b1twise_'s comments

b1twise_ | 14 years ago | on: Building a startup in a developing country: The pitfalls and opportunities

I'm a foreigner living in the Philippines, and I'm aware of a number of small tech businesses run by other foreigners here. Visa issues keep these businesses fairly low-key--foreigners technically aren't allowed to work on the easier visas to obtain. They tend to use their local knowledge to employ Filipinos as contractors efficiently. It can take time to find quality contractors, but it can save a lot of money.

Cost of living is low, but internet access and infrastructure issues can be problems. I pay quite a bit for 3mbit internet. I've had two power outages today. If you show up here and don't adapt, you will get frustrated and miss a lot of the benefits.

There are a lot of colleges here pumping out CS grads who are underqualified. They tend to look for work in call centers instead of programming. Filipinos don't spend money on the web, so targeting products at them is tough. Advertiers are aware of the fact that Filipinos don't spend money online, so ad supported businesses are not feasible. You need to earn in Dollars/Euros/Yen and then spend locally in Pesos.

b1twise_ | 15 years ago | on: Suggestion regarding "Unknown or expired link." message

I'm having it happen to me more and more often recently. There are situations.also, where it can be a huge hassle. I was reading over GPRS a couple of weeks ago and could barely get beyond the first page without hitting the error.

b1twise_ | 15 years ago | on: SMS from Chrome, fully sync'd with your Android phone

I use EasySMS for Android to do essentially this, but its compatible with any browser. I leave it open in a tab in my Firefox, and when I hear my SMS notification tone I go see who sent me a message and reply back etc. It is a nice piece of software as an alternative to this option.

I get a LOT of SMS messages, so this is a hugely useful application for me. I actually switched to Android just to get access to the EasySMS app--from Maemo/N900.

b1twise_ | 15 years ago | on: Ask HN: What is a good price for software that you license to schools?

I've worked at a fairly affluent private school, so I'll give you feedback based on that. However, you don't really give enough information for me to tell you what your product might be worth to a school.

- Charge annually. Schools are full of paperwork and approval processes. A once a year ritual of approval is easier than agreeing to a monthly bill.

- If it's less than 1k there's a lot less friction towards approval.

Caveats are that schools do prefer to host their own software (usually on windows) and can be willing to shell out large amounts of money for the right product (Blackbaud).