Just had a nostalgic catch-up chat with a long retired webdev (met through WebmasterWorld :)).
One of those who, back in the glory days, sat on a beach with a laptop for an hour before breakfast spinning up a hundred MFA sites, of which ten might last a week, one a month, yet sufficient to buy a new car then a new house, a boat, travel, a comfortable retirement...
Of course there was much more involved than just that hour, much more work than just spinning up sites but that’s the way she and similar spun the myth of AdSense gold without effort. The webdev equivalent of the swan serenely moving across the pond, the madly paddling legs out of sight out of mind.
Once the Google money train began to deliver in earnest she invested half each month in Google stock, which I thought hysterical and wise; hacking Google to buy Google.
I still have (printed framed hung) the email she sent right after the announcement of the iPhone: a picture of a hand calculator and a pic of the iPhone and the words if the pocket calculator was any indication the pocket computer will be transformative. And she then shifted to buying half Apple, half Google with half her Google AdSense income. When she ‘retired’ four years later (Panda)... well there is comfortable and then there is comfortable.
While I keep right on ‘empire’ building for the fun of it. Although there are occasions when I envy her ability to let it all go. I have grown attached to the dingdang digital critter. I used to laugh at the foolishness of Catz and Dogz, Digimon and Tamagotchi... no fool like an old fool and his pet sites...
Ah bah humbug gotta go a server is whining...
