Back in the dawn of time (early 90's) and I was contracting in Houston, I would answer ads for programmers. When asked my rate ($40/hr) there were always those who would say "I can get a dozen programmers who would do it for $10/hr". And I would tell them fine, get that $10/hr programmer, you might get lucky. If not, you'll be calling me up in 6 months and pay me $60/hr to fix the application.

Couple of them did end up calling me 6 months later and did pay me to fix the code. I learned quite a bit of what not to do (grin).

>Lots of discussion about bad code.
>As a change of pace, I'd like to acknowledge a debt to one of the worst coders in the history of VFP.
>He'll be nameless for obvious reasons, but this man's code could be in the Smithsonian - it's that bad.
>Beside being an abominable coder, he's a marketing genius and he has strewn countless victims across the greater New York area.
>The great comedian Bob Hope used to say "I want to be funny, but if I can't at least let me pick the act that I follow."
>This guy was the ideal act to follow
>I had a great deal going for a while by just cleaning up his messes.
>The uncomfortable truth is that it's much more profitable to clean up after someone like him than it is to write good code in the first place.
>.
>Fortunately- or not - depending on your viewpoint, he's left the business and has his eye on a new set of victims.
>One of my friends in that business is cleaning up.