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Any suggestions on good places to find freelance developers?

15 points by nickadams ↗ HN
I was wondering if anyone had any tips on places to look for freelance developers. See, I run a small web company (just me and my developer partner), and sometimes we get a lot of job offers in the pipeline and we like to have some freelancers in our rolodex in case we need to contract out work. Finding designers is fairly easy since I'm a designer and I'm in the community, but I'm not plugged into the dev community. I would like to know some good resources should a time come when I need to reach out. Any tips? p.s. When I say developer, I mean someone with PHP and MySQL server-side experience and XHTML, CSS, and Javascript client-side experience. Thanks.

31 comments

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semigeek
oDesk, elance - farm it out that way if needed.
Kaizyn
unemployment office, bars, Ycombinator rejects get-togethers?
wehriam
What's your problem with freelance developers?
wehriam
Try the 37Signals gig board.
lanej0
Your developer partner isn't similarly plugged in to the community?

Very well then... Colleges and universities aren't bad. Most students will work for a reasonable rate, and most CS majors can handle a little PHP easily.

RyanG
I agree. I worked doing php development during while studying CS undergrad. The thing with hiring students is that they work cheap, but don't expect them to get much done during midterms or finals.
izak30
Shameless Plug: http://issackelly.com looking for general freelance work to help fund my bootstrapped startup. I've worked extensively with each of those technologies.
cstejerean
Well, I don't know about PHP, but if you're interested in Python developers I can provide you with some references.
Zak
Here, perhaps, but you may find PHP is less popular here than average.
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wenbert
try philweavers.net - lots of talent there. i'm a php developer myself - i have some friends who are willing to do contract work... when i can't handle projects myself, i usually recommend those projects to them. i give them(client) the email directly so that both of them (client and reference) can talk it out directly...
edw519
I hate to rain on your parade, but something about your request seems backwards. Start-up designers shouldn't be looking for freelance developers. Start-up developers should be looking for freelance designers.

If 2 of you can't handle all of the early stage development work, then you need a third partner. Why would anyone any good work for you without getting equity?

Tichy
I don't understand that comment? Typically people work for someone because they get paid for it?
edw519
Sorry if I was a bit blunt. Let me try to explain it a little better...

This is hacker news. One of the primary beliefs here (correct me if I'm wrong) is that this is the best time ever for one or two good hackers to start a business if you can build something people want. Why? The incredibly low cost of entry, available technology, tremendous demand, etc. All you need is some skill, some smarts, a couple of laptops, and whole lot of determination. You don't even need much money. That's the good news.

Now the not-so-good news (for non-hackers). This is a sufficient condition. BUT IT IS ALSO A NECESSARY CONDITION. You gotta be able to hack. If you can't, then why bother?

I know. I know. You need both development and design. Design without development is a brochure. Development without design (although not a good idea) can be a sustainable business. Just ask google.

Many hackers here already do work for big companies for pretty decent $. And we're still unhappy because we want better. We want our own. A web/tech/software business has to be founded by hackers; anything else doesn't make much sense to me.

Didn't mean to sound so negative to the original poster. Maybe they ARE good hackers. But if not, they need at least one rock star hacker as a co-founder, not a freelancer.

This post kinda reminds me of opening a dentist's office if you can do everything needed except fix teeth. Imagine an ad, "Dental Hygienist and Office Manager looking to hire a freelancer to fix teeth." If I'm a dentist (who is any good), why would I respond to that ad? I'd just open my own practice. Why should hackers accept any less?

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icey
Maybe you should re-read the story. There's 1 designer and 1 developer in the company.
edw519
OK, you're right. But one could still claim that's 1 designer too many and 1 developer not enough.
Tichy
It's not actually THAT easy to earn money with your own startup. There is no guarantee for success. And it isn't that cheap, either - you still have the living expenses. Both factors combined can make a hacker accept freelance work from time to time.
edw519
Never said it was easy. Believe me, I know. Of course there's no guarantee. That's where the determination comes in. Don't understand how you inferred that I said either.

And yes it is cheap relative to other businesses. Try opening a restaurant with only 2 laptops, some determination, but no money.

I'll rephrase myself: "You don't even need much incremental money". You have living expenses whether you do something or sit on your butt. Better to do something.

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sosuke
I am always looking for great clients for my own freelance work. My problem is finding clients that don't want to gouge me. I stay away from freelance and bid sites because I will never be able to low-ball projects like those from overseas. When I look for client projects I check my local craigslist listings and so far I have been able to get a couple of extra projects a month. I have all the skills you listed in spades if you want to see some of my portfolio just shoot me an email and I will let you know the URL.
edw519
email address on your profile?
sosuke
Thanks for pointing that out, I had the address there but not in the about section as it should have been. It is fixed and visible on my profile now.
nickadams
Thanks for the comments guys.

To address some things...

@edw519 - This isn't a start-up situation. As I said, this would be freelance, (i.e., we pay them). And this is for client work that comes along, not an internal project that would be relevant to an equity situation. I didn't think that hiring freelancers when work exceeded manpower was that ass backwards...

@lanej0 - My developer is to an extent, but I was also looking for more resources. Can't hurt to expand right? Also, on your other point, it's tough working with college students because of their schedules. But it is something we've explored.

@everyone - I want to stay away from elance and the like. I'm not looking for someone who can low-ball the best, I'm looking for someone who can do great work. Also, job boards aren't the best either. They are useful for AFTER you get the proposal. I'm looking for resources so that when client work comes in, I'll have some names on hand to contact to determine if I can take on the job. It's kind of a preemptive thing. Too many of these job boards focus on the specific job, not the talent pool.

@tmm - A good way to find designers is to check out design galleries and design communities. That way you will be able to judge the talent pretty easily by the work they've done. A simple email will get the ball rolling. Most designers say whether they are looking for freelance work right in their portfolio.

Thanks everyone for the responses!

edw519
I stand corrected. Sounds like you have a large service component. I wouldn't hesitate to engage some of the posters here. IMO, this board seems like a cut above most of the others. Best wishes to you.
nickadams
No problem. I realize this is a start-up centric community, so I should have made my point a little clearer at first. And I do agree about this place. I haven't really participated in it until now, but the community seems really great. Much better attitude and more intelligence all around than others I've seen.
nickadams
I just checked out ProgrammerMeetDesigner.com. Looks like a cool resource. Very similar to what I'm talking about/looking for.