It does not cost me anything to be nice

The footer of this page contains an invitation to mail me if there is anything you want to ask about one of the articles I published. Or show me your project to get some input. Or if you simply want to chat. Despite this people still mail me if it is okay to send me a mail about one of the things mentioned. It is kind of like asking if you can ask a question.

I am serious about the offer. You can basically send me mails about nearly anything. Technically you can email me anything, but I can still opt to ignore the mail. A non-exclusive list of things which are totally fine:

Basically the only two things I usually do not respond to is you trying to sell me something or impolite behaviour.

I had people reach out via email who simply noticed in a conversation on Mastodon that someone is looking for a new job. Send me your CV. I usually talk to friends at least once a month and many of them have either hiring authority or work in a team that is actively hiring.

Want to know how I baked a cake I posted on Mastodon? Ask. I might need a minute to translate the recipe to English - converting the measurements to whatever non standard system you use is left to you! - but I will get it to you at some point.

Nothing I mentioned above does cost me anything but a few minutes of my time. I often just kill some time with random entertainment. I do not mind doing something during this downtime that might actually help someone. Or just brighten their day. Why would I?

Let me take a little detour out of the digital realm. Last year my wife and I upgraded our gaming system. So we had two fully functioning computers sitting in storage not doing anything. Perfectly fine for 1440p gaming. We send one of them to her brother and the other one was gifted to our neighbours kid. Let me tell you that was a really big smile.

The hardware was written off as business property and the write off period was over. At this point I can either keep it around or replace it to have a new write off and more recent hardware which at the end of the day does not really cost me much considering tax implications. (Yes, this sounds stupid. Yes, this is the German tax system. Do not ask. This is more than enough reason for five to six posts of being mildly angry.)

I rather have someone enjoy a piece of hardware than having it gather dust in my basement and lose relevance.

This is exactly the same to me. It does not cost me anything (thanks tax law). So why would I not do it? I have spend more than twenty years building up our company. We are doing fine. There were many lows, there were highs. I had a lot of help during this time. I still receive a lot of help in various forms. I am happy I am able to pay it forward.

>> posted on July 29, 2023, 6:41 p.m. in life