It depends very much on your current scope of influence. It can be hard to change a whole company, but easier to start with yourself and your team. Try doing one and see how it is received.
A previous CEO used to hold breakfasts once a month. It was really informal with a mix of people and a wide variety of work related topics got discussed. We could ask him things and he could ask us things. The setting made it really good for breaking down that communication barrier between juniors and The Boss.
In the town I grew up in (South Africa), there was a planning law that prevented the footprint of a house from being larger than a certain size. It had been that percentage for years and I'm hoping that it doesn't change because it's helped the area stay green and lovely without becoming overly built up.
Do similar planning laws exist in other countries?
In Washington, DC, at least in some parts this is the rule. The builder of the McMansion next door had to jackhammer up part of the garage pad when he discovered he was going over the ratio. Neighbors down the street bought part of a neighboring lot not for use, but to offset an expansion they anticipated into their original lot.
I can't speak for the rest of America, but that law does exist in at least parts of Atlanta. Most people are surprised at how green and forest-y the urban parts of Atlanta are.
There are two classes of payments - consumer and business.
This API is designed for business payments. Companies that process tens, if not hundreds of thousands of payments on a monthly basis. Think about the companies that sit behind businesses like Etsy or Uber - they need to take a lot of payments from customers and pay the supplier.
Many of those payment companies are financial institutions themselves who probably already have some kind of connection to programs like Visa.
I can also relate to the article because some hackathons that I have been to feel like you're building this thing that you know you are going to throw away. And events where you are able to use a new language you're under time pressure to just get it working rather than understand it. I'd rather spend a whole day on my own projects.
I've been to two other hackathons that are focused on attracting girls and women into the STEM arena (http://www.stemettes.org/events) but they don't exclude guys. The idea is more around splitting the participants into groups of different ability and helping them build something. I really enjoyed that the event is about learning/mentoring more than about wining prizes and I found it really rewarding to help kids that had some interest in coding.
The events are quite different from the 48 hour hacks because they are also catering for 6 year olds with short attention spans, but it felt like I was helping to show that coding is accessible to anyone of any age.
If you're a coder in London I highly recommend volunteering with them.
Not my site, but I think "Standard orders" go direct to you not to a warehouse. You pay shipping from the original seller, whatever they charge. You pay customs fees. Returns are going to be a pain in the ass - don't expect to be able to do that very easily.
For "anonymous orders", the concept doesn't seem thought through very well. Only 5% fee on any order from $1-$300? So I want to buy something from eBay for $1, you will anonymize that for 5 cents? I don't think so. I doubt you'll be able to do international orders anonymously.
I was in the same position as you but replace PHP with Java.
I thought I didn't need a degree but then met people in the industry that I wanted to be like, but I was limited by not having a degree.
It wasn't possible for me to study full time and I didn't really want to as I wanted to continue to have my years of work experience growing, so I signed up for a part time course.
Two years before my degree was finished I was nearly passed over on a job because I didn't have a degree so it really encouraged me to get it finished.
With the last round of job interviews there are many that said I would not be being considered without the degree.
If I were back in that same position again, I'd choose to do it the same way. Your relevant work experience keeps growing but you still get a degree - it's hard work and long hours but I think it was worthwhile.
The article seemed common sense. I've enjoyed reading the other comments here more and found the links useful. Does anyone have good reading material on your long term financial health? (Longer term than budget and save?)
