OT: Usenet Profile (was: broken sun visor mount)

T <[email protected]> wrote:

> VanguardLH wrote:
>
>> You're the same "T" in the Windows newsgroups to acquire knowledge
>> for free from there that you then charge your customers.  Expected
>> your same behavior here.  Maybe not here.
> 
> That is a distortion of what goes on over there.  I also answer a lot
> of questions FOR FREE.  I make a point of giving as much as I take. 
> I also frequently post tips too. And the time I take to do such costs
> me dearly in unbilled hours.  So please stop the distortions and
> accurately portray me.

In the last month, or so, for those newsgroups where our coverage
overlaps:

_microsoft.public.windowsxp.general_
Ask*: "Any xp friendly printers out there still?, MID <[email protected]>.

_alt.windows7.general_
Ask: "Thunderbird forks?", MID <[email protected]>.
Ask*: "Disappearing USB drives", MID=<[email protected]>.
Help & Ask: "Some decent browser besides FF?" MID=<[email protected]>
Ask: "Disappearing USB drives" MID=<[email protected]>

_alt.comp.os.windows-10_
Help: "What runs before login" MID=<[email protected]>
Help: "solid state drive" MID=<[email protected]>
Ask*: "Any ddns services you guys like?" MID=<[email protected]>
Ask: "Encrypted flash drive and the command line?" MID=<[email protected]>
Ask*: "Picasa sub?" MID=<[email protected]>
Diary log (not a tip)*: "Some excitement!" MID=<[email protected]>
Me-Too (not a tip): "20H2 went without issue" MID=<[email protected]>

* Obvious posts regarding your customers.  Others are unclear if for 
  personal or business use.  Sometimes it takes some drilling to find 
  out you're asking for your customers.

My retention is only a month to reduce the message store of my NNTP
client.  Granted that is a small sample from which to draw a conclusion,
but I've been watching your participation for a lot longer.  I'm not the
only one that came to the same conclusion regarding your participation
in Usenet.  I'm still willing to help, and have, even when you disclose
(not always immediately) that you need the info for a customer; however,
I prefer to know just WHO I'm effectively helping.  Hopefully you don't
charge your customers for the solutions you get here for free, but are
billing for only your time to implement the solutions.

Since you have proclaimed you are self-employed and have customers, how
can what you do on your own time using your own resources be considered
billable hours?  Your personal time to self-educate here, reading
library or purchased books, and web searches should not be billable to
your customers!  You aren't losing billable hours like you claim,
because it's not billable.  You are losing time to self-educate, but
that's your time, not billable hours.

Billable hours are the amount of time spent working on business projects
that can be charged to a client according to an agreed upon hourly rate.
... To charge by billable hour, workers need to track the amount of time
they spend on each client's projects every day."
(https://www.freshbooks.com/hub/accounting/billable-hours)

You actually have an item in your bills presented to your customers
noting how much time you spent doing research to solve their issues?  
The article notes that research is billable time, but then YOU have to
delineate those hours in your bill.  Do you, so they realize they've
being charged for your self-education?  Do your customers even get an
itemized invoice showing for what you are billing them?