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Comment by robotbikes | Hacker News Reader

This maybe true for you but I know that I get a sense of satisfaction from releasing free software and knowing that people around the world are benefitting from it. Not everyone seems financial riches as the end goal of their efforts.

Most musicians don't get boatloads of cash or to perform in stadiums but instead the appreciation of a handful of people who enjoy their music.

It does depend on your motivation for writing the code as well. If you are coding to solve someone else's problem and feel no benefit from it then indeed money is typically expected.

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> Most musicians don't get boatloads of cash or to perform in stadiums but instead the appreciation of a handful of people who enjoy their music.

I think there is a whole world of difference between 60,000 people singing along to something you wrote and having 6,000,000 visits to your Github folder.

Unless you are a robot the 2 feel and therefore are completely different feelings.

Matter of fact the first is a feeling, the second is an acknowledgement that your code works fine.

Businessmen seek to add monetary compensation to the aforementioned acknowledgement , because they know that the sole acknowledgement is not enough to propel future goals they might have.....including playing music in a stadium such as the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen did, or hosting a music festival such as Steve Wozniak US festival

People don't play music so they can get the cheers of 60,000 fans a few times in their career if they are extremely lucky. They play alone, with friends, with family because they like music.

People don't write software like linux to get 6,000,000 likes they can bask in. They write software they need because they like writing software and need that software.

People are successful when they decide to be. Are you successful?

> People are successful when they decide to be. Are you successful?

That is some sort of Politically correct thought where you give everybody participation trophies and everybody is successful (which means that nobody really is)

Like everything there are metrics, Linus doesn't figure in any of the polls which ask people who they admire the most.

Even those going down to #500.

People like Bill Gates, Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison, Larry Page, Sergey Brin...they all figure into those standings.

For many the level of admiration others have for them isn't as important as doing whatever one desires.

Success is a state of mind. You setup the conditions.

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