
Embrace the desire to make money - swombat
http://swombat.com/2013/7/24/embrace-desire-money
======
msluyter
_There will come a point in life where you have enough money, hopefully. At
that point, you probably should start ventures that aren 't about making money
(though money-making businesses are a very robust way to change the world)._

My theory is that this rarely actually happens. People rarely reach a point
and think "ok, I have enough money now; I'll go work at a charity." Mostly due
to the hedonic treadmill:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonic_treadmill)

This is actually empirically testable to some degree. I recall a recent study
asking millionaires if they had enough money, and most of them said something
like "no, I won't feel secure until I have 10-20 mil."

~~~
ambiate
I would feel secure at 600,000 post-tax for a 15 year adventure into research
for bioinformatics, analytics, and embedded design.

During this 15 year break, I could easily notch away at the big circle of
knowledge, generate side income, write books/tutorials and contribute to
companies/individuals in software aspects.

I would also be able to work at night. I have a reversed circadian rhythm. I
spend most of my nights getting 2-4 hours of sleep and murmuring about math
and programming during the other 4-6 hours. A typical job schedule holds back
my productivity.

My happiness is defined by obtaining/spreading knowledge. 40,000 (post-tax) a
year is more than enough to maintain a household of three, take vacations, and
stay on top of technology.

~~~
kayoone
Sorry for OT

That doesnt sound healthy, you should reverse your reversed circadian rhythm.
I dont buy that this is given to you and you cant change it. When i get up at
6 a couple of days in the row its hard at first but after a while it wake up
at 6 without an alarm (provided i go to bet early enough). If i stay awake
until 2 all the time, i wont get up before 9. Thats a habit and you can change
it.

~~~
zimbatm
Why assume he's being irresponsible ? People generally have more knowledge
about themselves than a random observer on the web.

------
lhnz
It's not about money, it's about power. And I mean 'power' in the full sense
of the word: the autonomy, money and status/connections to do what you want -
whether that's changing the world, giving your family a good life (relative to
their peers), or dating a supermodel.

Money is just a proxy.

Power is also just a proxy to happiness [0]. The power to make yourself happy.

Concrete actions combine to give us access to abstract values which we
position towards our purpose of reaching our favourite abstract concept
"happiness."

We often seek happiness as an end. But good advice might be to "Invest in
lines, not dots."

[0] We assume that if we can change things quickly we will be able to keep up
with our hedonic treadmills. (The reality is that this won't work without
control over our minds, since our desires can also upgrade quickly.)

~~~
siddboots
And as a proxy to happiness, the buying power of the dollar varies from one
person to the next.

I agree with the author's advice, accepting that it was directed towards
entrepreneurs. However, it's also perfectly fine to _not_ desire more money
than you already have.

------
smartician
It's hard to take an article seriously that has so many fallacies.

For example, lifestyle is a choice. Whether you're bootstrapping your own
start-up, or working as a highly paid employee, you freely choose how to spend
your money. Lifestyle inflation may be real, but it's almost entirely
avoidable. It's a matter of discipline.

Secondly, the article is comparing the risk of losing an _investment_ vs. the
risk of losing a _source of income_. Very different things. If you invest
countless hours and tens of thousands of dollars in a failed start-up, that is
gone. Hundreds of thousand of dollars in opportunity cost down the drain. If
you lose your job, what do you really lose? No, you get to keep all the money
you earned so far, and chances are, you're even getting a nice severance
package. And you go out and find another job within a few months at the most.
Where's the "risk"? You're not putting anything on the line.

I'm not saying that being employed is superior to starting your own business.
It's just that this sounds more like self-justification, presenting a skewed
picture.

------
larsberg
> the kinds of jobs that pay well also have a tendency to require complete
> focus. They consume your attention, your life.

That's probably true at the seven-digit level, but most of my tech friends who
are in finance work no more than a 9 hour day, 5 days a week. The only
exception is Citadel, though this situation may be characteristic of the
Chicago finance industry rather than NY, London, or Singapore.

Several of my friends made the shift to that industry partially for the money
but mainly to get off of the long hours and travel of consulting gigs, the
gaming industry, and small companies.

~~~
gadders
From banks I have worked in, I would say that is true 95% of the time, but if
there is a time crunch (EG due to client commitments, regulatory deadline)
they will expect you to work all the hours there are to deliver.

------
j45
Great post.

Before changing the world, change the world inside you and directly around
you.

One of the things that gets missed in "making money" is how a sliver of tech
talent can solve such huge problems for the average person.

PG hit the nail on the head in encouraging everyone to simply solving problems
the average non-tech person has, whom are the majority. Solving your own
problems has merit if your problems aren't rare, or can be a financial engine.

It's an opportunity to grow beyond where too many techs are today... they
simply don't see how many people are so passionate about what they do that
they are willing to do the most unreasonable thing: calculate, track, and
manage things by pen and paper, or whatever they can get in a spreadsheet.

To me, when I see someone do something by hand, manually, because they're so
passionate to get it done, or have no choice, it's a mirror to me. How the
hell do my talents add value if others are stuck with what they're doing
because no one is giving them any attention?

Instead, we have techs justify what they're doing to be something grand and
great to "make it up", or some how make life more worthwhile?

Maybe, part of this is from an preference to relate to a keyboard instead of
relating to others. Maybe its a part of maturity and starting to see one's
self as part of a bigger whole. The need for an ability to shift lenses is
critical, because hiding behind a keyboard is not ok anymore, the world has
arrived on our doorsteps asking to solve problems with tech.

Software can either make people's lives much harder or easier. Being on the
right side of the equation, even if it's giving up a few hours a week just to
solve anyone's problems with a script will uncover more opportunities for
creating value (read: the right ones will be dying to pay you something to
keep your attention).

Ironically perhaps, most of all, is the fact that having a financial engine
lets you drive and pursue more of the things you want with your time and by
being able to pay for the time of others.

~~~
griffordson
This is so true. Also, if you can solve a problem for one such customer in a
reasonably sized niche you can earn recurring revenue by selling the same
solution over and over again. And reasonably sized is probably much smaller
than most people imagine.

~~~
j45
Absolutely. Almost any small business will pay $1-200/month (often more!) for
anything that saves or makes them $500-2000/month in money. The key is being
able to communicate and help them find and define the problem that can do
this.

Walking into any small business and saying "If I could save or make you
anywhere between $500 and $2000 a month, would you be interested?" without a
problem identified to solve finds more opportunities than anyone can imagine.

The #1 cost in any business is labour, if you save people time, and create a
business case of how many hours literally are saved per week, and how many
dollars are printed.

Learning to add and create value, however is at the root of not being able to
make money, and understanding one's own value, genuinely and bringing that to
a conversation is something that's always worth working on.

~~~
jacques_chester
I think we focus on tech and consumers startup because of sample bias. We
ourselves are techies; journalists at large are general consumers and so over-
report things they are familiar with.

But most of the flows of money in the world are actually between businesses as
they progressively transform products en route to the final consumer. And
businesses are, in some ways, much easier to sell to.

Not an original idea. I got it from reading Hayek:
[http://chester.id.au/2013/01/05/on-selling-to-
consumers/](http://chester.id.au/2013/01/05/on-selling-to-consumers/)

~~~
j45
Very few thoughts or ideas are ultimately original :)

One thing that struck me from what you said is that its up to techs to learn
to relate to the rest of the world trying to make their lives easier with
tech, and for the most part, are ending up working for technology, instead of
technology working for them.

~~~
jacques_chester
Oh yes. Every non-tech job I've ever had is _riddled_ with inconvenience,
drudgery, pointless paperwork. The information revolution has barely even
begun.

The best part of my current contracting work is that while it isn't HN-
glamorous, I save real people I talk to real hours of horrible tedium by
automating away busywork. It also pays pretty well.

------
mindcrime
I want to make a lot of money, and I'm not even slightly embarrassed by that.
Why would I be? This is my life, and my dreams are at stake, and - last time I
checked - you only get one shot (one life) at living your dreams.

I'm not killing myself working 7 days a week, balancing a startup and a
regular job, spending almost my every waking hour working in some fashion,
forgoing vacations, a social life, a girlfriend, partying, etc. - all just for
my health. In fact, my health is most likely suffering from this lifestyle.

But when I look at the potential: building a profitable, growing company that
could give me the financial freedom to live the rest of my life more "on my
own terms"... having the freedom to travel to exotic locations, have fun
adventures, engage in projects that just plain interest me (as opposed to
having to be motivated by financial returns), etc... that makes it all seem
worthwhile.

 _It 's not about money, it's about power. And I mean 'power' in the full
sense of the word: the autonomy, money and status/connections to do what you
want - whether that's changing the world, giving your family a good life
(relative to their peers)_

It's basically what lhnz says: It's not really the money per-se that matters,
it's the freedom that having plenty of money allows you, that matters. I'm not
out to own a yacht, a private jet, or 7 mansions in 6 countries or anything...
I don't need to be Larry Ellison rich, but I'd like to get to "FU money"
level.

That's not my only reason for trying to build a startup, but it's definitely
one of them.

 _or dating a supermodel_

I like the way you think! Preferably a 6' tall, redheaded supermodel with a
Scottish accent. :-)

------
davidw
In general, a great point - it's something I should have thought about more,
earlier when I was more of a head-in-the-clouds aspiring hacker.

One detail, though:

> somehow, many if not most people working in these high-wage jobs don't
> accumulate all that much money.

This sounds plausible, but I'd prefer to see it backed up by statistics.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
I don't have a bookmark unfortunately, but I read first hand a couple of years
ago a study mentioning that employees did spend more and more as their wages
went up (ultimately leading to golden handcuffs).

~~~
cpursley
It's called _lifestyle inflation_.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
Great, thanks - I never saw that term before.

------
marcosscriven
Reading this I think I might qualify as the archetype referred to in the
article. I spent 15 years working in investment banking IT - which obviously
doesn't pay anything like the traders/senior management, but still probably 4
or 5 times more than might be average in London. Five years ago I felt this
was a huge amount, but amazingly it's still only just enough to have a flat
(not a house) in London. Like the OP said, I didn't really save a lot - a lot
went into equity for a flat. I decided at 36 to just give the 'startup thing'
a go a few month ago, and made
[http://www.fabfabbers.com](http://www.fabfabbers.com) \- but while I don't
think what I've made is all that great, for me its been much more of a
formative experience. Seeing really for the first time what it's like not to
have a job to go to every day, what it's like to people to have zero respect
for what you're doing, what it's like trying to focus on a product rather than
just being a techy. In summary, I'm with the OP on this - I think making money
is a decent aim - not least because if people are willing to part with money
for your product or service, then in many ways that's an undeniable indication
that what you're providing is worthwhile (unless you're a power company ;-)

~~~
gadders
Good luck - looks really cool.

A friend of mine left IB to found this:
[http://trotify.com/](http://trotify.com/)

------
thibaut_barrere
I've always been surprised to see people mention they want to start by
changing the world.

Such a mission is probably on top of the Maslow's hierarchy [1]. Starting
first by making sure you can sustain your family seems more natural to me!

Now I know that people went broke and miserable and also changed the world,
but being happy feels like a achievement, too :-)

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs)

~~~
siddboots
Horses for courses, I suppose. "Changing the world" is just what some people
want to do, even at the risk of poverty and misery.

Maslow's hierarchy was never supposed to be a prescriptive account of how we
_ought_ to live.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
I do plan to change the world, actually. I'm only taking baby steps to it :-)

I don't take the hierarchy as prescriptive either, I just noticed that it
matched, mostly, my baby steps to change the world.

------
drrotmos
Do people actually say that "A startup's purpose should be to change the world
for the better in a meaningful way"?

That's ridiculous, and symbolizes what's wrong with the current startup
culture. Fine, go ahead and change the world for the better, but a startup is
a business and the primary goal of a business is to turn a profit. If you can
combine profit and world-changing, that's great, but don't forget the
priorities. If that doesn't fit you, start a charity instead.

~~~
samscully
If someone has changing the world as their primary goal, and they decide that
a startup is the best path toward that goal, I don't really understand why
they shouldn't do that? To me a startup is an amoral vehicle for achieving its
founder's ends, so if they want to have changing the world as priority number
one, and are satisfied with just breaking even, that is up to them (and
similarly if turning a profit is top priority).

Of course if it doesn't at least break even eventually, a startup is not
really a useful tool for achieving anything.

~~~
drrotmos
To you, yes, but to the law and perhaps more importantly – to the relevant tax
agency, a business is meant for turning a profit.

If the founders aren't interested in turning a profit, a charity will serve
them better.

~~~
samscully
IANAL, but as far as I understand a company director only has a 'duty to
promote the success of the company' in the UK [1]. I think it is similar in
the US. 'Success of the company' doesn't strictly have to mean making a
profit, if the shareholders don't want it to.

[1] [http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2013/01/07/companies-
do-n...](http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2013/01/07/companies-do-not-have-
a-legal-duty-to-maximise-profit-or-to-avoid-tax/)

------
Peroni
Great post. It's one thing to want to 'make a difference' but the vast
majority of successful entrepreneurs set out to make their business as
financially valuable as possible which is why exit strategies are crucial and
prevalent.

There really is nothing wrong with being money driven. Ultimately, it's hard
for your business/startup/company/corporation to make any significant
difference to anything if they aren't established as a financially valuable
organisation.

------
griffordson
I find the crowd that pooh-poohs lifestyle businesses while working for
someone else particularly amusing. You are much more likely to accumulate real
wealth with a lifestyle business that you own than you are working for someone
else.

~~~
kayoone
While true, its not given that you will ever exceed earnings of a reasonably
well paying job.

~~~
griffordson
Sure, it is completely reasonable to stay in a well paying job to avoid the
risk of losing money (and sanity since if you only make the same money in your
own business you'll likely be much more stressed.) To be clear, I'm not
criticizing anyone who makes that choice. I made that choice for a long time
since I have a family to support. But I didn't make fun of entrepreneurs who
weren't trying to boil the ocean. I've always found those who do that a source
of amusement.

------
dylandrop
Having been raised in a community in Los Angeles with extremely affluent
people, I am highly skeptical of this article. From my experience, money leads
to malaise and depression, and isn't a great end goal. There are plenty of
miserable rich people -- and why? Because it isn't a good goal. You'll always
strive to be richer.

I think there are enough people striving to be rich in this world, and not
enough people working to make it better. This is especially true of engineers.
I find that most people I find trying to save the world are activists, while
as an engineer, I know I can change the world in a very immediate and
practical way. I'm fine with making a good $100k salary, I don't need to make
$100 million to be happy. There's something to be said for a healthy balance
between making a good salary, and doing something worth while. There are
enough entrepreneurs just trying to get their social app to be sold to Google
or Yahoo or Facebook. There are DEFINITELY not enough Engineers without
Borders.

------
xradionut
95% of the people I've worked with or met in startups aren't financially
better after the process. But most did leverage the experience to find better
jobs/careers...

As for money there are various sums of riches that lead to various life
scenarios. At 6 million, I could take a few years off, switch careers and
"retire" with a careful eye to expenses. At 10 million, no real job necessary
beyond hobbies. At 40 million, I could really invest in projects I believe in
and make big differences in many peoples lives. (I currently do assist people
and contribute time and resources to various communities, but having serious
capital would allow for economy of scale...)

All said, I don't want money, I want the security and the leverage to do good
for myself and others. No bling or bottle popping wanted...

------
krmmalik
I _literally_ went through the realisation that this is exactly what is wrong
with me - about 5 days ago. Since then i've done some hard work in changing
how I feel about money, and what money means to my life.

I don't know if I'm there yet. If anyone has any advice for me, I'm all ears.

~~~
rfnslyr
Anyone who says they are not in it for the money is lying. The underlying goal
is always money, few admit it. If they truly wanted to do something not for
the money, they'd be in their garage carving figurines not spending every
breath maintaining a (probably) already dead startup.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
I personally really don't care about the money (no lying, I swear).

I care, though, about the fact that money brings me time, and as such more
freedom to do whatever I like.

I do not know where you took that from...

Most of the people (EU-based) I know that are bootstrapping their own
(profitable, not dead) startup or service seem to be minded similarly, too.

I just make sure I have enough money to not have to think about money, so it
actually gets out of the way.

~~~
ken_railey
_I personally really don 't care about the money (no lying, I swear).

I care, though, about the fact that money brings me time, and as such more
freedom to do whatever I like._

These two statements are contradictory. The whole point of having it is that
it is stored value that can provide you with the things you actually need;
time, in your case.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
I don't see it contradictory since my freedom and time is not solely brought
by money; money is just one ingredient (in the middle of knowledge,
confidence, etc etc).

Similarly, I don't care much about H alone, but I definitely enjoy H2O!

~~~
rfnslyr
Yes your freedom and time is _solely_ brought by money, and because money is a
representation of value, anything you do of value for someone else effectively
buys you the means to freedom and more time which is exactly what you are
doing to afford yourself the freedom of not caring about money.

However, if you did not have money, you would either:

a) Be comfortable living the most basic lifestyle humanly possible.

b) Be working so you can afford yourself the lifestyle you want.

Clearly, you are not in group A since you have a more than comfortable
lifestyle, so it's B. You did contradict yourself.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
Your first sentence is an opinion stated as a fact, which I disagree with. But
I don't consider that stating something demonstrates it.

Later you divide the whole humanity in A, B (and C). I certainly do not
consider this is correct, and believe there are many more cases to be
considered.

I cannot see what could possibly go wrong, going from here, in terms of
deciding that people contradict themselves, logic, etc!

Feel free to consider I contradict myself - I certainly do not agree.

~~~
rfnslyr
Why did you reply if you're not going to further discuss? Thanks for crossing
your arms and walking away.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
I replied to state my disagreement and end my participation to the
conversation politely, nothing more.

To which you replied (but edited later):

    
    
        Okay thanks for pointing out exactly how I typed my 
        paragraph. Did you offer any sort of rebuttal? No. Stop 
        being a baby.
    

This is obviously going nowhere - so yes I'm leaving the discussion.

I'm now back to my regular schedule, arms uncrossed (I rarely cross them, mind
you), actually. Have a nice end of day (sincerely).

------
stkni
> There will come a point in life where you have enough money, hopefully.

But if you're like most of my friends you'll also have two kids and a
mortgage. At that point your appetite to take risks is reduced because it's
not just about you any more.

On the whole though I'd agree. The risk/reward profile of startups is pretty
different to that of employment in a high paying industry. And I would be
willing to bet that on average employment returns are higher than startup
returns.

------
_pmf_
Oh, I'm very much embracing this desire. The real problem is convincing other
people to share my enthusiasm.

------
abelardx
I totally agree that wanting to make money to provide a better life for
yourself and family is very laudable. However, the article didn't mention the
greatest creator of wealth in the world, which is compound interest and time.
You don't have to do something big to have big money. Consistently saving over
decades is how most people achieve financial security. For more than just
security, the standard way to get rich is to start your own business. Even a
small business, if it succeeds and lasts five years, should be a cash cow for
life. The richest guy I know runs a single dog kennel, for example.

------
peterwwillis
Compare yourself to the rest of the world, and you already have made lots of
money. Congratulations! Now you can relax and just enjoy your life.

~~~
swombat
Sorry, but I can't agree with that attitude, at least not from a motivational
perspective. With that view, why bother coming down from the trees in the
first place?

The mindset you describe is good to make yourself happy, and useful in that
context, but useless to make your life better (by any metric).

I believe one can be both happy and have the ambition to continually make the
world a better place through one's achievements.

~~~
peterwwillis
Happiness, fulfillment, and a 'better life' are all different concepts [though
not mutually exclusive]. It's also all completely subjective, so whatever
works for you is correct.

I have no idea why we came down from the trees. It's quite nice up there.

------
umsm
Is it just me, or am I missing the point of this article. I have yet to meet a
person that is embarrassed to make money. Everyone wants and needs to make
money, because without that fundamental goal, nothing else in the business or
venture is possible.

------
lectrick
Semantics matter here. I really wish the title of this was "Embrace the desire
to be successful," because with success usually comes money, although I think
the distinction is important. One is qualitative, one is quantitative.

------
mathattack
Taking this too far can be painful. Would you rather be in a startup
surrounded by mercenaries or idealists? Or someplace inbetween?

~~~
swombat
You need both to have either. If your business lacks a purpose/mission, it
will probably not make that much money. And if it lacks a clear and strong
desire for money, it will probably not achieve any useful purpose, or at least
not on any scale.

Probably worth making that point separately in a later article. Thanks for
bringing it up!

~~~
mathattack
That's what I was getting at. 100% mercenary doesn't work. (Or at least it's
painful to have to count on mercenaries, even if you understand their
motivation) Neither does 100% blind eyed idealism. It's finding the sweet spot
in the middle, which varies by company and industry.

Edit - And please keep writing!

------
buzzcut
The one thing this country (I'm speaking here of the US) doesn't have any
discernable lack of is massive herds of people who are desperate to make more
money. Lots of it. Piles of it. Mountains of it. And right now. If there is a
clear and unambiguous, nearly universal, practically uncontested value in this
country it's to make more money.

That's not necessarily bad, but it often is, and frequently has both bad
personal and economic consequences.

Of course it's not even clear what we're talking about since "making money"
isn't really defined in the article, and the kinds of salaries that are easily
within reach of, I would assert, most professional HN readers (who are
programmers), are airily dismissed with the claim of heavy taxation (which are
actually near historical lows), and the costs of "maintaining a certain
lifestyle" which is more or less a personal choice. If you are a person living
in NYC or SF and you make $125,000 a year, and are unable to max out your 401k
AND save at least a grand a month, then you are making extremely poor
decisions. Now, that may not be the kind of money the author has in mind, but
it ain't bad, and you can lead a decent lifestyle and save at the same time
without much effort.

There is, I think, some small truth to the claim that there is more talk of
changing the world in SV than at, say, Lehman Brothers, but I think it's
slightly naive not to see that this is often a thin tissue over the desire to
make money. Not too many people go into to business and don't want to make
money and a lot of it if they can. Talk of changing the world is prevalent
precisely because the current software revolution makes it astoundingly more
likely that you can make money AND change the world. That's certainly not true
if you start a bodega and probably not true if you start a hedge fund. But in
software it is. Software companies are changing the world in ways that are
both trivial and profound, and some of them are even making a boatload of
money at it. I don't see a lack of people who want to make money anywhere. I
see a set of people who recognize that they can potentially have an outsized
impact on the world and make a lot of money because software makes this
massively more likely than at any time in the past.

It just seems to me that the author both assumes a problem that doesn't really
exist, and proposes an answer to said problem that is presented as more sure
and easier than it actually is. But anyway I think the confusion is because we
shift from getting rich at the beginning to "make enough money to be
comfortable" at the end, so it's slightly confused: it's not about all out
self-interested greediness he tells us, except at the end it is. And the
social consequences of that mindset are just conveniently ignored. In the end
there just doesn't have to be strong competition between the desire to make
money and the desire to also do decent things in the world. It only seems that
way when one of those desires (the first one) is grossly out of whack.

~~~
jakejake
I think the author is talking about a very tiny bubble of, not just Silicon
Valley, but also further limited to recent grads who are still living the
college life and just starting companies.

If you limit your world view to that group then I'm sure it seems like
everybody is in it to change the world, and a goal of making money is not
noble.

I'm not a part of that group, so I don't really see that at all. Nobody that I
personally know has any problem with making money. Not that we're all chasing
money either, just that there's certainly no conflicting feelings going on.

------
michaelochurch
The "change the world" rhetoric is posturing. It's a way of saying, "I'm so
secure that I don't _need_ to think about money". It's an aristocratic
conceit. As an added benefit, it makes it easier to attract young, clueless
talent and make it work 85-hour weeks. I know far too many people working for
terrible startups on minimal wages because they "believe in the company".
That's fine if you have real equity, but taking a $50,000 haircut for typical
employee equity is insane.

I hope people read this and absorb the message. If you're trying to hustle or
build something the odds are already against, you _can 't afford_ to ignore
"the making money part". To channel Mark Suster, ring the fucking cash
register.

~~~
lectrick
The reason why wanting to change the world _appears to be_ an "aristocratic
conceit" is that the current reward system overly rewards predictable riskless
delivery over unpredictable risky innovation, meaning that it is much harder
to obtain the breathing room (read: cash) on both a personal and business
level to go in those "world-changing" directions.

Given that venture capital investment is one of the best (if riskiest) ways to
make money, I really think it is time to throw out the accredited-investor law
and open it up to everyone. This will flood the world with startup capital,
allowing more breathing room for real innovation (read: world-changing) to
occur.

I agree that if no bottom line is made at all, you're in trouble. I can't find
the post now, but there's a great blog post out there about realizing that you
have to make yourself valuable to SOMEone, SOMEhow in a way that will make
them pay you, whether you like it or not...

~~~
jacques_chester
> _This will flood the world with startup capital, allowing more breathing
> room for real innovation (read: world-changing) to occur._

I wonder if this isn't over optimistic. I find it too easy to imagine that
even _more_ money would upend the productive world while frantically
scrambling for the next hypersocialgamified instacandygrambook.

