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Well, its definitely been a while since my last update. However, I do have a good excuse this time.... REALLY!
I acutally too a vacation! Imagine that, a real honest, one-week vaction from work. This included my freelancing on Odesk.com. Pictures will be coming soon, but I have to weed out the family from the public ones. You know how it is.
Quick Overview:
So, back to Odesk.com. I've been looking at freelancing my embedded linux skills for a while now and stumbled upon the odesk.com site. Here is my profile on there if you are interested. While there isn't a plethora of embedded linux jobs on there, the ones that I have seen are from knowledgable buyers who know what to expect and are willing to pay for real skill. I did also sign up for getafreelancer.com and some other site, but with the nearly hourly email on those sites, its hard to sort the wheat from the chaff. They just really annoy me. Odesk keeps a nice balance of updates that come out, at max, once a day.
Some of the other sites I've been to don't let you know anything about your likely employer, so you're just kind of throwing bids down a hole. On Odesk, you get an idea of the buyer you're dealing with as both the buyer and provider can leave feedback that is public. There is also a ranking system and free online tests to help you show off your skill level.
Now, enough of the happy-go-lucky stuff. There are some gotchas that you need to know about. As compared to other sites, they aren't that bad, but its good to know up front.
Hourly Jobs:
This is what most providers prefer. Basically, Odesk provides a client that you install on your computer that will take screen shots and append your current status (this is generally updated every half hour... VERY good idea to do this as it prevents chargebacks). Each week, Odesk submits your work journal for review to your buyer. You do have time to go in and edit the entries and remove any times you weren't actually working on their project (very unlikely, but it's there for you to work on).
At this point, the buyers payment method is debited for the work you've done and held in escrow. The buyer then has a week to review your log and raise any concerns. You have two days to review/respond to the buyer(I have, as yet, had no concerns raised). If nothing occurs after this 9 days, your Odesk account is fully credited the pending payment.
That's right, you're practically garunteed payment in the hourly system. Also, buyers have the opportunity to contest the issue before payment is rendered. And if you're keeping track, this also means that 10 days after your week is done, you get paid. Now isn't that nice?
Flat Fee:
Now, this one isn't preferred by providers simply because you are NOT garunteed pament. With the client and review period for projects, you are. However, the flat fee are more like your general freelancing contract. I've yet to do a flat fee job, and I really don't intend to... but the opportunity is there if you want to break into the business, so to speak.
So, there you have it. I recommend you at least check it out to see if there are jobs you'd like to apply for. If not, just forget I mentioned it :D
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