Some of us bring in value by developing existing software packages which amplify the work effort of some critical sector or another. The renumeration for this work is in the form of regular pay. A portion of which should probably be invested smartly.

As software systems grow they turn into complex systems. They become embedded in the processes of the end users, while requiring constant boring work to remain alive.

I fail to see how this maintenance work is less worthwhile than developing new tools. Any complex task requires decades and decades of labour.

This is not to say that identifying niches that benefit from established tecnhinques and require only some domain specific customization would not also be wortwhile.

But claiming "everybody should find such a niche and become entrepreneurs" is quite bit too much. My mental energy is used in my daily work which brings added value to my orgs and our clients. The benefits of this are enormous - I can focus on deep, technically complex work while outsourcing payroll, taxes, liabilities etc. to my employer.

Effectively, I don't think many people can do deep work and become an entrepreneur at the same time. Also, expert skills in one domnain are no guarantee in some other. Star software engineers can turn up shit or stellar business operatives.

I think you are covering the software engineer in some weird halo of infallibility.

That said, I do have enormous respect for people who have created new businesses. But it hardly is the only way to bring in value.

I don't want to start a business and in fact I specifically plan to never start a business. Sounds terrible. All that... business stuff. I shudder to think about it.

I do like programming, and I plan to spend my productive time on this Earth programming on projects that interest me and help humanity in some way, but I just absolutely 100% have no plans to start a business. I admire your excitement about the idea, but I think that maybe not everyone feels the same way :)

(I also recognize that maybe not everyone feels that automatically saving+investing as much of your income as possible is a good idea - I'm mainly attempting to reach those folks who do think it's a good idea and just need a little bit of prodding to actually set it up.)

I'm all for entrepreneurship but the original question asked about passive income. Your suggestion is clearly very active.

> Why save a salary, when you can create a business, create value, and scale to the entire Internet and give people some benefit? Every hacker should start one or several businesses. While it may not exactly be a moral obligation, this brings humanity forward.

How does starting a business bring humanity forward? Maybe I'm just pessimistic but as far as I can tell the pursuit of money largely just ruins things.

I would think that a "hacker" would make things just because they can and enjoy it, without concern for things like profits or market value. Indeed weren't the very first hackers amateurs and not professionals, in the literal sense?

I'm not saying that people should just forego money completely of course, as I am just as guilty of anyone of wanting more money. I just don't understand why "every hacker should start one or several businesses." if we're solely concerned about humanity.

> rather than saving it, they should invest it into their businesses

"Saving it" here is not hiding it under the mattress. Buying stocks is literally investing it, only into other people's businesses. Buying corporate bonds is lending it to other people's businesses so they can grow. And investments into existing established businesses could easily be argued to have at least as large a potential impact as starting out on your own with a minor project that is more likely to fail than not.

> Why save a salary, when you can create a business, create value, and scale to the entire Internet and give people some benefit?

Risk tolerance.

If, for whatever reason, my business doesn't turn as much of a profit as I'd hope, and I've spent everything I could on it, I'm in an awful position: both as a person who needs to keep a roof over my head, and as someone hoping to do good things for humanity. If I'm on the verge of bringing humanity miles forward, and fail, I've done less good than if I reliably brought humanity a few inches forward.

On the other hand, if I do save my salary up, I can choose at some later point to spend all of my time and energy on something cool, and keep spending that time and energy until something happens, because now my risk tolerance is much higher. And then it's much more likely I will bring humanity forward by the miles I wanted to.