and 5901
('raw' VNC). I also use a non-standard SSH port (not port 22) for my remote
servers. I'll have to give it another go sometime. And yeah, I know I should
be doing everything over an encrypted channel anyway. :-)

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hotshothenry
I have a hard time working from my home office (my bedroom) for long stints of
time because I get bored and restless really quick. I love working in like a
starbucks or something like that but I feel weird just being in there for that
long and only getting like a coffee lol.

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apollo
Certain libraries are good.. in some of them you can even get a private study
room with internet access. I would look at college campus libraries before
public libraries. And libraries vary a lot, so I'd recommend checking out a
few of them before giving up on this option.

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yef
Move. Treat the next place as an investment in your productivity and
happiness.

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jaxn
I have an office that another startup lets me use (for a few more months). We
are working on getting some sort of coworking space going which would be ideal
for me. Otherwise I will rent a small office somewhere (I can't get anything
done at home with my wife and 4 kids there).

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jaytee_clone
Library, still the best.

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ca98am79
coffee shops.

~~~
wallflower
What do you guys do when you have to go use the restroom facilities? I tend to
bring my laptop in with me since the loss of it would piss me off more than
the embarrassment of taking it with me.

~~~
marketer
Just kindly ask someone to watch your laptop while you're away.

~~~
larrykubin
I always just leave it out and go to the restroom. Maybe some would call that
foolish, but I'm not too worried about it. It seems like everyone at the
coffee shops I go to already has their own laptop that is better than mine
anyways :).

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taojian
We hates the city, don't we, precious? Yesssss, we do... We hates it and all
the nasty bright men in it...

