Woz: 'I Am the Happiest Person'
108 comments
·August 16, 2025ChrisArchitect
[dupe] Main discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44903803
herval
I met Woz briefly at a Coffee Shop in NYC, many years ago. I was pitching investors for funding and had no idea what I was doing.
He gave me some quick feedback that made a world of difference in SF (years later, when I tried raising angel money): get closer to people first. You don’t have to be their friends - just show up to where they show up (bars, meetups, library - anything), then tell them what you’re doing, and they’ll write you checks without you asking.
This is still the key reason why raising money in the Bay Area is so much easier than anywhere else.
I didn’t get any check from him that night, but he came across as such a human person - like someone you know for years - even to a complete stranger trying to go straight for his wallet.
Tech would be amazing if we had 1000x more Wozes around.
throwanem
If it were still about something other than going straight for the wallet, maybe we would.
herval
There’s still idealists and inventors around.
The problem is that the bulk of investment money these days comes through professional finance people (not the stereotypical “engineer who made a lot of money and now wants to help others”), who prioritize others who think like them, creating this self-fulfilling spiral of value extraction above all else. It’s the kind of thing you always see in “late stage” industries (eg aviation in the 1980s vs 1970s). It’s not irreversible though (eg there’s a small resurgence in hardware innovation happening right now, with companies like Framework, being funded by “idealist” investors, Pebble coming back, etc).
I think lots of people expected AI to be that too (the new “world of opportunity” that would come with a new “platform”), although so far it seems to be shaping up as FAANG players fighting for control (which is a bit disappointing from a user’s perspective)
throwanem
What happened after the dotcom boom?
walterbell
Other tech pioneers who rode off into the sunset:
Blackberry co-founder (sold stock when iPhone launched), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Fregin
Facebook co-founder (pushed out), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eduardo_Saverin
MySpace founder (pushed out after sale), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Anderson, "If you knew me before Myspace, you'd probably thought I'd have been a scholar teaching philosophy in a university my whole life. If you met me before college, you'd probably have thought I'd be a musician for my entire life ... I like change.
herval
Trivia: Saverin still owns 2% of Facebook. He’s currently the richest Brazilian (and of Singapore, where he lives), according to multiple sources. Now _that_ is how you ride off into the sunset!
FirmwareBurner
>Trivia: Saverin still owns 2% of Facebook.
It also helps that he was financially well off before Facebook too and could afford top lawyers. I imagine things would have gone differently if he were some broke immigrant kid on a visa, getting buried by Zuck's lawyers.
Justice may be blind, but it's definitely not free.
bko
It helps to be knowledgeable about this stuff. But since so much was at stake, couldn't you find a lawyer that would work on some kind of contingency?
herval
He wouldn’t even be in Zuckerberg’s circle if his family wasn’t wealthy to begin with. Life isn’t fair, who could’ve guessed that?
brettgriffin
What is the point of this hypothetical? Why do we care about the outcome of a situation that you conjured up that wasn't reality?
Is the insight here that people with resources have advantages?
whyenot
There is also Michael Scott, Apple’s first CEO. He didn’t necessarily ride out into the sunset as much as being pushed out into it after some very controversial mass layoffs. He’s a neighbor and purchased several homes near me. One, a large estate, he demolished and turned into a pond and fruit orchard. Another he turned into an office and lab space for his interest in gemstones. It’s actually been quite a while since i last saw him. I wonder if he is still living over there.
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spacedcowboy
Whereas I am not trying to take anything away from Woz (I’ve never met that Steve, but by all accounts he’s a really nice guy), I can’t help but feel that his personality and the ethos he espouses have been made a lot more possible by the fact that he had a lot of disposable income…
geodel
Of course. And he mentioned as such having multiple houses and USD 10M in accounts. There is no gotcha here.
FirmwareBurner
Yep. It's easy to be happy, bubbly, carefree and say money is not important to to you when you're set for life and don't ever have to worry about paying the mortgage, healthcare, childcare, bills, etc in one of the most expensive regions on the planet, but people without seven figures in the bank might disagree.
Sure, he's not Musk, Bezos or Zuckerberg levels of rich, but compared to average folk who need to work for a living till retirement, he's still very, VERY rich.
rwmj
Set for life level of wealth (say, $2-3m) is achievable on a programmer's salary or for someone working in finance, and after only a decade or two of work. You just have to save and invest most of your salary instead of spending it all.
bestham
If you read his boks or others stories about Woz you would know that he was like this long before he had fortune in business. He spent a lot of time and money on setting up a quite popular answering machine service for delivering jokes and did attribute his success as an engineer to not having that much money [1] so he needed to make due with what he had.
[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Wozniak#cite_note-2_co...
titanomachy
> It's easy to be happy, bubbly, carefree and say money is not important to to you when you're set for life
I’m not sure this is true. I know plenty of miserable rich people. What is easy for someone who to look at a rich person and say “I’d certainly be happy if I had that money”.
anonzzzies
Here in the EU I never had to worry about any of those things by design even though my parents had nothing. I made a fortune without ever having to worry; sure I will never make billions but why would I be interested in that? Happiness does not require that and you can still make 10m in the EU without worrying about the things you summed up. The US is more risk for more reward but is that worth it? Never for me.
zer0zzz
I think that’s missing the point. This isn’t about glorifying being poor but understanding when enough is enough.
brundolf
It's still remarkable because so many people with that amount of money are still on the grind, still chasing the siren's call, still feeling miserable because it's not enough, still feeling tiny because they compare themselves to the billionaires
Very few people get to that point and then choose happiness instead of ambition
esalman
> his personality and the ethos he espouses
We have to remember that it is a choice.
vdupras
Of course, it goes without saying. But on the other side, not many people would have what it take to not let that kind of wealth go to their head. This désinvolture has to be praised.
tchalla
“Money isn’t everything in life but before you say that make sure you have enough money”
underlipton
I do wonder if the relative ease he might have had with his craft early on contributed, too. He doesn't strike me as someone who's ever really struggled to learn or produce, just met a steady stream of interesting, surmountable challenges (and was blessed to be able to eschew anything that would have been troublesome). Such a combination of prodigious talent and a keen awareness of where it ends probably makes for a pretty happy existence.
dyauspitr
Of course, for most regular people money buys happiness.
paulpauper
but he also had to live with having sold apple stock far too soon. Not that he cares that much .
gazpachotron
I've been to a lecture he gave, and Q&A session. I was left with no doubt that his ethos of joy and honesty predate his wealth and are entirely independent of it.
pengaru
> I've been to a lecture he gave, and Q&A session. I was left with no doubt that his ethos of joy and honesty predate his wealth and are entirely independent of it.
Don't most young people start life this way?
It's the influences of time spent in the rat race and a society fighting for scraps that beats it out of us.
I find those who struck it rich early and still turned out assholes more noteworthy.
chaps
Noteworthy in what way, exactly?
achenet
I started life in a family where money was often an issue, and it did give me some issues with it, which my chill dev job has actually helped me get over (I feel rich, so I'm generous).
So sometimes it's the opposite, you start out needy and the 'rat race' actually brings you to a more abundant world-view :)
algo_lover
The only thing I feel is 2nd hand regret for Woz. What if he didn't cash out? What would his net worth be today?
I am so caught up in the rat race, that I can't even understand what Woz want's to say, or what makes him happy. I only feel sad for him.
But if you think about it, I actually feel sad for myself. If I were in Woz's position with ~$20m or so and had missed the Apple cash cow (assuming $500m at the very least), how would I react? Would I live my entire life with regret and remorse? Would I be bitter?
Huge props to Woz for figuring out what makes him happy and doing exactly that.
m463
> with ~$20m or so and had missed the Apple cash cow
But he already HAD a lot more money, and he gave it away. Do you think his behavior or outlook would change if he had $500m?
Parents should take their kids to the children's discovery museum (I think it is on Woz way).
There is nothing quite like seeing kids enraptured by playing with water or bubbles.
It is also amusing to watch closing time, as parents have to literally DRAG their crying kids away from it all out the door.
tra3
How about this:
Steve J made ~10 billion at the time of his death at 56. Steve W made ~100 million and is still around at 75.
To make math real simple, I would definitely pay $500 million a year to stick around.
ozim
Jobs is ultimately an example of how death doesn’t care what is your net worth.
oceanhaiyang
As is anyone.
nickjj
> The only thing I feel is 2nd hand regret for Woz.
I'm going to speculate that in most cases, 20 million and 200 million is effectively the same. I wouldn't be upset in the slightest if I missed out.
If you can get a 2% return on 20 million that's 400k / year. That's a mind boggling amount of money. I picked 2% figuring to beat inflation by that amount in an extremely low risk investment so you don't have to think about market fluctuations hurting you.
1970-01-01
>I earn money from my labor and pay something like 55% combined tax on it. I am the happiest person ever.
Those juxtaposed sentences do not compute for the vast majority of ultrawealthy engineers/CEOs/upperclass/1%. It certainly proves that after a fuzzy but real number of dollars, there exists a point where you simply have a superfluous amount of money.
sswaner
And perhaps a sense of civic duty: Those tax rates were created (hopefully) by elected representatives.
Zigurd
That attitude about paying taxes is an actually effective altruism.
labrador
I used to be a software millionaire back in the 80's. My discovery is that money does buy happiness so the phrase should actually be "Money does buy happiness, but can't cure clinical depression." The list of wealthy people who have committed suicide is long, starting with my contemporaries Kurt Cobain, Chris Cantrell, Anthony Bourdain... and almost me. The money is gone now but I'm happy with enough to live comfortably.
wood-porch
I’m glad you made it man. I don’t know how much longer I can hold out
tasuki
> The money is gone now
How did it happen? Millions in 80's sounds like a whole lot of money...
> but I'm happy with enough to live comfortably.
Congrats!
labrador
I spent it all looking for a cure: therapy, travel, spiritual journies like road trips. My needs are low so the social security I paid into here in America is enough for me now. I'm happy like Woz.
__turbobrew__
Money doesn’t cause happiness, but poverty does cause grief.
sharadov
Woz lives not too far from me and is a regular at the park I go to, walking his dogs. The first time I saw him, I wasn't sure if it was him, so asked a person nearby - he has a very distinctive look with his facial hair and smile.
Since then, I've seen him a bunch of times, chatting with people and being friendly.
Zigurd
[flagged]
IncreasePosts
How can you tell how happy or unhappy thiel is?
Zigurd
If Peter Theil was happy we would hear him go mwahaha or twirl his mustache.
LightBug1
[flagged]
nialv7
Too bad the world isn't run by people like him.
Additional comments here,
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44903803 ("Steve Wozniak: Life to me was never about accomplishment, but about happiness (slashdot.org)"—593 comments)