[pg]

In my experience, startup founders who want to get rich want it more in order to have the freedom to work on what they want than to impress people.

That could be because we prefer startups whose founders include hackers. On the other hand, we don't just prefer that type because they're more fun to hang around with, but because in our opinion they're more likely to succeed.

[blizkreeg]

I keep hearing this thing about freedom to work on something you want to after getting rich as opposed to something you have to. I'm not sure that Utopian scenario exists.

It sounds charming to be a vintner, writer, film producer, or my personal favorite, travel the world care-free once you have enough money but I'm honestly not sure there's more to it than the charm of it. Time and resources aren't that short that we cannot do what we want to (even if it means in a limited manner) in the present. I have a friend who wants to become a writer (he writes very well, too) but in the mean time wants to make a lot of money by being a Fx Quant so he can "retire" to write full-time. I can't help but think that he is mistaking what it means to be a writer to the idyllic charm of the idea.

My field of view might be limited but I don't know of even half a dozen people who went on to do drastically different things after getting rich, so to speak. They continued doing what they did before, the only difference being that they now had the means that afforded them more diverse experiences. In fact, just recently one of the ten richest men in my city came back to my division to run it after a hiatus of ten years. He is past 60, owns a vineyard, and enough money to outlast five generations. At this age, he comes back to the challenge but grind of trying to turn around a division's fortunes.

The purpose I think comes from industriousness, not in bumming around from one fleeting interest to another because you have money.

[piaw]

OK, since I have retired to travel and write, I'll chime in here. The writing part is fun, and being able to do it on my own terms (i.e., not kowtow to a publisher/editor's need to sell books by the pound rather than by content) was worth it to me.

The travel is even more so. I'd taken vacations before, but always came back wishing I had 1 or 2 more weeks more. With a day job, it was hell asking for 5 weeks or so. Now, I just go. And I no longer come back wishing I had another 2 week. The indignity of having to ask for permission always annoyed me, but I didn't realize how annoying it was until I didn't have to ask.

Ultimately, I think you have to ask what it is that drives you. Some people like being bosses and being able to lord it over their underlings. Those people will never retire, and they shouldn't. Their self-worth is dependent entirely on other people being subservient to them and their goals. But many INTJ types (especially engineers) don't have self-worth tied to the opinions of other people. Such people historically do very well in retirement, and retirement is not a bad goal for them: http://retireearlyhomepage.com/mbti.html

[erikpukinskis]

I'm honestly not sure there's more to it than the charm of it.

I think this is true for those folks who are putting these things off... if you don't enjoy it enough to do it today, there's a good chance that you only find it "charming" in the abstract.

I'm not a vintner or a writer... but I brew beer and I write software for fun, and I garden and cook and all of these things... on top of my day job and my startup. They aren't just charming to me, these are things I love, and I'm excited about replacing my day job with more of that stuff as my startup starts to earn a profit.

[ahoyhere]

Nail, head, hit.

A friend of mine's private dream is to quit the IT business entirely and go raise sheep in NZ. He may truly be a country boy at heart, but there's little stopping him from doing it now… it's just an escapist fantasy.

I always wonder if people who claim to want to travel the world have ever actually done enough travel to know how brutal it can be to, in fact, travel the world. I spent 9.5 weeks traveling around the world last year and it just about killed me.

Most people can't separate "feeling an impulse to do something" and "knowing it's the real deal for the rest of your life." My husband is one of those types who always wants to move to wherever we're vacationing, but since they're usually backwaters, I know for a fact he'd end up miserable. It's just that they feel good because they're away from obligations. (The real thing is that he doesn't enjoy the work he's doing but he's not ready to admit it to himself yet!)

[hyperbovine]

It's the Mexican fisherman story. Sacrifice your freedom and happiness so that you can get rich so that you can have freedom and happiness.

Why not just take the direct route?

[rick888]

"It's the Mexican fisherman story. Sacrifice your freedom and happiness so that you can get rich so that you can have freedom and happiness."

and how do you suppose we do that?

Freedom to me means:

1) not having to work for anyone 2) having enough time to do what I want 3) traveling around the world

You need money to do all of these. To get money, you need to create something that people are willing to pay for, which takes some sacrifices.

You are sacrificing some time and freedom now for complete freedom later.

[jasonkester]

Sounds like you've never tried this freedom that you speak of. I've been doing the 3 things on your list for the better part of 10 years now, and I've never been wealthy.

3. Living on the road is no more expensive than living anywhere else. Less usually, since there's no rent or car payment involved. I can live large in Thailand for $500/month.

2. Living on the beach, I once calculated that I needed to bill one day per month to break even. Anything above that went into savings. That leaves 29 days a month to do whatever you like.

1. During those 29 days per month, I work for either a.) myself or b.) nobody. Maybe once a year I'll take a short contract, pull in 20k or whatever, and repeat for another year.

And that's just the level of effort needed for subsistence. Any money earned above that goes straight in to the "retirement" fund, in quotes because frankly I consider myself retired today.

[ramchip]

Aren't you extremely wealthy compared to the average Thai?

It sounds interesting for someone in your kind of situation, but there's a lot of assumptions that are not universals: being fairly rich (or having skills worth a lot) off the start, being limited to cheap countries (the parent poster talked about going around the world, which sounds a lot more expensive than and quite different from staying on a beach in Thailand), having skills that can be applied via teleworking and short contracts, etc.

[wallflower]

A personal question. You do not need to answer.

When you return "home", wherever that may be, do you find yourself treated distantly by friends and family? My sister did the world traveling thing for years and though she did send postcards - we found it hard to share the same feeling of excitement for her travels as she did. She is back home now and starting her own family.

What is it like when you return home?

[rick888]

"Living on the road is no more expensive than living anywhere else. Less usually, since there's no rent or car payment involved. I can live large in Thailand for $500/month."

When I say "travel", I mean living in other countries for extended periods of time, which as you pointed out, is cheaper than living in many cities in the US.

" Any money earned above that goes straight in to the "retirement" fund, in quotes because frankly I consider myself retired today."

so..are you wealthy or not? It sounds like you are agreeing with me.

[mkramlich]

Welcome to our site, Mr. Ferris. ;)

[stoney]

If you don't mind me asking, what sort of short contract do you take? How do you get them (advertised jobs, through contacts)?

[iamwil]

My cofounder was telling me a story about his friend's brother--where he doesn't really work much, but travels a lot.

Apparently, when asked how he does it, the brother quipped, "Most people are too stupid to be poor."

[davidw]

> You are sacrificing some time and freedom now for complete freedom later.

No, for the chance of complete freedom later.

[noodle]

is that what freedom means? it sounds like you're condition of freedom is to have money, and its only freedom as long as you can pay for it. not really that free.

[rick888]

"is that what freedom means? it sounds like you're condition of freedom is to have money, and its only freedom as long as you can pay for it. not really that free."

I suppose I could live in a cardboard box on the side of the road and quit my job, but I don't think it would be a very nice existence.

Having enough money to quit your job, buy a nice house, support a family, and travel is the ultimate freedom. You don't have to answer to anyone.

You may be happy with much less, and that's your choice. This is my definition of freedom. It's also why I am working on my own company.

The money isn't even the point. If I could get all of the above for free, I would do it (who wouldn't?). It's what the money provides.

[hyperbovine]

Having enough money to quit your job, buy a nice house, support a family, and travel is the ultimate freedom. You don't have to answer to anyone.

Ahh, but there's the rub. What good is a nice house and a family if you live at the office and devote every waking moment to your startup?

I think those things are nice too. My point is that there are a lot of people who have a house, a loving family, and travel, who are not rich. If that is really your goal, sacrificing your happiness, health and sanity in pursuit of FU startup money is a pretty circuitous way of attaining it.

[rick888]

"Ahh, but there's the rub. What good is a nice house and a family if you live at the office and devote every waking moment to your startup?"

You don't need to devote every waking moment to a startup to be successful. I devote lots of my time right now only because I am also working a day job. Once I am making enough money and I quit my job, I could easily run it during the day.

I value my free time more than anything. If I was just going to trade in one office slave job for another, I wouldn't even bother.

I would also rather spend my life working on my own projects than be forced to make someone else rich. Have you ever had to implement ridiculous features or work until 10 o'clock (unpaid) because your manager or boss decided at the last minute that something needed to be changed?

"I think those things are nice too. My point is that there are a lot of people who have a house, a loving family, and travel, who are not rich."

What is "rich" to you? It's a relative term.

"If that is really your goal, sacrificing your happiness, health and sanity in pursuit of FU startup money is a pretty circuitous way of attaining it."

When did sanity come into the discussion? I love working on my business. Programming is a passion of mine. I am also pretty healthy. I exercise every day (biking, jogging, and/or lifting weights). I also sleep around 8 hours a night and try to eat a healthy diet.

It's also not a permanent sacrifice. It's only until things get to a level where I can hire other people and or quit my job. School is a 4+ year sacrifice. What's the difference?

[jazzdev]

is that what freedom means?

I'm halfway through Harry Browne's "How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World" (recommended by someone on HN) and he has an interesting definition of freedom. Freedom is spending more time seeking pleasure than avoiding pain.

I'm paraphrasing, but I think that's the gist of his definition. Good book.

[evanrmurphy]

Freedom is spending more time seeking pleasure than avoiding pain.

Very interesting definition. Thanks for sharing that.

It vaguely reminds me of Amartya Sen's Development as Freedom, in which he explores how the right to certain opportunities may be as essential to freedom as the right to property.

The connection may only be superficial, but that was a good book too. (Sen was a Nobel Prize winner.)

[mattm]

Awesome book!

[jscn]

I think you're conflating two ideas here: negative and positive freedom.

Negative freedom, freedom from having to do things you don't want, can be had by quitting your job and living in a cardboard box. Don't want to go to work? That's cool, you can just sit in your box, or go for a walk, or whatever.

Positive freedom, on the other hand, can really only be had in this society by accumulating money. If you want to buy a house, support a family and travel, then you need to have the cash to do so.

Of course, if you get enough money, then you can have both. The converse isn't true. But that's difficult to do, and it certainly is a gamble. I think you and the OP just have a different idea of where it's desirable to be on the continuum from -ve to +ve.

[jimbokun]

Care to offer a better definition?

[noodle]

i honestly can't think of one that isn't constrained in some form. in modern society, that is. freedom seems to be constrained by the existence of other people.

[rick888]

"i honestly can't think of one that isn't constrained in some form. in modern society, that is. freedom seems to be constrained by the existence of other people."

When has it ever not been? In pre-modern society people still used some for of currency to obtain things. You could technically live a "free" life without money, but your existence would be even worse than it is now.

[JesseAldridge]

The Mexican fisherman story, in case people haven't heard it:

http://www.brefigroup.co.uk/resources/view_product.do?produc...

The main flaw is that it ignores the massive amount of wealth created by scaling up the fishing operation. The fisherman could've made a much greater contribution to the world by listening to the investment banker. We are all morally obligated to make enough money to buy a yacht with a flag saying, "Chillin' the most" and to subsequently rock that bitch up and down the coast.

[einarvollset]

Please god tell me you're joking.

[GVRV]

I'm sure that is sarcasm.

[peteypao]

Yeah, you're kidding me right?

[pg]

Are you saying that there is some more direct route to working on what one wants? Or that the direct route to happiness is to give up such aspirations?

[hyperbovine]

If your aspiration is simply to code interesting software projects all day long, I see no reason why being rich should be a prerequisite. Your expenses are minimal; you have no need of an office and can live anywhere. Will you require some money? Yes, and acquiring that will distract you slightly from the things you'd rather be doing. But that is a much better proposition, to me, than gambling away a decade or two of my best years on the remote chance to become wealthy and "completely" free.

[pg]

You're talking theoretically about the life I actually lived for the second half of my twenties, living cheaply and supporting myself with occasional bursts of consulting. It was not as easy as you make it sound. I preferred it to a regular job (which leaves you too little time to work on your own stuff), but it was extremely stressful to keep running out of money. With kids it would have been impossible.

How remote the chances are of making money from a startup depend on the person. The probability ranges from a snowball's chance in hell to maybe 90% in the case of someone like Bill Gates. (He was not necessarily going to be the richest man of all, but the likelihood of him not even making enough to be independently wealthy was pretty small.) I can't tell what the chances would be in your case without meeting you, but certainly there are some people for whom starting a startup is a reasonable gamble.

It definitely wouldn't take decades to find out. When startups fail they usually fail in less than 2 years.

[hyperbovine]

As a 27-year old, part-time consultant, it's not so theoretical :-) I agree I could never support a family living the way I do, but raising a family is at odds with maximizing your free time anyways.

[cookiecaper]

I don't really know what to say about this. It makes me totally face_plain. In my opinion, a goal of maximizing your personal free time at the expense of family is completely crazy. You should raise a family because its joys are immense and awesome, more immense and awesome than anything involving a huge chunk of money and/or free time (i.e. boredom, which more often than not does not end well), and I would instantly sacrifice my entrepreneurial desires if I had to choose between my wife and son and my hope of getting a lot of money independently. It's much better to have a family waiting for you after an eight-hour work day than to set your own hours and come home to an empty house.

[failquicker]

"With kids it would have been impossible."

It's not impossible, it's just adding another degree of difficulty. I did exactly this in the second half of my twenties. Working on my projects, doing consulting when I had to to support myself and my family. I believe the impetus that drives "family men" to seek shelter in a "normal" job can also drive you to be relentless in making your startup work. More skin in the game.

Also, team comes into play here. Personally. I know that if I wouldn't have had such a wonderful and supporting partner at home, the startup issue would have been a non-starter.

Team first =)

[chc]

It's a little bit disingenuous to say earning lots of money is the same as "gambling away a decade or two" while a full-time job will "distract you slightly." Getting money and getting modestly rich are essentially the same thing, just one way you have a reasoned goal for which to optimize your money-earning.

[Tichy]

In your youth, you don't have to care about risks much, hence your expenses are low. You can never get really broke, because you'll always have an able young body to sell and start over. The older you get the more you have to worry about risks.

[_delirium]

Most hackerly types I can think of just go work on what they're interested in, without an explicit goal of making millions from it. Take the quintessential Jobs/Woz thing: Woz, the hacker of the pair, was interested in making Apple machines, but didn't give a damn about getting rich.

[melling]

I bet he's pretty happy now that he is rich. And Steve Jobs wouldn't have bought Pixar and created NeXT if he hadn't made a fortune at Apple before he got fired.

[grinich]

It's hard to say that for sure. Jobs seems to be a pretty driven guy.

[jmtame]

woz was quoted in return to little kingdom that jobs was driven by making money. that was when they started selling blue boxes in dorm rooms.

[sosuke]

Darn it you changed your reply after I replied, this still kind of applies. Edit again, you're reply is practically evolving every time I hit update.

Being free and being broke is what I think his direct route is. You can say that the pan handlers have more or less freedom than a business owner, depends on how you define the words.

[zackattack]

Yeah but very few people can successfully pull this off. The vast majority of broke people are still harboring some sort of grudge against society or someone from their past - it's like they have 99% of the inconveniences of abandoning materialism, but none of the benefit because they refuse to "go all the way" with it.

In many ways intellectual freedom can only be found once material mastery has been achieved. There are a few famous examples from history that say otherwise, like Diogenes, but I doubt you're at his level. I also doubt you really believe in what you're saying, otherwise you would go straight to "abandoning" instead of posting on Hacker News.

[alassehz]

Would you really say intellectual freedom is truly achieved only once the material has been achieved?

I would argue that there is a threshold for this material mastery. I don't think is necessary for it to be exorbitantly rich. I can look at researchers who enjoy their work, and are working on problems interesting to them. They usually don't have a big monetary profit. Just a thought

[sosuke]

Way to much you, your and you're in that last sentence zachattack, I felt like you think I personally believe that is freedom. I don't believe in that codswallop at all I was just offering an interpretation of what he might have meant, much like his interpretation of freedom. Money is my means to the end and I won't stop till I've got enough.

[msort]

Because the direct route is not easy, or even possible for most people.

We are human being living in a commercial society. Money is essential for us to survive. And for most people, a modest level of success is essential for happiness.

I think the right approach is to strike for goals which have dual rewards: material and spiritual. Do things you love. If money doesn't come, also do things bringing in money.

[Tichy]

Sitting on your ass all day staring at the see is not what everybody wants. Also, the fisherman in the story already has a successful business.

[pedalpete]

I'm not familiar with the Mexican fisherman story (search didn't return anything).

Was the Mexican fisherman toiling away on a fishing boat so he could become rich so he could have the freedom to spend his days fishing?

[krobertson]

This was one reference to the story I'd found: http://bluehaert.wordpress.com/2006/05/02/story-the-business...

Basically, a businessman runs into a fisherman by the beach and is telling him how he should get a boat, a fleet, put in hard work to make a lot of money and then he can retire, take it easy, go fishing for a couple hours each day, etc. Then the fisherman says "Isn't that what I'm doing now?"

Being successful is vague. If your goal is to be happy rather than rich, your requirements are much simpler.

[rick888]

"Basically, a businessman runs into a fisherman by the beach and is telling him how he should get a boat, a fleet, put in hard work to make a lot of money and then he can retire, take it easy, go fishing for a couple hours each day, etc. Then the fisherman says "Isn't that what I'm doing now?"

If the fisherman is already fishing and selling his fish to earn a living..isn't he already in business for himself? If he can save enough for retirement, than I see his point. If not, it's going to be pretty rough for him when he gets to an age when he wants to quit. If he had enough money, he could also move onto something else if he ever got bored of fishing.

Fishing for fun is also different than fishing for a living.

Money doesn't make you happy. It opens many more doors that can lead to happiness.

[deltapoint]

I think you may be taking this story too literally.

The moral of the story is to pursue happiness over extreme financial success at the expense of happiness.

The story also acts against the deferred life plan. Many people endure things they hate in order to make a lot of money. In most cases, this is probably a bad thing... especially when there are better alternatives.

[tedkimble]

I believe your search required "jimmy johns" where the story is often on the wall.

http://pitchfevermusicacademy.blogspot.com/2008/06/great-sto...

[allwein]

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=mexican+fisherman+story&l=1

[PawelDecowski]

For people who don't know the story: http://pauldecowski.com/

I put it up on my domain a while ago because I liked it a lot. Maybe it will be useful for once.

[nickpinkston]

We just had this discussion yesterday at a StartupDrinks. I think the Darwinian notion says:

1.) We are hardwired to want things to attract mates. 2.) Power, Success, Prestige, Freedom, etc. are attractive. 3.) We want things that are derivative of such things, even if we consciously believe we want to benefit humanity, think it's, fun etc.

Conclusion: The mind has a way of aligning our conscious interests with our subconscious procreative ones. We need to recognize this, but we don't need to embrace the appetitive.

[prototype56]

Yes immediate and proximate causations for our actions are often wildly different . This has parallels across all species .

A peacock my really feel that it has passion for dance this need to "express itself"( immediate causation )..but to an outside human observer all it is doing is attracting peahens ( ultimate causation)

[aswanson]

I don't care about my freedom being attractive. I want a certain level of material comfort without answering to anyone or reporting to a cubicle. Some drives derive from mating impulses, yes, but many derive from hating bullshit. Period.

[nickpinkston]

The point is that we all consciously have reasons like what you're saying: independence, hating bullshit etc. However, all are motivated by hardwired goals of species survival.

These base needs make us want to gain advantage in mating, but also in things like independence - which give us a higher likelihood of survival (i.e. controlling how to fulfill our base needs, reproduce, not be killed by others, etc.).

[jquery]

Your logic is tautologous. Evolution seeks no such things. Evolution just happens and is random. It's quite likely we have many traits which are not advantageous for survival, especially in our modern world. Appealing to evolutionary psychology is an intellectual and argumentative reductionist shortcut.

[nickpinkston]

Evolution is not random - ask any biologist. Random mutations are actively selected for traits strongly favoring better species survival.

While certainly not a panecea, such strong drives as success, power, etc. that we're discussing are in no way accidental such as optical illusions and the like. To make an argument like this is to misunderstand evolution entirely.

[jquery]

> Evolution is not random - ask any biologist.

First you say this. Then you say this:

> Random mutations are [...]

See, you're arguing semantics. Yes, evolutionary pressures force natural selection, extracting order out of the fundamental randomness, but the mutations of evolution are random. My point is we don't know which pressures forced which particular traits, so to draw specific conclusions about modern behavior based on evolutionary psychology is more in the realm of speculation than actual science. It's all so much guessing and assumption.

[aswanson]

Exactly. The reductionism is just too easy in these arguments with every behavior contorted to project onto a sexual / survival basis. There is no quarter given for things simply being what they are.

[ericd]

Very few things are what they are when it comes to how we work, because until very recently (compared to the total history of humans), the environment in which we lived was intensely competitive and brutal, and anything that didn't aid survival/propagation that required energy was strongly selected against over generations.

There are many things for which the evolutionary cause is not obvious to us, but it doesn't make sense that there would just be lots of random truly superfluous aspects to us.

[aswanson]

What is the species survival motivation of me enjoying Tolstoy, classic rock or scrabble? I'm sure you can come up with a retrofitted explanation to observation, but the point is you cannot reduce _every_ single human behavior and action to evolutionary impulses, at least not without a heavy amount of speculation. In many cases, we have to be honest enough to say we simply don't know.

[akkartik]

On the one hand I don't need that much money to have freedom. I live frugally.

On the other hand I fear that I'm underestimating how much I need. Because the macroeconomy will be more challenging in the future than it has been in the past. And because we're often competing financially with our closest peers. If more people have successful startups in the bay area the price of housing and everything else will go up. National inflation matters less than regional inflation.

We know the rewards of living in a big city. But the cost of living in a big city grows over time, and faster than one thinks. Like the red queen, you end up having to run at some speed just to stay in the same place.

[b3b0p]

I know this is how I feel.

The only time I think about the money is when I read someone on here mentioning it, but it quickly fades.

Otherwise, all I think about is being able to work on anything I want and starting my own company. Nothing seems cooler than that in my opinion. Besides, if you want bragging rights, how many people can say they started their own company?

[sosuke]

The problem is when you don't have money or savings to not think about money all you think about is making that money to do whatever venture you want without worrying about putting food on the table and a roof over your families head.

[b3b0p]

If that were the case, I wouldn't be working on a startup probably. Instead I would be looking for a job to pay for the necessaries.

[simplegeek]

I'm not a startup expert so I'm going to ask an honest question. In old ages, when start-up wasn't a very well-known concept how did great minds convinced themselves to work on what they love without getting rich first (they even had to go through misery)? I mean I probably want to do a startup so that I can get rich enough to work on number theory while feeding my family at the same time (and I'm doing a startup so that I don't go through that misery while pursuing number theory)? So isn't it all because I want to avoid the misery and not because I love freedom?[sorry, not a native speaker]

[axod]

>> "In my experience, startup founders who want to get rich want it more in order to have the freedom to work on what they want than to impress people."

Isn't the whole point of doing a startup, to be able to work on what you want? Surely creating a profitable startup gives you that freedom to do what you like?

[fizx]

No, because there's billing, payroll, taxes, customer support, management, board meetings and a hundred other things that come with running a startup. We have to do what's best for the company, and that usually doesn't include taking a month off to try to build a robot spider.

[run4yourlives]

Well that depends, and it is the difference between working for a company and "running" a company, IMHO.

The actual act of founding a company can result in you working for it or running it, sometimes one after the other. This transition is as key as the work itself. The traditional method is to sell, taking a lump sum buyout and outsourcing the entire operation to someone else forever. That gives you the base from which you can take a month or more to build robot spiders.

Other methods also exist, most popular being to outsource a lot of operation functions and automate others, but still retain control. This happens a lot in many organizations, not just tech startups.

This provides enough freedom to build robot spiders and work on your company at the same time; retaining the investment for the long term, presumably because it is something you actually enjoy doing. Tim Ferris is the extreme example here, 37Signals a more realistic one.

If you are slaving away "working" for your own company as a long term solution, you are doing it wrong. You may as well go find a corporate job and pile up the pension.

[thetrumanshow]

Yes, but if your margins are good and your growth is strong enough, you can remove yourself from the equation and hire people to takeover most of these tasks. You'll probably still have to attend the board meethings though.

Then again, it's probably not considered a startup anymore at that point.

[wallflower]

Read "The E-Myth" by Michael Gerber. It points out how most businesses must be setup from the start to allow a systemizatiom/franchising that allows the founder to exit.

[tomwalker]

Are you looking for people for this robot spider startup? Il join

[corruption]

My goal when I first started was to exit and buy a fully equipped bio/physiology/elec/engineering lab and enough raw material to invent full time.

I thought I'd need 10m+ to do this, but over time I'm gradually acquiring everything I need due to places like sparkfun, ebay and alibaba for little more than the cost of an average car.

I'm inventing every day (5-6days software, weekends building random projects), learning more than I ever thought possible and loving every minute.

My point is that if this is anything like your dream, it's readily doable now as the cost of doing science is extremely cheap these days. And I've found that productivity increases when I take a break from software in the weekends and do some wet/hard projects.

[javery]

I think it's about the freedom to work on what you want mixed in with the ambition to build something great. I care more that what I am building makes an impact on people and businesses than if I get super rich, but they usually go hand in hand.

[joecode]

Indeed. The danger, however, is getting so caught up in the race that you forget why you started in the first place.

That's why I'm forcing myself to finish a book before my next startup. It's matter of self-respect.

[purpledove]

She is saying that the start-up mythology of success, which is vital to keeping up the spirits of the best of us, can lead the good-but-not-great astray in their lives.

She is saying that ideas are powerful, and internalizing the wrong ones can cause damage.

I recently saw pg give an interview wherein he discussed how much more Y Combinator focuses on who the founders are rather than what the idea is. This is a great start, and I think there is a lot of fertile ground that can really be developed into a powerful message that will reach many young people.

[bbers]

Won't successful founders from YC will have the opportunity to work on what they want no matter how much money they have? Or do the founders you know want to work on things that are very expensive?

[PaulJoslin]

This is so true.

When I dream of 'winning the lottery', I don't dream of laying on sandy beaches. I dream of starting a new start up, knowing that I can have enough FU money to take risks and make it great.

[clistctrl]

I can only speak to myself, but I want to get rich not for a Lamborghini, but so I can start another company to truly make a difference. Personally I think the Gates foundation is going to have a longer lasting impact on the world then Microsoft has. Yes I realize how huge of an impact Microsoft has had.

[seldo]

Call me cynical, but I don't think 18-year-old Bill Gates had the Gates Foundation in mind when he started trampling over the competition in his rise to the top. He wanted to be rich and powerful (because frankly, with the looks and alleged personality of Bill Gates, how else was he going to get a date?).

The Gates Foundation, worthy as it is, was something he only realized he wanted after he had achieved everything he'd thought he wanted, matured, and realized it wasn't really important.

[potatolicious]

> "(because frankly, with the looks and alleged personality of Bill Gates, how else was he going to get a date?)"

Honestly, that's probably a better description of Zuck than it is Gates. If Bill Gates' goal was to get rich and fuck women, I doubt he'd have settled down so quickly with another coder who worked in his company.

You know, more like supermodels and actresses and such.

[kragen]

I doubt he'd have settled down so quickly with another coder who worked in his company.

Gates founded Micro-Soft in 1976. He married Melinda French in 1994, 18 years later. She was a manager, not a technical lead, and she was primarily working on "information products" like Encarta, not software products.

However, I agree that it's unlikely that getting a date was his motive.

[jules]

Gates is pretty good looking. Maybe not compared to TV stars, but he is compared to, say, Microsoft CEOs.

[edanm]

You make a few grand statements with no backing (e.g., who said Gates decided that Microsoft wasn't important? I'd be a pretty happy person if I'd have contributed as much to the world as MS has).

I can't say for sure what Gates had in mind, but I can extrapolate from the few cases I do know about (myself and other entreprenurial-minded friends). The reasons vary, but I for one am definitely in this to make money for the power to do more important work later.

[clistctrl]

I agree this is probably true. However I think it still makes a great example.

[oconnore]

I think the one way that riches truly improve your quality of life is to make travel easy. The ability to explore your world is a great gift, and something that not many underpriveledged people can afford. A Lamborghini doesn't factor into that equation, because unless you live near the Autobahn, it doesn't get you anywhere a more modest car can't in the same time.

But if I ever become extraordinarily wealthy, my first purchase will be a private jet, and I will explore as much as I possibly can before I die.

[blizkreeg]

I'm not sure where you live but travel doesn't take a lot of money. If you live anywhere in the western world and make a modest living, it is very much possible to explore the world around on a cheap budget. The pleasure is in experiencing the world and her people, not in being able to do it in style, I suppose. IMO, at least.

EDIT: didn't mean -in style- in a negative manner. There are probably only a few thousand people in this world who own private jets - ridiculously low odds. So why put it off? That was my only point.

[oconnore]

I never said anything about style.

If you live in the western world with a modest living, you can afford to take a few vacations here and there to neat places. But I would have to be rich to telecommute during the week from Venice, Peru, Japan, New Zealand, Lebanon, France, and and on alternating weekends see my little brother's Piano recitals in Boston, and visit my girlfriend in India.

Maybe I would discover that that life isn't so great, but I would like to see first hand. And I think you made some unfair assumptions about my point.

[_delirium]

That seems like something quite different from traveling and exploring the world; that's some kind of jet-setting commute schedule, which yes, is the purview of the rich.

If you want to just travel and see the world, though, you can do it considerably more cheaply, and no, not just as "take a few vacations". You can travel through Europe for 6 months on Airbnb and train/bus tickets for a few tens of $k, not millions. You can drive around the United States (which has tons of amazing things most people have not seen, especially if you like nature) for even less money. You can spend a year in India for very little money, especially if you meet a few locals to help out making arrangements. Etc. It doesn't even have to be bohemian backpacker style: all you have to do is get slightly off the tourist/resort circuit and costs go down hugely in many parts of the world.

I guess it might depend on what kind of trips you find appealing. To me, flying to Paris for a weekend is a really terrible way to travel, but if that's your ideal sort of vacationing, then I can see the considerations would be different. For me, time rather than money is by far the bottleneck in why I don't do more of the traveling I'd like to do. Of course, that implies money a bit (one reason for not having time is working), but a different magnitude of money than "private jet" type of money.

[potatolicious]

Sympathy upvote - not sure why you got downvoted for a perfectly cogent argument.

You are of course absolutely right - if what you're after is the resort hotel experience, jet-setting around the world, fine-dining and boutique shopping then yes, you do need to be exceedingly wealthy.

But IMHO travel is so much more meaningful than that, and in fact I don't see much of a point to the jet-set lifestyle at all. A trendy nightclub in Shanghai is going to be largely similar to a trendy nightclub in NYC; you will many of the same boutiques on a chic street in Paris as you would in London.

IMHO the point of travel is to experience the uniqueness a place has to offer - and to do so you cannot ignore the people who inhabit such a space. Largely, they are not rich and wealthy, and living the rich and wealthy jet-set lifestyle is essentially a barrier to meeting, interacting with, and getting to know them.

It is consistently surprising and disappointing to me that the upper classes in our society try so very hard to emulate the bohemian way of life, when it is so very easily in reach for just about everyone.

[blizkreeg]

Sorry if that came out wrong. I certainly didn't mean it in a negative connotation. Hell, I'd love to travel in a private jet! :-) I was just saying that travel doesn't have to wait.

To your point, I would love to visit my family in India a few times a year, if it was within my means. At times, I've wanted to just take off to exotic locations for the weekend. But oh well. I still travel internationally to my heart's content once or twice a year.

[pvdm]

Travel is overrated.

http://earlyretirementextreme.com/travel-is-not-worth-it.htm...

[piaw]

That's a bizarre attitude. If you cookie cutter travel, you'll get cookie cutter memories. I travel my way, my style, at my pace, and at my speed. When I travel, I get invited into people's homes for tea, get introduced to their families, and get asked to stay. I get chefs coming out of retirement to cook me dinner, because I'm in a position where their hospitality really means something to me, and both they and I appreciate it.

There's no way I would give up travel. If you think travel sucks, you're doing it wrong.

[Mz]

I can only speak to myself, but I want to get rich not for a Lamborghini, but so I can start another company to truly make a difference.

I honestly don't understand this. To me, this is no different than the arguments elsewhere in this discussion about needing money to "travel". Why do you need money "to make a difference"? I don't have money but I run a website that makes a difference. The number of people it reaches is currently small. I have thought about it and I don't think throwing money at the problem would do any real good. If I thought throwing money at the problem would work, I would be trying to start a foundation and raise the money to throw it at the problem. But I really think the current model of throwing money at the problem is part of the problem, not likely part of the solution.

Gates said something once like "Automating an efficient system multiplies the efficiencies and automating an inefficient system multiplies the inefficiencies." I think throwing money at a problem does the same thing. If the solution you have isn't really that good, more of it may make a bigger "difference" but not of the sort I want to see in the world.

You "make a difference" every day of your life. What kind of difference are you making today? And if it is not something you think is worthwhile, why put off "making a difference" until some mythical time when you have more money?

Sincere questions, not in any way intended to bust you.

Peace.

[geoffw8]

Yeah, I say you have to go out to play good football. Then goals come.