"That sounds pretty cool. I'm not really looking for new projects right now because I want to spend my time on the ones I've got going already, but if you want, I can send you a list of programming resources* you might find useful."
If they respond with "But don't you like my idea?" or "You mean you don't want to help me?" respond with something like "I haven't done enough research to know if the idea is good or not, and it's really hard to predict how the market is going to go, especially in technology. I think it'd be awesome if you built this thing... I just can't offer much more than moral support, high-fives, and maybe a little bit of advice. If you really want someone to build this, try hiring a freelancer on ODesk... I just can't make the time right now."
Don't worry about whether the idea sucks; very few ideas survive through the full development of the product, and very few of these people will follow-through.
If they keep pushing, end the conversation with "Look, you're my friend, but I'd much rather we stay friends than become business partners." or "Look: I'm choosing to spend my time on my projects. This doesn't mean I don't like you, or that I dislike the idea; it just means that I'm not the guy to build it for you. I'll gladly point you to resources, or show you where to go to hire a programmer, but this is your project, and you should be the one to build it."
*Obviously, you'd have to compile a list like this, but that should be relatively easy to do.
My experience as both a student and a teacher (in several different schools) suggests that a decent number of teachers (less than half, but more than a few) become teachers mostly because they really like the power games that can be played in school, and the lording of authority.
I don't mean this to disparage teachers as a whole. But the power rush is pretty substantial, if one lets it take hold.
I had a similar experience, and am curious why you think you had the experience you did?
I grew up an unabashed geek in the midwest, and felt no more social isolation than anyone else in my peer group at school.
Some of this was because I played sports (not well, but this was a relatively small school so I wasn't going to get cut). Most of it, came down to two factors:
1) I didn't react to taunting, teasing, name-calling, or even the occasional bits of violence. I only really had to deal with this in 8th and 9th grade, but those who would do such things figured out after a while that I wasn't going to give them any satisfaction.
2) My peers respected people who were good at things. I was good at things (our academic bowl team won nationals, for example, and I had several short stories published). In fact, I'd go so far as to say most people respect people who are good at things, especially if that "good at things" is immediate and visible and public.
Frankly, if schools/teachers adopted a broader view of "success", and if they provided a chance for students to showcase their successes in a public fashion (I'm talking actual successes here, rather than "Congratulations! You're made of carbon, and that makes you special!" psuedo-successes designed to prop up self-esteem), a lot of the bullying would probably stop.
This seems like it could be really useful when paired with "The Gutenberg Method" (http://entropysite.oxy.edu/morrison.html), which basically asks students to do the assigned reading at home, along with some type of annotation of "Here's what to look for".
Then, in class the next day, the teacher answers any questions, briefly covers any difficult concepts, and they can spend the rest of the class-time engaging with each other instead of lecturing.
My suspicion (disclaimer: I was, at one point, a teacher) is that if you want people to use this service, you'll have to show how it improves instruction, and you'll have to do so in much more concrete terms than you have here.
That said, if I ever have a classroom of my own again, I can see myself using this tool when appropriate.
It can be a good teaching method or a bad one, depending on how it's used.
Personally, I enjoy having students come up to the whiteboard. But when we do so, I present it as the student at the board is a representative of the class. The whole thing is collaborative, and I have students who are sitting explain what the student at the board is doing.
What this means is that students who know what's going on are able to take the lead (when at the board), whereas students who are less confident can rely a bit on their classmates. The whole time, I stress "Look, we're learning new stuff and it's going to be challenging. Work together and you'll get it." This makes a different vibe than if we just sat and watched before I determine if the answer is correct or incorrect.
I don't use this for individual assessment, and I don't attach any guilt or shame. It's purely done to get students working in the Zone of Proximal Development and to get someone other than me talking.
I'm a few chapter's into Hartl's book now. I really appreciate how it explains most things on a few different levels, i.e. both the concrete and theoretical workings of a piece of code. I don't understand much yet, but instead of frustration (I've had a few programming books whose learning curves have turned vertical), I feel excitement.
If the start of the book is any indicator, it's a great resource.
"Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn (as well as "My Ishmael") changed how I view the world and how I characterize contemporary issues. The Takers/Leavers dichotomy, while a tad simplistic, was jaw-dropping at the time.
"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" had a similar effect, though with the Classicist/Romanticist split more than any other part of the book. Also: "Itty-bitty rules for itty-bitty people" made quite a few things make sense.
Some of this gets filed under "Growth Prospects", and some of it gets filed under "Autonomy". If your employees have challenging and/or meaningful things to work on, and an environment where they feel they'll be successful, that makes it quite a bit easier to stick around.
Not to say that grunt work is bad, but your employees who need a larger motivation than "It's my job" or "It's how I earn money" need to see how the work they do contributes to something larger than the stack of paperwork on their desk.
Assuming he makes $50 every day for a calendar year, we're talking a little ways north of $18k/yr, before taxes. Not the biggest amount in the world, but certainly pretty substantial by any reasonable metric.
Alternatively: $50 seems to me like a pretty reachable number, while still being large enough that it's not immediately reachable.
Though I won't presume to know the OP's motivations.
Yeah, but his purpose behind wanting to make $50 a day can dictate how you want to get there. Do you want it to be a sustainable $50 or are you trying to reach that goal to then expand beyond that $50? Whitehat / blackhat $50 a day?
So, the why is important for me to suggest to you how :)
If they respond with "But don't you like my idea?" or "You mean you don't want to help me?" respond with something like "I haven't done enough research to know if the idea is good or not, and it's really hard to predict how the market is going to go, especially in technology. I think it'd be awesome if you built this thing... I just can't offer much more than moral support, high-fives, and maybe a little bit of advice. If you really want someone to build this, try hiring a freelancer on ODesk... I just can't make the time right now."
Don't worry about whether the idea sucks; very few ideas survive through the full development of the product, and very few of these people will follow-through.
If they keep pushing, end the conversation with "Look, you're my friend, but I'd much rather we stay friends than become business partners." or "Look: I'm choosing to spend my time on my projects. This doesn't mean I don't like you, or that I dislike the idea; it just means that I'm not the guy to build it for you. I'll gladly point you to resources, or show you where to go to hire a programmer, but this is your project, and you should be the one to build it."
*Obviously, you'd have to compile a list like this, but that should be relatively easy to do.