Author Topic: Making your hobby your career  (Read 3588 times)

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: Making your hobby your career
« Reply #25 on: 13 November, 2018, 07:47:59 pm »
Reading to the deaf?

About average for We Are Action On Hearing Loss Really Not Interested In Deaf.  They once refused to employ barakta because she can't hear a telephone.

But the RNIB are the ones with form for the molishing of audio books, shirley?

citoyen

  • Occasionally rides a bike
Re: Making your hobby your career
« Reply #26 on: 13 November, 2018, 08:19:32 pm »
My understanding is that reading audio books is also very poorly rewarded - unless you can pass yourself off as Stephen Fry or someone. I've thought about it too, as I have had unsolicited favourable comments about the quality of my voice (both spoken and sung!) but have never got a round tuit.

I used to do it regularly as a volunteer for the RNID when I was a student - reading text books onto tape for deaf fellow students. It was interesting, and a great way of broadening my own education by reading things I’d never have looked at otherwise. But that was the full extent of my reward - I don’t imagine they would have had funds spare to pay for it (though they did have a well equipped recording studio - a good use of their limited resources).

Mind you, with my voice, I reckon they could have operated a profitable sideline in selling copies of the tapes as sleep aids.

Anyway, if it’s something you’re interested in doing, contact the RNID because I imagine they probably still need this service.

Reading to the deaf?  Do you mean the blind?

Erm. It was a long time ago. I forget the details.

:facepalm:
"The future's all yours, you lousy bicycles."

Adam

  • It'll soon be summer
    • Charity ride Durness to Dover 18-25th June 2011
Re: Making your hobby your career
« Reply #27 on: 13 November, 2018, 09:29:38 pm »
A couple of years ago, in my spare time I trained as a Bikeability instructor, and also did various Cytech bike mechanic courses due to getting a bit disillusioned after 35 years in the financial services industry.  Helping millionaires keep their millions is a bit soul destroying....... 

Anyway, I've now formed a CIC to recycle unwanted bikes, run training courses and other more useful things.  One week in so far and 14 bikes renovated.  Definitely more rewarding from a human perspective.
“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.” -Albert Einstein

Re: Making your hobby your career
« Reply #28 on: 14 November, 2018, 09:09:55 am »
Many life stories on this topic seem, to me at least, to be stories of how one got out of a career and turned a hobby into paid income.

My story is a bit different as I never got beyond O levels so I never managed to start a career. Instead, I have been playing guitar on stage since I was 9 and have got by as a semi-pro musician. I say semi but in reality it has fluctuated between zilch and about one third of what I have needed to pay the mortgage and survive so I have often needed other jobs and lodgers to keep my head above water, financially speaking.

Many years ago I was curious about computers, bought a Sinclair ZX-81, wrote a few programs to help me with my then side job doing finances in the NHS (this predates the NHS having computers) and that led to a variety of computer openings. As music is what makes me tick, regardless of the pay, I have stayed mostly with what I love doing.

My stepson is also a musician, and very interested in computing. So along with recording and performing (as Cursor Miner - an acquired taste!) he did a PhD at Queen Mary's on the subject of, well, this...  https://www.eecs.qmul.ac.uk/~simond/phd/RobertTubb-PhD-Thesis.pdf

On the back of it he now has a job with a software company in Berlin - his first "proper" job which he started aged approximately 40.
We are making a New World (Paul Nash, 1918)