Lingghezhi goes private

I always did enjoy working on computers. Let's just say it goes back a long way, along a road full of memories. Memories with meanings far deeper than I care to share here.

As most of my readers and fellow college-mates know, I service laptops. A few even know I helped setup wireless networks here and there in this little University town. I am especially famous for bragging about linux whenever someone asks me about it. Countless tales have been told in Charaka The Lair of Kings of the wonders of it.

Laptops used to just end up in my room every other month or so, mostly because I used to camp at the library all day long back in my first year. The word of my then informal services and my great move-out into the Acharyan kingdom happened about the same time. Somehow, this has resulted in a very interesting experiment of how word-of-mouth advertising actually works. I do absolutely nothing. And people somehow magically know I can do their laptops. This worked greatly in my favour because of my interest in seeing how far a machine can be tweaked and optimised.

And then things got busy.

In short, I am the guy everyone here calls when their laptop fucks up.

And I did it all pro bono publico.

And who could resist the free service? Send in your laptop on Friday. Come collect on Monday, and you will have a laptop that behaves like it was bought yesterday.

And this went on, with some weekends where I slept in the same room with 4 other laptops.

One fine day, epiphany came in the form of an MSN conversation. And I decided that doing this for free is pretty detrimental to my studies. And more importantly, it was sucking up my time. Time that I could be spending with my angel.

So I wrote out a price list, had it reviewed by my friend, rewrote it a couple more times. And published it. And thus, lingghezhi's services were no longer as free as before. I priced everything below standard computer shop prices. But looking back on it, I think I charged too low.

Because if nothing else, I'd say business merely increased.

It wasn't exactly what I planned, and earning cash doing a hobby I enjoy is of course a good thing. But the fact remains, I'm a medical student. I don't have the time for this sort of thing. And so I increased the prices a little more. No change.

But now, I'm afraid things won't be the same. For a number of reasons, including those above.

And also, I'm now officially working privately. I cannot answer questions on this for professional reasons. Suffice to say that, this means I WILL have to reject some laptops if I'm busy. And my prices are now the same as corporate prices. Just know that.


lingghezhi
System Admin
signing off