Walking backwards for Christmas

I went looking for some info about tax (not yet found) and ended up reading a brilliant article about freelancing by Phil Gyford [thanks to fidothe's delicious delicious links for that]. I hopped across from there to Matt Webb, mindhacker, who wrote well on the strange business of working out what to charge and how it can be influenced by the degree to which you think your work might benefit yourself or humanity.

This brought me back to my own situation, freelancing as I do: I’m writing a little software – developing an lightweight home automation interface at the moment – then also polishing the work of others, slotting in features, occasionally tutoring clients or the employees of clients, and quite often overtly using the information design and typography skills I learned at university. This is what is turning cogs in my head. But most of the social contacts I have are in the world of graphics and print history, because I volunteer for St Bride Library and that takes up most of my free time, some of my work time and certainly all my conference time.

I seem to be walking into the world of software facing backwards into the activities that were the springboard for that work, rather than forwards into the possibilities ahead. Like the goon I am, I suppose. And for how much longer?