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The Real Silicon Valley

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Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#131

Post by chiph »

paulsowden wrote: post #105
pmorici wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there any tax-advantaged savings options besides IRA and similar retirement savings that you essentially can't access until you are 60+?

There's also HSA (although still taxed in California you'll still avoid federal taxes) which is tax deferred and if used for qualified medical expenses you'll never pay federal tax. After age 60 it can be drawn down on similar to an IRA. (Has the caveat that it to maintain an HSA you need to be on a HDHP, which for a healthy 20 something is probably a reasonable choice).

HSAs are a great choice for someone without ongoing medical costs. I'm currently earning 2% in mine. Best part about it is that contributions stay in the account & continue earning interest, unlike an FSA where it's use-it or lose-it each year.

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#132

Post by martinced »

phatbyte wrote: post #129

I advice everyone on HN to view this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nif01WZ9aI Maybe this won't change anything, but there's more in life than just getting funded with millions of dollars. I feel pretty bad for people who get depressed or worse because they didin't made it in SV...that's so superficial about life and things in general. Do we all really need millions of dollars and IPO to be happy and be consi…

My only regret on my dead bed is going to be to have make the world progress faster than I could have.

I've writing technical books helping to share knowledge and that's the one thing I feel the most proud about. I won't regret having brought my contribution to sharing knowledge.

I love my family, but I also love my work. I love R&D. I love trying to create something that shall help people. I'll never ever have any regret about moving to California (not there anymore) and worked there like crazy for someone else's startup.

Then "success" has never been measured only by money: there are very succesful non-profit organization out there. But people are typically working hard to make them work too.

It's not about "making an IPO" or "getting rich". It's about "making a difference".

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#133

Post by hnriot »

Real life is seldom like a tv show. I don't think this should be news to anyone. I bet physicians don't like Grey's Anatomy either.

While I'm sorry things didn't work out for you, I don't see this as anything to do with this area. Your story is one that is playing out all over America in this economy.

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#134

Post by michaelochurch »

SatvikBeri wrote: post #130
michaelochurch wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is excellent advice. The question is: what should people do to acquire career capital fast? Work hard at their assigned stuff, or invest in self-directed labor? I think there's something to be said for the zigzag strategy. Take finance jobs to improve comp, and more typical tech jobs to improve autonomy and technical knowledge. No tech company will match a $250,000 hedge fund salary, but most will compensate "ou…

What should people do to acquire career capital fast? Work hard at their assigned stuff, or invest in self-directed labor? Cal Newport wrote a book on this[1]. The short answer is "acquire rare and valuable skills." If you have a track record of applying NLP to massive data sets today, that makes you extremely valuable. Combine two or more valuable, but not necessarily complementary, skills and it makes you a unicorn…

Good answer, for sure. The one thing that is dangerous is that it's hard to know, when you're going off and learning "esoteric" skills, if those will be winning horses or dead ends. A lot of people would rather max out on enterprise Java (which has a well-studied, if commoditized, market) than take a risk on a specialty that might be "hot" today but dead tomorrow.

The AI winter is one of the worst things to have happened to software, and the decline of funding and even respectability of basic research has set technology itself back 25 years, and there's a scary lesson in it, which is that interesting, cutting-edge work can suddenly enter a funding drought.

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#135

Post by oscargrouch »

da02 wrote: post #121
oscargrouch wrote: post #36

I quit my TI job, lost my beautiful fiancee, lost my friends and came back to live with my parents, and all of this after thirty.. Im pretty sociable guy.. and had a very rich and good social life before all this.. Im living in Brazil, without access to this garden of VC funds you guys have in the Valley.. But i live in front of a beautiful beach, where i go out everyday to run, and let some stress behind me.. Im sti…

Do you have a blog or website? I would like to read more of your thoughts and commentary (tech/housing/whatever).

Sorry but right now, im in a "zen thing" of trying to unite my actions with my thougts, and think, and express my thinking process through the action itself..

After observing nature, i came with this uncommon conclusion, that wherever the gods my be, the creators of this whole scenario we live in, are in such a state of perfection, that they communicate with actions, with the own things they create..

If you look at a flower, or listen to a bird .. isnt a way of communication? a message by itself?

After look to ourselves, wherever we have acomplished or made... i felt i did so little yet.. what can i teach to others, does it apply to myself?

I think the fruit of a tree, tell everything about what the tree are.

thats why im more silent right now.. there some things i need to acomplish first.. that will tell more about how i think about things, even without a spoken or written word.

Theres too much noise in the world already, and all this misleading noise make people crash..

Will i produce more noise? i dont know yet.. but while i try to figure out whats real from whats ilusion , i can work on things that can act, and be used in the same way i think.

This is mind-action harmony.. this is me training myself while im in a journey..

its not just about what i have acomplished but also what i have becomed

we can exchange ideas any time you want! i prefer dialogues to monologues :)

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#136

Post by oscargrouch »

braco_alva wrote: post #78
oscargrouch wrote: post #36

I quit my TI job, lost my beautiful fiancee, lost my friends and came back to live with my parents, and all of this after thirty.. Im pretty sociable guy.. and had a very rich and good social life before all this.. Im living in Brazil, without access to this garden of VC funds you guys have in the Valley.. But i live in front of a beautiful beach, where i go out everyday to run, and let some stress behind me.. Im sti…

This is exactly how I feel, Im in Guatemala, where we don't have much access to VC funds either. A year has passed since we started, and we still don't have a steady income, but it is worth it, totally worth it, when I realize that I am doing exactly what I want to do, even if the odds are against me, I know I have to keep trying.

I think whatever we do, we should avoid the trap of being payed to be unhappy.. we pass the most part of our living time sleeping and almost all the rest working (with little to something else, family, fun, rest..)

We should have fun in what we work, in what we do.. trying to be excited just for the profit of it, wont do..

things like; "I Will work for 3 to 5 years on this thing and then sell it(because i cant stand working on it) and buy a boat, put some chicks on it with champagne and travel the world with my fortune" wont make anybody stood still in harsh times.

faith is the engine of soul and in the end you are what you believe. by corrupting and selling what you believe, you will become void, empty, bitter..

It starts from there, money or success is a consequence

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#137

Post by oscargrouch »

cabinguy wrote: post #60

Bah Humbug (please excuse me, it's just a seasonal expression). While I can feel your pain, this story has nothing to do with SV - it's the story of an entrepreneur. The same story exists in every state in the U.S. and every major city (and most small ones) in the world. Entrepreneurship is very hard. I'm 41 y/o and bootstrapped my first internet company at 24. I owned a nice home, a beautiful vacation (lake) home, a…

i think the "come to silicon valley to become a entrepreneur" myth its looking the same as the 30´s "come to hollywood to became a movie star" myth..

The majority of those girls ended coming back to their little towns or showing the boobs in night clubs..

Why with the entrepreneur myth would be any different?

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#138

Post by phatbyte »

martinced wrote: post #132
phatbyte wrote: post #129

I advice everyone on HN to view this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nif01WZ9aI Maybe this won't change anything, but there's more in life than just getting funded with millions of dollars. I feel pretty bad for people who get depressed or worse because they didin't made it in SV...that's so superficial about life and things in general. Do we all really need millions of dollars and IPO to be happy and be consi…

My only regret on my dead bed is going to be to have make the world progress faster than I could have. I've writing technical books helping to share knowledge and that's the one thing I feel the most proud about. I won't regret having brought my contribution to sharing knowledge. I love my family, but I also love my work. I love R&D. I love trying to create something that shall help people. I'll never ever have any r…

I got nothing against people who pursue that, I speak against myself on my first post. I also want to create something that makes a difference, I want to generate value and create something meaningful for other. But I would never replace my dream with all the other things I love in life. In the end the balance will always be negative for me.

With this said, It doesn't mean I aim low on things I want to achieve, I just thing balance is the correct path to have in life.

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#139

Post by oscargrouch »

imperialdrive wrote: post #92
oscargrouch wrote: post #36

I quit my TI job, lost my beautiful fiancee, lost my friends and came back to live with my parents, and all of this after thirty.. Im pretty sociable guy.. and had a very rich and good social life before all this.. Im living in Brazil, without access to this garden of VC funds you guys have in the Valley.. But i live in front of a beautiful beach, where i go out everyday to run, and let some stress behind me.. Im sti…

Well put - life, the pursuit, the lessons, and mainly all the fell good times to be had... for some reason running along the beach is something I relate to the most. I'm taking a year off after directing start-up operations for almost 10 companies in 15 years... so much learned but so nice to be away from it all too. Thinking of getting out of tech and using the people skills learned along the way to do something in…

Looks like you got a lot to teach.. I would be glad to listen and learn from you :)

Re: The Real Silicon Valley

#140

Post by braga »

oscargrouch wrote: post #36

I quit my TI job, lost my beautiful fiancee, lost my friends and came back to live with my parents, and all of this after thirty.. Im pretty sociable guy.. and had a very rich and good social life before all this.. Im living in Brazil, without access to this garden of VC funds you guys have in the Valley.. But i live in front of a beautiful beach, where i go out everyday to run, and let some stress behind me.. Im sti…

Although very far from SV levels of funding, it's not that hard to find VC if you're in Rio or São Paulo. If you need any details or help, feel free to contact me.
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