Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure I buy this. I think the best hackers (perhaps not the same as engineers) have a certain mindset that doesn't go away. The oldest working developer I've ever worked with also happens to be the fellow that turned me on to Ruby AND Lua, when nobody on Reddit was talking about them (actually before reddit existed) and nobody else in the office was tinkering with them. He just had a roving interest in technol…
He was also working as a developer in an office with you. He may have been wealthy or had started various startups, but he still worked for others in his old age. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's not what I would expect from, say, a multi-million dollar CEO in semi-retirement. Maybe more a member of the board or a private investor who works on various fun projects.
My assertion was that serious hackers don't lose their love or interest for technology. I wasn't talking about the entrepreneurial spirit, at all. Merely saying that nerds are nerds for life, but they might pick up other skills along the way (and those other skills are probably valuable in starting and running a business). The fellow I was speaking of was always without entrepreneurial ambition (he was happily an IBM guy for years, in fact...a private office with a view and a good salary was all he ever wanted)--and actually perfectly fits the description I gave above about nerds over 40--but his interest in and passion for software development never waned.
So, perhaps you could clarify what you were trying to say about aging hackers above, since I didn't understand you the first time?