Well, I'm still working for the old ball and chain on my one day off a week. The work is boring, and certainly unfit for a classicist and student of ancient languages (for even someone with a degree in mere English Lit' could do this simple task) but even so, the content is interesting, fascinating, in fact (like you would not believe).
Related to this is the notion of a new school starting. From the offset I have argued that the institution should be entirely autonomous and stand on its own two feet. In hindsight I should have stuck with the co-founder's idea about keeping it just between he and I (between the two of us we could easily manage the workload - both of us hold master's degrees). I suggested bringing in other people in the hermetic community. Another quite popular author arrived, then insisted on relinquishing the autonomy to the old ball and chain. (She already takes 90% of all the profits from all the authors [except yours truly] - which is standard in the publishing industry). So why give up any and all of the rights to someone else? It will mean that I am again, back in that... place, if I devote much of my time towards this new enterprise.
I remember once, a learned programmer giving a lecture (back in the 1990s) said at a business conference, "Never, ever, give up your intellectual property rights." It is the most prudent decision. As a result, I am getting cold feet about this new project. They have problems. (1) They're based in Taiwan, which probably won't exist for much longer in the next ten years or so. (2) Payment is problematic, they have to receive three confirmation codes on someone else's mobile in a different country, in a different time zone (eight hours difference), just to receive one payment. (Imagine that every week or month?...).
So, I will leverage it, Francis Uruqhart style, highlighting the problems of payment in China (where the co-founder now lives) and also Taiwan. I will make sure I am to be Vice-Chancellor (the highest possible position), or walk away. One of my all time personal heroes, Walter Jeremiah Sanders the Third did this after Silicon Valley laid off a spate of engineers, and he did extremely well, in very adverse circumstances. He made it work.
There is also another problem. This other guy that's been brought in has only a high-school education, so from a legal standpoint he is unfit to teach, being completely unqualified.
All that said, it seems to have taken on a life of its own now the old ball and chain has got her claws in. There is talk of a new website. My contact in web-development has become extremely distant (he is a conspiracy theorist). So? I'll have to get back into programming again. It's like riding a bike. Security is an issue, but research and study is an answer to that. Worst case scenario: I can forget the whole thing and simply focus on writing and translating books instead, and of course my new degree in law.
I have a feeling that just like my last degree, this recently awarded one will come in useful for one thing only: when we run out of toilet paper.
Max.
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