On my own

I have been working for a fairly large software company for the last 3 years.  During these years, I have been paid fairly well, learned a lot about software development, and have worked on a few interesting projects.  The experience has been good and I expect it to continue to be good.

Despite a positive work experience at my present company, I still day-dream about working on my own.  I would have my own home office.  I'd build software.  I'd make money.  In my day-dreams at least, it is so appealing.

Working for the 'man' is basically a fair deal.  They pay me fairly well, and they also handle all of the marketing, selling, lawyer-ing and whatever else is involved in running a company.  I know that my code is worth more in their hands than mine.  Without their infrastructure, my code would be close to worthless.  

Yet, the biggest issue I have with working for a company is that all of the software that I produce is owned by someone else.  If I quit my job or get fired tomorrow, my company can continue to use the code I wrote to make money.  It would be nice to actually 'own' or benefit from the code that I wrote as long as it is being used, even if I left the company.  

I don't know if this desire to be own my own will ever manifest into any kind of action, but the thought has been bouncing around in my head for so long, I couldn't help but web-log it.