[mhurron]

Of course they are lucky. Luck is not the only thing, you really do need something useful and it has to work so you need to know your audience, but luck is a big part of it.

You have to be in the right place at the right time. That is all luck.

[choult]

You have to be in the right place at the right time.

You also have to recognize the opportunity and take it. That's what "making your own luck" is all about - exploiting opportunities to their full.

[Iftheshoefits]

This, to me, implies an extraordinary claim of prophetic insight.

The person who "recognizes" the opportunity is still doing a lot of guesswork, and good luck has as much to do with his recognition of the opportunity as it does anything else.

Networking and having a head start are also key factors--show me a successful tech startup and I'd lay better-than-even odds on the founder(s) coming from a life of (relative) privilege (and also being white, if in America). What could be luckier than being born to the "correct" parents?

[rythie]

Though the right place at the right time is almost never at home watching TV. Getting out and meeting a lot of people greatly increases the chance that you will be in the right place at some point.