

Ask Hackers/Entrepreneurs: How are/will you change(ing) the world? - rokhayakebe

Most entrepreneurs will tell you that they want to "improve the design". Changing the world. Such a noble cause. So if you do not mind (and do not be humble and/or shy) can you please tell how you are or will change the world (or part of it)?
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wheels
Changing the world seems to be a bit of a loaded phrase that begs for
delusions of grandeur. I prefer the phrase Guy Kawasaki uses sometimes, "make
meaning".

I think ideas are more a product of the times than they are of individuals,
generally. Most important new ideas are invented in multiple places
simultaneously.

I love music. And film. And I read a lot. And I'm fairly social online. I
started Directed Edge because there's too much noise on the web that gets in
the way of me finding the content I care about.

~~~
trevelyan
I run a content/community site and can't figure out how to use Directed Edge.
The demo page is not very helpful. I'm lazy enough to expect to know how
things work before signing up....

~~~
wheels
Hi -- there's a little info in the second half of the page here:

<http://www.directededge.com/getstarted.html>

With a link to the API at the bottom:

<http://webservices.directededge.com/>

Where would you have expected to find that information? If it was unclear for
you it probably was for others too. Feel free to email me if you have
questions.

~~~
wheels
I just updated some of the content on the site to try to make the flow a
little more natural. Again, we'd be super interested in feedback and if you
feel like this clarifies things.

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einarvollset
I'm planning to introduce a new type of financial instrument. Basically, it'll
be a contract between two parties, whereby a buyer pays periodic payments to
the seller in exchange for the right to a payoff if there is a default
relating to some asset (e.g. a mortgage).

In the event of default, the buyer delivers the defaulted asset (e.g. the
failing mortgage) to the seller for a payment of the original value of the
mortgage. I think I'll call this a "physical settlement".

Alternatively, the seller can pay the buyer the difference between the
original value of the mortgage and the market price of mortgage. I think I'll
call this a "cash settlement".

I think this will provide a way to distribute risk through the financial
system. The benefits are numerous. For example, a lender of mortgages can turn
around and sell their mortgages on the open market. This should lead to laxer
lending practices.

~~~
gills
Wow, you really got me laughing there!

~~~
einarvollset
Thanks man! A little esoteric, but appreciate that some people got it. :-)

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westside1506
I've always wanted to do more to "change the world", but I've found that I am
ineffective/unmotivated to do so through direct actions via volunteering. I've
tried and I'm not good at it. My wife and I used to have many discussions
about this (she's much better at the direct help actions than me).

After I had a nice startup exit in 2001, I found that I could try to change
the world (or at least things I can see around me) much better through
directed donations and angel investing. That lets me broaden my effect without
doing the parts that I am not good at doing. I still like the startup game
too. :)

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qhoxie
Not much to do with entrepreneurship, but I have been part of a group for the
past 5 years that teaches at-risk youth about college and general
success/happiness in life. We volunteer directly with about 500 kids a year
and regularly hear success stories about them pursuing their dreams.

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froo
How will I change the world?

    
    
      Longterm:

I'm building my startup with a friend (we've applied to YC) which with we can
help manage a common problem.

I can't really say what it is just yet, but we've got high expectations of
ourselves.

    
    
      Short term:

I know this is going to sound like an immature prank, but I'll be helping to
get Rick Astley voted as the Best Act Ever at this years MTV EMA in any way I
can.

    
    
      Why you ask?

Well its sending a message that we don't want to be dictated too on what we
should and shouldn't like - kind of like a virtual protest against the media
in general.

When you consider some of the other acts up for nomination some of which I'd
never heard of until yesterday (tokio hotel?), then you would understand - how
can some of these artists (U2 is an exception) be classed as best acts _ever_
when you've got the greats like the stones & beatles weren't even considered?

~~~
lacker
Don't get me wrong, I'm rooting for you, but... I'm not sure if "get Rick
Astley voted as the best act ever" and "change the world" belong in the same
sentence.

~~~
yters
How is rick rolling the world not world changing?

~~~
froo
For me, it's not an attempt to rickroll the world, it's an attempt at making a
bit of a statement.

The nomination was a bit of a practical joke, but when you consider who else
was nominated it transcended the prank for me into what it is now.

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tdavis
Another question I'd like to ask is: Why does everyone want to change the
world? What makes you think you can?

I'm not changing the world. I'm building a useful tool that helps people save
money when they want to attend a sporting event, concert, etc. That's about
it. Not quite as glamorous as saving the world, but at least it's realistic
and useful _now_.

~~~
yters
Even if changing the whole world is not someone's goal, this is a good sort of
question to help people form goals for their life.

~~~
tdavis
I disagree. Better questions for setting goals in ones life are, "What do you
enjoy doing?" "What makes you happy?" "If you had all the money in the world,
what would you do with your time and with the cash?" These kinds of questions
are more valuable because they are applicable to the individual. The question,
"How will you change the world?" isn't very relevant for a couple reasons:

1\. What if someone has no interest in changing the world in the grandiose
fashion that this question implies? Maybe the thought of saving all the babies
in Africa doesn't make everyone feel equally great about their life. Not
everyone can be a bleeding-heart humanitarian; society wouldn't function.

2\. It's really vague. My personal answer to this question is, "We all change
the world every single day simply by living and interacting with others."
Therefor, I'm changing the world 24/7 and there's really nothing more I feel I
need to do in terms of something that would have a far-reaching global impact.

Life goals should revolve around the core prospect of thoroughly enjoying
life. Maybe an immediate goal is "go to the gym 5 days a week" and a long-term
goal is "save enough to retire by 45." If changing the world will help you
enjoy life more, then by all means, answer the question to help set goals.
However, we should not assume that changing the world is universally something
that people want to do.

My Dad never wanted to change the world, he just wanted to provide as good a
life as possible for his family, make enough money to give his children what
they need and (most of) what they want, and that's pretty much it. He didn't
"revolutionize" anything. He didn't save any babies in Africa. He's just an
awesome father and that's enough for him to be a hero to me. Corny? Perhaps,
but a good example nonetheless.

~~~
jonmc12
I think what you say is true, but I disagree that it is not a useful question
to ask. Just like the world needs people who focus on the happiness of
themselves and those close to them, it also needs those who look at problems
that affect all of us and say '.. and this is what I am going to do about it'

Pick your favorite world changer, do you really think they would have been
motivated for change if they did not constantly ask themselves 'what am I
going to do about this huge problem?'

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gord
I truly, honestly believe that as of today many people just cannot get to
their data.

For end users that is having good web/UI tools to help them. Another part of
it is allowing programmers to express their ideas about data in a better way -
It should feel like you are expressing normal program logic concepts that just
happen to be backed by reliable, durable, fast, cached storage.

Theres a renaissance going on now, where lots of ideas from functional
programming are filtering out and being adopted..thats wonderful for our
craft. We spend a lot of energy comparing one language to another, but pretty
much accept without question that SQL as the only-one-true-way of handling
data. Or we make a big framework to wrap that in objects, and the framework
generates SQL.

Databases could have much much better programming facilities out of the box,
including an expressive modern extensible language and event callback
mechanisms. It should be easy to just write a usable web site without stepping
out of that language - optimizing the common usage scenario.

There must be a better way, it is time to make SQL obsolete.

If your interested in hacking on something like this as open source get in
touch,

gord quantblog.wordpress.com

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thaumaturgy
Revolutionize everything.

That's what I'm setting out to do. I've been self-employed now for just a
little over 6 months, and already I've built networks and solved I.T. problems
for a number of folks locally, at a fraction of what it would have cost them
otherwise. People are happy enough that, even though I've yet to do any
marketing at all, my business has grown beyond my ability to handle it, on
word of mouth alone.

But I'm only bootstrapping right now. Eventually I want to make sure that the
people with skills in various areas get all the exposure they want, and that
the people looking for skills can find them. I want to make all kinds of
resources more available to all kinds of people. I want design and produce
everything from new software to revolutionary backpacks (not so much school
packs, but packs for backpackers, climbers, photographers...).

I've helped launch a local Rotaract club, and I'm the sole founder of a local
club for "solopreneurs". At just over a month old, the club managed to form
some relationships that are helping us to launch my county's very first
inexpensive shared office space for budding entrepreneurs.

So, a long way to go yet, but not too bad so far either.

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manmanic
Energy is the big challenge of our generation, not computer technology.
Climate change is part of it, but it's not the main issue. At some time during
the next few decades we're going to hit crunch point in terms of oil and gas
reserves. Not only because few new resources are being found, but also because
their depletion is accelerating, especially due to China and India's stellar
economic growth.

Humanity will get through the energy crunch, probably with a 20-year
depression and government commandeering of manufacturing resources to build
renewable energy capacity. During that time there will be huge unemployment,
war, and for many poorer countries, likely starvation. The food chain is
deeply dependent on fertilizer, made from oil.

So the key for the next two decades is to do as much as we can to prepare for
this period. Ideally we'd completely wean ourselves off oil and gas, like
Sweden or Norway, but that seems unlikely to happen. But at least, it means
investing in renewable energy capacity and technology, so that things don't
completely grind to a halt.

Trouble is, this isn't really a computer problem, so how to help?

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fallentimes
Kiva.org to start. Need to think about the "will" part.

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thorax
With bug.gd, we're going to change the way users and software engineers deal
with faults and errors in their applications. In our world, _by default_ ,
people are going to work together a lot more to solve them and developers are
going to know when/where/how their applications failed during user
interaction.

The goal is to make sure that no one ever has to repeat research to work
around problems that have already been solved.

We feel some of our initiatives could single-handedly lower the computer
expertise needed to work with open source software, cutting-edge technologies,
and things typically reserved only for early adopters.

We're really excited about the potential here.

------
sgrove
Cothink.org (in private alpha)

By making tools to encourage service learning, and continuing to pressure
universities and colleges focus outward on community projects rather than the
current curriculum. Exciting stuff!

~~~
DTrejo
I am VERY interested in your startup. I am a high schooler who has done some
things in his community:

-founded tennis team at school

-brought Challenge Day (tolerance, anti-bullying, community building)

-working on bringing solar panels, already have school superintendent, board member, green architect, and a consultant behind the project (not to mention the principal and a group of ~15 students).

Email me, I want to hear more. <http://dl-
client.getdropbox.com/u/10047/myemail.PNG>

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mjnaus
By building a Twitter for the homeless

~~~
gills
That sounds interesting, what benefit are you trying to achieve and are you
willing to share details about how?

~~~
gills
Use words folks, karma is a pretty low-information channel. What's wrong with
being interested and supportive?

~~~
wheels
Woosh.

~~~
gills
Thanks. I thought so.

I tried to keep the dialogue respectful to both the poster and the homeless,
it is unfortunate that others have not. In my experience most people want to
help in some way when confronted with homelessness, but they don' know what to
do. Rarely do they wish to hand over cash. Rarely do they wish to have a
conversation and understand the situation. Many are interested in aiding
programs which empower homeless people to dig out of their situation. There is
low-hanging fruit in connecting those who wish to help with those who are
already organized to do so.

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alizaki
At TimeSvr, we want to take advantage of the quality/price arbitrage between
developed and developing countries to help busy people save time and get
things done everyday. Noble? If we can get people to free up 15 - 30 minutes a
day, that's almost between 2 and 4 hours per week they can spend doing
something/with someone they love.

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siliconcalley
I think changing the world is a fairly daunting task, so I'm just trying to
focus on solving a specific problem in my world.

I think if we all solve one problem, collectively we can change the world for
everyone.

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swombat
Bringing the construction industry into the 21st century, thus helping to
eliminate a lot of waste and frustration with the products they're using.

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blender
We have built an online donation processing platform that exposes a web
services API. We haven't launched yet - but our brochureware site is
www.benevity.org

Our mission is to facilitate $1 Billion of online giving through the Benevity
Network from individuals, integration partners and corporate sponsors by
December 31, 2013.

Cheers

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yinyang
Trying to make *faircompanies (www.faircompanies.com) worth it over the long
term. Working on a new version of my site to make it more interesting to
people that want to find out about how to change the world.

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unalone
I want to introduce quality control in the field that my start-up's for. It's
something that there isn't any system for online, and I want to introduce a
level of self-respect beyond offline publication.

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shafqat
By restoring media credibility and giving people a platform to voice their
opinions about the quality of journalists and news sources.

------
alaskamiller
Built schools and housing in the military. Now I'm being selfish and hustling
to make money to survive so that I can work all day without worry.

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TweedHeads
Politics, we have to change politics if we really want to change the world for
good.

We need a new party from the ground up with a million headcounts online.

We need to replace this jurassic congress of crooks and liars for a more
accountable direct democracy.

We have the tools and the will, the time is right.

