The Brit who wrote an iPhone app in his bedroom | Hacker News Reader

The Brit who wrote an iPhone app in his bedroom

news.bbc.co.uk

18 pointspeter1238 comments

Back in the early days of personal computing it was common to see stories about young people who wrote a killer game at home on their TRS-80/BBC Micro/ZX Spectrum and made a lot of money. I find it refreshing to hear these stories about individual developers who do something cool on the iPhone and got recognition and money for it.

e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Smith_(games_programmer...

How does a Brit get deported from Holland?!

Apparently because he failed to keep his 'residency papers' in order. Although European citizens generally have the right to live in other countries it was common up until fairly recently to have to register in the country you had decided to settle in.

Resident registration is still required in at least some EU member states, even when one is a citizen of another EU member state. In Germany, all residents - including German nationals - have to register each change of address with the local authority/authorities.

Why did he write it in his bedroom? Did he not have a living room or some other more appropriate room?

I do everything in my bedroom when I get a chance, it's easily one of the more comfortable, cool (temperature-wise) and quieter rooms in the house.

Even though I technically have a more "appropriate" workspace available, I just don't like it. I piled a lot of my hardware in one corner of the bedroom, the bed in another, occasionally use a display to watch a movie in bed with the boyfriend. Surprisingly the noise has not yet been a problem, but the hardware in question is usually two laptops and a mac mini and a drobo, all typically pretty quiet. I have a monster of a tower for gaming, but that's usually not left on while we're sleeping.

It's all a matter of preference.

Some day I will write an iPhone app in the bathroom and make it to the BBC headlines.

Only if you do it in Britain!

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