

BBC article about over 50's startups. Who here is older than 30? - inovica
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7138964.stm
Just curious. After reading this article, and being 38 myself, I thought it would be interesting to ask the Hacker News community who here is older than 30, but creating a startup?
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enigman
I'm 53, almost 54. Not everyone over 30 is a technophobe or afraid of change.

Access to computers was _very_ hard to come by when I was in my teens, but a
lot of folks were interested nonetheless. By my early 20s the first PCs were
hitting the market. A 48K basic Apple II cost about $2000, equivalent to
perhaps $6000-$8000 today. As poor as I was then, I bought an Apple II system
in 1979 and have maintained a strong interest in computers and technology ever
since. People in my generation (and slightly older) _started_ the personal
computer revolution, and much of the earlier work on the internet.

One advantage of age is a perspective at how far we've come. In the early 80s
I was a systems programmer for a large IBM/370 shop, running IBM's VM
Operating System... the original "Virtual Machine" environment. We supported
500-1000 active/logged-in users on mainframes that had 16MB of RAM and perhaps
8GB of total disk storage. It was pretty cool in its day. Today, a $400 laptop
could whup that system (in most respects). Amazing really.

My colleagues and I have gone from programming in PL/I and Assembler to Basic
=> Modula2 => C +. C++ => Java => Python/Ruby => and lately, a growing
interest in that old warhorse, Lisp.

I can't sprint as fast as I once did, and it's harder to engage in marathon
all-nighters than it was in my 20s, but in most ways I'm smarter and more
capable now than I was back then. So please excuse me (and others like me) if
we continue to stay engaged...

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tallpapab
56 - It has been and continues to be fun. I started in College in 1969 in a
physics class. "There's a computer down the hall (IBM 1130, cards, FORTRAN).
Go figure it out and analyze your experiments." Since then I have been
learning non-stop. I got my degrees in Math, but have had to learn about
programming developments for decades. The other fun thing is that I have had
to learn about what my users are doing: pharmaceuticals, banking, electric
power, genomics, among others. I'm so rich. Enough money, great family, ever
stretching horizons.

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bdfh42
My brother and I are both hacking code for software based start-ups and
enjoying every minute of it. We are both over 50. Why would you want to stop
doing new and exacting stuff at a particular age?

~~~
marvin
Because when you become a certain age, you're supposed to stop having fun,
learning new things, socializing and generally having an interesting life.
Then you become senile and die. Oh, and you're supposed to alienate any
improvements in the human condition as well, such as cars, rap music, the
waltz or computers.

I see this all the time, it's a real disgrace for the human race. I have a
hard time believing that it really has to be like this..but everyone I know
over 50 assures me it is true.

There are obviously 'some' happy, older people out there, so I do feel that I
have a little bit of evidence supporting my belief that old age doesn't
necessarily mean a depressing life. Perhaps being a wage slave their entire
life and then suddenly having all the free time they want does something to
people. It is definitely worth researching, this entire debacle has an aura of
bold statements about life without grounding in fact.

~~~
mechanical_fish
Actually, I once heard a great Stanford podcast in which a gerontologist
talked about how the mind changes as you age, and one of her points is that
the elderly tend to be fairly happy with their lives.

It's worth remembering that, while you may look at a 70-year-old and think "I
could never live like that", that's largely because _your mind is not seventy
years old yet_. The good -- and scarcely surprising -- news is that old people
seem to be fairly happy doing the things old people do.

I wish I could provide you with a link to that lecture. Heck, I wish I could
find it again myself -- maybe this summary would be less vague, then. But
Stanford's "iTunes U" has got to be one of the worst-designed pieces of
information technology I've ever seen: you can't Google the damned thing, and
once you do find something I have no idea how to link to it. You can Google up
plenty of flames: see here:
<http://weblogs.elearning.ubc.ca/brian/archives/022052.php>

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david927
40, and I hope I never stop enjoying new music, learning new concepts, and
expanding who I am.

~~~
bayareaguy
"Only those who continue to change remain my kin" - Nietzsche.

~~~
akkartik
Nice quote. According to Google it's on the net in only one other place:
<http://theaegispress.com/Philosophy%20of%20Goethe.pdf>

Which turns out to be a pretty good article. The phrase after this quote is
pretty interesting too as a summary of what is desirable:

"Always striving and always working toward a new synthesis.."

Read the whole thing.

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buro9
33 now, 34 next month.

The right age to start a business is somewhere between the age you are excited
about the possibilities and think you can do something to make even the
smallest ones become reality and the age at which you feel defeated by the
world at large.

So long as you're in that range I see no problem with you succeeding, be you
18 or 58.

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inovica
I'm 38 myself and have been into this for 15 years now in various businesses
and into computers since I was about 12 years old. The media often talk about
'young' startups more and also I remember reading a couple of articles that
Paul Graham wrote about doing things whilst young. I must admit I find it
harder to do all-nighters and now I have children there is less focus on
business, but I'm still as passionate and I was curious as to what the
audience was on this particular site.

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iamelgringo
34\. I'm a career changer. I'm getting bored of being a ER/Critical care
nurse. :)

So, I'm finishing a CS degree this summer, and I'll be working on startups
full-time while working as an ER nurse part time. It's not a bad way to boot
strap, really.

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ojbyrne
47, co-founder, digg.com.

~~~
electric
" 20 years or so screwing around with technology and business, in complete
obscurity until fall 2004, when I became the "I built digg.com for $10/hour"
guy."

Awesome. :) cheers!

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jgrahamc
I'm still in my 20s: 0x28 this year.

~~~
jfoutz
I just turned 0x20 good one in hacker years.

~~~
mickt
Yeah same here, 0x28 isn't a bad age to be so far. ;)

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edw519
52

Let's not forget one very important fact that I never see mentioned here...

When I was in college, and then in my 20's, there was NOTHING available like
there is today. No microcomputers, no internet, no start-up mentality. (When I
say "no", I mean for 99% of us.) When I graduated college, most people had
nothing ($48 in the bank and a 6 year old car) and EVERYONE wanted a good job
with benefits and a chance for a better life.

I did that and was fortunate to get into IT at the right time in my life.

Fast forward 30 years...

Imagine having written 30,000 programs, implemented 100 major apps, worked
with hundreds of great people, and made tons of mistakes and STILL have the
same chance at start-up success that everyone else here has. As long as you
have an open mind, play nice with others, and take care of yourself, this is a
great time for ALL hackers, regardless of age.

I may not run the 100 yard dash as fast as I did in 1978, but my code sure
does. I'm having more fun than ever. Can't wait til I make my own, "What do
you think of my app?" post.

~~~
akkartik
:) My goal is to make a post like that every month.

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eelinow
34, soon to be 35. I've been a Software Engineer for over 13 years and have to
say that while it has always been very enjoyable, it was only over the past 4
or so years when I went independent, and focused on startups and what not,
that I really found my true happiness. I work from home now and have found
that not only am I producing my best work, faster than ever, but I'm happier
than ever. This is work? ;)

Eric <http://www.codedevl.com>

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wyclif
I just turned 40 as well. Over the hill? I don't think so...I'm learning as
much now as I was at 25. I've never been involved in a startup. I spent a few
years as a sysadmin, then got out of the business to become a cartographer.
I'm interested in technologies surrounding GPS and GIS.

I learned about computing on a TRS-80 and the Commodore 64; when I got to
college it was VAX and Digital UNIX. I started with BASIC and C and I'm
learning Python and Ruby.

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brlewis
I'm 39, and have been developing my site for about 4 years:

<http://ourdoings.com/>

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gcheong
40 and I still feel like a programming noob, but I've only been at it for
about 12 years. One advantage I think those of us who work for big corp may
have is that we can see inefficiencies all around us and inefficiency =
opportunity. May not be as sexy as the latest Ning, reddit, Facebook, twitter
thing though.

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jmzachary
I'm 38. I started my company last week on Jan 2.

Age is a state of mind. I see 20 somethings thinking like 50 somethings, and
30+ somethings thinking like 20 somethings. What you do with that state of
mind is what counts.

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electric
I'm 85 years old. Rocking out. Starting new companies. Life is good.

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thomasfl
It's great to recommend youngsters in their twenties to start something and
not wait, but obviously there's no reason to discourage people over 40 to be
entrepreneurs. BTW I'm 40.

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emacdona
I'm over 30. I don't have plans for a startup anytime soon... but I love the
comments in this thread. They let me know it's still possible!

And I haven't ruled it out...

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bjelkeman
43 and on my sixth or seventh startup, depending on what counts. It is getting
better/easier/more fun now when I have some grey hair... ;)

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dejb
37\. More into business ideas than coding now. Back running the internet co I
helped start 10 years ago after years of coding in between.

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DarrenStuart
I am 33 and love my career choice. How many other careers can be your
passion...

~~~
gibsonf1
Architecture (the building kind) definitely can be, but the pay can be very
disapointing.

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davidw
00100000 myself. pg is over 30, and still seems "somewhat relevant".

~~~
Tichy
Not sure if I would hire him as a Java Developer, though. How familiar is he
with the latest Java Frameworks?

~~~
eru
Shorter is better (- or should I say cynical?): "Not sure if I would hire him
as a Java Developer, though."

~~~
Tichy
Point taken, thanks. Hopefully it was still obvious as a joke - I think I
would hire pg even as a Java developer with 0 years of experience ;-)

~~~
eru
Oh, I thought you wanted to play on the fact that pg may be a fine programmer
- but that he would be a lousy Java developer for lack of motivation.

~~~
Tichy
Well, perhaps he would be persuasive enough to convince management to switch
over to LISP ;-)

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psb
I'm 39 (for two more weeks anyway)

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abstractbill
32, and loving the startup life.

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DanielBMarkham
I'm 42 and a half.

Or in hex, 0x2A

You can do some really cool things when you're in your 20s. I know I did. Why
stop? Look at the cost of market entry. Kicking off a new web app startup is
equivalent to what? Taking a year off and buying a boat?

The trick is: can you be as hungry when you're 35 as when you're 25? I think
you can -- but my opinion is biased.

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randallsquared
34 for a few months, yet.

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gibsonf1
42, and it feels good :)

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hollerith
I'm in my late 40s.

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mechanical_fish
Approaching 37.

~~~
tomh
Same here. Got into computers with an IBM PCjr (ha they sucked) and wrote my
first programs in BASIC and Pascal. Took a sabbatical from computers that took
a little longer than expected and got back into them around 1998.

Since then, I went back to school and eventually got an MSCS. Still working on
picking up new skills in parallel with my current job (which is all
Java/J2EE).

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run4yourlives
32 here

