On: Equity investing in superstar individuals (not their companies, them)

[dstorrs]

A variant on this that I've seen proposed is: find a (medical student | apprentice plumber | law student | etc) that you think is talented and honest. Pay his/her way through school and provide enough money to get them comfortably set up. They now owe you free service for the rest of their career in that field.

[btilly → dstorrs]

The problem is that the amount of that student's future work you can reasonably consume is far less than the cost of their education.

[lg → btilly]

Well, this could be a good strategy for patent trolls.

[lolcraft → dstorrs]

So, you've basically proposed slavery, then?

[abalashov → lolcraft]

Yes, unless there are some hard (and reasonable) limits to the extent of free service defined.