[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.

[lionhearted]

> 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.

As you travel, you slowly get friends around the world who are doing amazing things you'd like to see. I wish I could see my grandmother back in Boston right now, go to my best friend's birthday party in Los Angeles, visit Beijing to catch up with a couple old friends and talk business, and also be here in Vietnam for a couple weeks, also doing some business and adventuring with great people.

I have traveled the world slumming it. It's great, it's awesome. But as you do it, actually, the jet-setting lifestyle becomes more appealing, not less. I wish I had the freedom of action and mobility to be where I want without regard to money. Well, I'm working on that right now, actually. Well, not right now, I'm screwing off on HN right now, so umm, back to work for me :)

[cageface]

These have been some of my biggest disappointments in travelling. Globalization has made Europe look almost indistinguishable from the States in many ways. The week or two that a typical U.S. job allows you to spend abroad doesn't really accomplish much either. The real appeal of travel to me is to genuinely immerse myself in a different culture and live and see the world in a different way. This takes the kind of time that you just don't have unless you're willing to prioritize it over other very pressing needs.

[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.