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I've been in web design and development for the last 22 years. That sounds ridiculous in my head as 1997 doesn't seem that long ago. I started as a HTML cutter and entry-level designer while studying IT at university, before ditching the degree (web stuff wasn't taught back then) to learn on the job and moved into web project management a year or so later. The next few years went into web production management at a number of ad agencies, before freelancing as a web producer in the early 00's until the end of last year.
I enjoy the creative and problem-solving aspects of web dev, but freelancing is frequently a hard and unrewarding slog. I chose the freelance path to support my then girlfriend and now wife's career, which involved a lot of travel (she's a triple Olympian, Commonwealth Games Gold Medalist and Record holder, was robbed of Olympic Gold by three convicted Russian drug cheats...we're still hopeful of getting the medal). After she retired from sport, we spat out a bunch of kids and I stuck with freelancing to share in the child-rearing duties while she returned to work as a paediatrics physio.
Flexibility over how I spend my time is fantastic, but it comes at a financial cost. The bulk of my work revolved around ecommerce web development and I made other people wealthy in the process. But over the last few years, automation from SaaS sites like Shopify and Squarespace has all but killed the small business web dev market, making guys like me redundant and my future was looking bleak. I remained the last man standing of my colleagues from the past two decades and kept afloat entirely due to securing client retainers and passive income streams very early in my career.
A couple of years ago I decided to stop working for other people. Instead, I wanted to build a couple of ecommerce businesses for myself - selling products is significantly easier than selling yourself at an hourly rate. It's cost me a truckload of time and money, but I wear many hats and can do every part of website design, development and marketing myself, so it's starting to bear fruit.
As of last December, I'm the Australian distributor for XIM Technologies and ConsoleTuner products at
https://modsquad.com.au, with a few more distribution deals coming down the pipe. There's still a long way to go to get to where I want to be, but things have kicked off with a bang.
For me, XIM not only changed how I play my games, it's moved my life in a better, more rewarding direction. I've been obsessed with video games for 40 years and I'm finally doing work that I truly love and getting paid to do it. I have enormous respect for OBsIV, mist and Od1n and the work they do around here. The same goes for Jefferson over at ConsoleTuner. I plan to live up to those high standards in my dealings with the Aussie gaming community.
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