dlou@thor.ucsd.edu (Dennis Lou) (10/23/90)
Okay, I got a 386DX PC/AT running at 20Mhz with 2 megs of ram and a 100 meg hard disk, SVGA, SoundBlaster, modem, etc. I also might have a laser printer in the near future. Well, this stuff cost mucho dinero for a poor college student like me and it's also depreciating very very quickly. I was going to use it for a consulting enterprise, but I don't know if what I was thinking of can/will go through. How can I use this thing to make it pay for itself? Does anyone out there have any tips/info on starting a word processing/desktop publishing enterprise? How about contract programming? Shareware markets, what's hot and what's not? (I know C, C++, Pascal, LISP, FORTRAN, BASIC and Assembly) Computer rental? Data entry (e.g. mailing lists, I know where I can get a scanner and OCR really cheap)? BBS? (It'll probably cost more to run a BBS for a year than the system is worth! :-) E-mail me here. Thanks! -- Dennis Lou Disclaimer: I don't use lame disks. dlou@dino.ucsd.edu "But Yossarian, what if everyone thought that way?" [backbone]!ucsd!dino!dlou "Then I'd be crazy to think any other way!"
cs161fhn@sdcc10.ucsd.edu (Dennis Lou) (11/01/90)
Well, I put out a request and many asked for copies via e-mail. Since the requests outnumbered the answers, I'll post. It seems like the overwhelming suggestion is for WP related stuff. Here's my original post and the responses I got.... (I hope the respondants don't mind me posting!) > >Okay, I got a 386DX PC/AT running at 20Mhz with 2 megs of ram and a >100 meg hard disk, SVGA, SoundBlaster, modem, etc. I also might have a >laser printer in the near future. > >Well, this stuff cost mucho dinero for a poor college student like me >and it's also depreciating very very quickly. I was going to use it >for a consulting enterprise, but I don't know if what I was thinking >of can/will go through. > >How can I use this thing to make it pay for itself? > >Does anyone out there have any tips/info on starting a >word processing/desktop publishing enterprise? How about contract >programming? Shareware markets, what's hot and what's not? >(I know C, C++, Pascal, LISP, FORTRAN, BASIC and Assembly) >Computer rental? Data entry (e.g. mailing lists, I know where I >can get a scanner and OCR really cheap)? BBS? (It'll probably cost >more to run a BBS for a year than the system is worth! :-) From grabhorn%gandalf.nosc.mil@nosc.mil Mon Oct 22 21:19:46 1990 I was talking to a friend of mine from Oceanside a week ago, he's got a buddy who's doing typing and making about 80K a year. When I asked my friend how many hours a week he was working he replied sometimes 6 or 7, 10 to 14 hours a day. But he said when things get slow, he'd take a month off and travel... Me, I couldn't spend that much time typing! I've been thinking about using something like CorelDraw to make and sell flyers to local businesses in my spare time (ha!). Menus for sandwich shops, flyers for real estate agents, coupons for the local video rental outfits, etc. I've got a laserjet II; you'll need one if you want quality output. I'd like to hear any interesting ideas you get! Steve -- -- Steve Grabhorn, Code 645, Naval Ocean Systems Center, San Diego, CA, 92152 Phone:619-553-3454 Internet:grabhorn@nosc.mil UUCP:..!sdcsvax!nosc!grabhorn From kahn@rufus.math.nwu.edu Tue Oct 23 11:55:34 1990 ********************************************************************* Learn to use TeX and hire yourself out as a technical typist to the math and physics departments and to Ph.D. students (to type their theses). (I didn't say it would be easy!) Daniel S. Kahn kahn@math.nwu.edu From grabhorn%gandalf.nosc.mil@nosc.mil Tue Oct 23 19:51:42 1990 ------- i'll send a message to my bud in oceanside on plodigy (prodigy) tonight and see if i can get more details. i really think one of the most important things you need, no matter what you do, is good word-of-mouth, repeat business, etc. i'll ask him how long his friend has had this business going and how he gets his work. i really like the desktop publishing/artwork idea myself. if you knew the software you could turn out artwork pretty quickly. how many time have you been in the local sandwich shop or pizza joint and been handed a menu printed on a "blocky" dot matrix printer? i've been in quite a few (well, maybe they were bars :-) ). but how much could you charge for something like that? that's why i think you'd have to have quite a few customers and be able to turn stuff out pretty quickly. actually, if you had a scanner, you might be able to work yourself into doing catalogs and things like that. does TeX let you print math symbols? i've heard of it but never seen it. another thing, take a look in the classifieds in back of computer edge. that might give you some ideas, or at least let you know what kind of competition is out there! oh no! bldg. 33! better hope we don't have a big earthquake!! :-) (don't you have an account on one of the nosc machines?) later, steve ------- From webdw@cbnews.att.com Tue Oct 23 23:44:45 1990 Take a tax preparer certification course; do tax returns via MECA tax program (easy to use). Then you can write off computer, assuming 100% business use, entirely. Put up pseudo-random number generator so you can pick lottery numbers. [people will really pay you 10c on the dollar for computer picked numbers.] Put up games and charge $5.00/hour usage fee; it's a lot cheaper than arcades. BDW From lancer@wpi.wpi.edu Wed Oct 24 08:25:50 1990 You might want to try a resume service... They're very sucessful here in the Northeast. All you do is get a good looking resume (or set of them) and advertise. People will come to you to prepare their resumes and all you do is insert their personal information into the spaces on the resume form of their choice. With a laser printer doing the printing and some good paper, you can quickly get into making some serious money! Good luck from another poor college student, Lancer@wpi.wpi.edu From ogicse!plains!uunet.UU.NET!microsoft!steveha@ucsd.edu Thu Oct 25 12:33:13 1990 I don't know much about computer consulting, but that is a good way to make money. Another good way is to run a word processing/desktop publishing service -- sounds like you are very overqualified for that, but it is likely to make you some good money unless there is a lot of competition in your area. Other ideas are more specific versions of the word processing/desktop publishing service: producing resumes, advertising flyers, etc. Good luck! --- Steve "I don't speak for Microsoft" Hastings ===^=== ::::: uunet!microsoft!steveha steveha@microsoft.uucp ` \\==| -- Dennis Lou | "But Yossarian, what if everyone thought that way?" dlou@ucsd.edu | "Then I'd be crazy to think any other way!" [backbone]!ucsd!dlou +---------------------------------------------------- dlou@ucsd.BITNET cs161fhn@sdcc10.ucsd.edu | Woz went to my high school.