[hkmurakami]

As an aside, my 20-something-SF-resident-friends are flabbergasted when I tell them that I, as a person who's spent his whole life is this start up la-la-land that is SV, have absolutely no interest in "changing the world".

I just want to work on interesting business problems, just like many others just want to work on interesting technical problems.

[ThrustVectoring]

Yup. It's called having some goddamn boundaries. My work persona is there to clean up some code, write some features, and make the business processes we support work slightly better. For this, I get money, which I take home and enjoy through hobbies, friends, and loved ones. It's a good enough life, and I'm perfectly happy with it.

[ratbr]

In my experience, the notion of "change the world" has no age bar sadly. Also, "change the world" is often thrown about in arguably shallow contexts. But then look at how Facebook got started, and it is fair to say that it has changed the world. My point? I agree with you, but I am not sure if that's just cynicism because arguably "shallow" companies have changed the world for real.

[Zelmor]

Facebook might have changed the world, but I don't think it's for the better.