Coding Bootcamp (€5.5k): Yeah, or ney?

[monnffffiiiiiii]

I was thinking about doing Le Wagon, a 9-week coding boot camp.

The thing is that it's quite pricey, namely €5.5k.

The rationale behind doing it is:

1. I have a hard time building a company in a physical location that pins me down. Initally wanted to get into e-commerce as I have many skills for it (marketing, copy, content, branding, biz acumen) but that meant I wouldn't be able to move anymore (and I like moving, a lot). Building a fully online business solves this.

2. Tax efficiency. I live in Belgium and building an ecom shop in Belgium means getting murdered by taxes + regulations.

3. ChatGPT is an amazing software engineering assistant. I have already coded a few products for myself with it despite having very limited coding skills.

4. Valuable skills for life.

5. I have talked to two people who did it and said it was worth it. Overall opinions online are very positive but I am always wary about biases (if you paid so much money, your brain will force you to think positively about it).

The cons:

1. If I end up not enjoying coding or being too stupid for it, it's wasted money. As of now, 5.5k is more than 40% of what I have in my bank account.

2. We may be getting dangerously close to the point where AI will make tailored-built software for you without you needing to even know code anymore. Is programming smart or stupid to learn in the age of AI? I can't tell.

3. I could learn on my own, but that would take me at least 6 months, and I am not sure I'd be capable of it anyway. Here, you clearly pay for the structure, the fact it's in real life, the "networking", and the support.

4. I am absolutely not aiming at getting a job with this since I am already earning money on my own, which means it will take a long time before I can see a ROI.

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By far the biggest advantage of this is being able to have a fully online business, which means not being pinned down to any location and being able to shift tax residency of both myself and my biz easily. Since the EU will put you in prison for driving cars and eating meat by 2035, I may have to leave this place sooner than expected.

Easier to leave with a laptop than it is to leave with inventory.

So.....what do you think? Should I go for it? I really want to, but it's also a significant leap to take.

Worst thing that can happen is I lose 5.5k.

 

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[Skroob]

Wow that's pricy. Personally, I wouldn't spend 40% of your savings on this, there are just so many free or cheaper options to get you started (codeacademy, skillshare, etc etc etc). I'd suggest at least picking the basics up from one of them and if you enjoy it, then maybe a more intensive bootcamp would be worth the cost. I would not put 5500 eurobucks into a course for something you don't even know you'll enjoy.

Re:

2. We may be getting dangerously close to the point where AI will make tailored-built software for you without you needing to even know code anymore. Is programming smart or stupid to learn in the age of AI? I can't tell.

See my thoughts about that here:

MINDSET - RANT - Software Developers: AI shouldn't be scaring you (yet, anyway...)

I keep saying over and over that ChatGPT (or LLM AI in general) as it is currently isn't a concern for software developers and I finally found a good example: View: https://twitter.com/charlierward/status/1638303596595892224 Here's a twitter thread of a startup founder who used ChatGPT to...

www.thefastlaneforum.com

short short version: AI can do trivial work but not the kind of stuff you'd need a developer for anyway.

 

[SEBASTlAN]

Why not attend a bootcamp that doesn't charge you until after you secure a job?

 

[Tau Ceti]

You could always use https://www.freecodecamp.org/

It's free and its at your own pace. If you are not planning to get a job when you graduate from the bootcamp then what the point of spending the money.

Also I think you may have the wrong expectations regarding the networking aspects. You ll be graduating along with a bunch of people who are just getting started in the software development field. That means that the only referral you would get for a job would be from the school itself. Not from your classmates as they are not yet working in this field either.

If you are talking about meeting investors, cofounders or people related to business, then you are better off applying to a startup incubator.

Also, I am not sure how your statement here:

Tax efficiency. I live in Belgium and building an ecom shop in Belgium means getting murdered by taxes + regulations

is related to you learning to code either by yourself or in a boot-camp.

Your tax residency depends entirely on your physical location. So if you live in Belgium and your company is incorporated in the Bahamas, and you want to get the money out of it, you still going to have to pay taxes on that income in Belgium.

But that is besides the point, because the tax question is item number 217 on your to-do list and you should start by creating a product and making some sales.

When you start making USD 100K per month, you can hire the best lawyer in Belgium to give you tax advice in order to reduce your taxes.

 

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[Dockid]

What programming skills are you hoping to learn? If its building websites then learn HTML/CSS/JS for free online to get a solid base. Build a couple of project websites and you will learn by doing.

Then once you have a fundamental understanding of frontend languages you can move on to creating backend systems for websites. I learned all of this stuff for free online. I did Computer Systems in college but most of what I learned was through FreeCodeCamp videos.

I spent 3 months completing a 3 hour YouTube tutorial video on how to build a reddit clone. It took me so long because I took the time to research and understand everything and solve any problems that came my way. I also used this tutorial to help me build a private social media application for my university, which was my final year project.

By the end of this free tutorial I had gone from a complete beginner in web design to being able to build full applications. I learned how to use a frontend framework - Angular , a backend framework - SpringBoot (Java based), how to build responsive websites and I also learned Typescript all from taking on one big project and following a YouTube video. Going into this project I had a solid base in Java but I had no HTML/CSS/JS skills.

My Conclusion: Just learn by building your own programming projects, or following others build programming projects for free online.