Cool. Wishing you good luck. Many founders/CEO’s are in there 20’s/30’s starting in the hype riddled world called tech. When you are that age you are still discovering many things in life and maybe being the CEO of a tech company is not that right. More ‘older’ CEO’s will create a more stable, slower, environment to create lasting products
Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
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Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hardcore tech: e.g. fusion energy, quantum computing, superconductors. Softcore tech: e.g. websites, apps, deep learning.
Is building a product that uses OpenAI considered hardcore? I think he'd have to be building his own LLM from scratch for it to be considered hardcore.
Somewhere in the middle.
Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#23Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#24Just for context to the non-climbers - climbing a v8-v9 is like being able to run a 5 minute mile or play golf with a zero handicap, and climbing at that level in your 50s is even more impressive.
More like a 4:30 mile. Decent college athletic level
Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#25Because nobody will hire an >50yo in tech. Yes, there are exeptions for managerial roles (not tech, just tech adjacent at best) or extremely rare competences (live in memory AS/400 debugging anyone?). Tech is the most agist sector, well, ok, maybe behind olympic sports or lingerie modelling.
There are plenty of opportunities for older people in boring tech. I’m in my 40’s working for my local government and the majority of my coworkers are in their 50s and 60s. Great benefits but of course our salaries are not competitive.
Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#26Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#27Because nobody will hire an >50yo in tech. Yes, there are exeptions for managerial roles (not tech, just tech adjacent at best) or extremely rare competences (live in memory AS/400 debugging anyone?). Tech is the most agist sector, well, ok, maybe behind olympic sports or lingerie modelling.
There are plenty of opportunities for older people in boring tech. I’m in my 40’s working for my local government and the majority of my coworkers are in their 50s and 60s. Great benefits but of course our salaries are not competitive.
Were any of you hired when you were in your 40's 50's, etc?
Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#28> "I am 53, but I am full of energy. I spent the past couple of days bouldering v8-v9 problems in Lake Tahoe, which is something that not many twentysomethings can do" He's stronger than most of twentysomethings. "What makes me tick is not the desire for more money, I really have all I need. " He's rich. "The happiest times of my professional life happened when I was in a room with people I liked and respected, think…
I am in my mid 50s. While I am certainly not at death's door, I have had some medical issues recently for the first time in my life. My energy is not what it was.
Starting an innovative company is something that would be a big challenge and certainly not something to be sneered at.
You seem angry at him, but I can't see why.
Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are plenty of opportunities for older people in boring tech. I’m in my 40’s working for my local government and the majority of my coworkers are in their 50s and 60s. Great benefits but of course our salaries are not competitive.
Were any of you hired when you were in your 40's 50's, etc?
Hired at 60 for marketing/tech and, after that job went away as the company itself was near death, again at 63 in a purely IT role (first one in my life, although I’d been doing IT-ish stuff as part of my other jobs for most of the previous 25 years). Retired from that one on the Friday before my 66th birthday.
Re: Why I am starting a hardcore tech company in my 50s
#30> "I am 53, but I am full of energy. I spent the past couple of days bouldering v8-v9 problems in Lake Tahoe, which is something that not many twentysomethings can do" He's stronger than most of twentysomethings. "What makes me tick is not the desire for more money, I really have all I need. " He's rich. "The happiest times of my professional life happened when I was in a room with people I liked and respected, think…
I'm surprised at the saltiness, jylam. I see nothing wrong in any of the quotes you posted. I think the author is reacting to two things:
* The meme that startups are a young person's game. Hell, some people even say that technology is a young person's game.
* The fact that most people do slow down in the second half of their career, for various reasons (kids, or because they've reached their financial goals, etc).
It's not clear at all why his post was offensive to you. Maybe what you're really angry about is the notion I mentioned above, which is unfortunately common, that people "age out" of strong or interesting work?