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Comment by drpgq | Hacker News Reader

I'm always surprised that more billionaires don't try interesting off the wall projects when they have so much money. What's the fun of having it, if you can't have the occasional mad scientist moment.

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The intersection of billionaires and people with the ability to try interesting, off the wall projects probably isn't very big.

I was just thinking, it's probably true that most people who try interesting off the wall projects don't become incredibly wealthy.

As Musk has stated, he was one more failed SpaceX launch from pretty much being bankrupt. As a "mad scientist", it's pretty easy to blow your money on ideas that don't quite pan out.

which, on something of a tangent, is why i think government has a critical role to play

Science fiction author David Brin has some interesting suggestions for philanthropists looking to create a legacy, such as building a third-world university system, financing a freelance manned mission to Mars, or funding whistleblowers.

http://www.davidbrin.com/eon.html

Here's one: http://www.vice.com/read/russian-billionaire-dmitry-itskov-p...

Anyone have a list of billionaire futurists?

In Australia we have Clive Palmer. He's building a replica Titanic and a mechatronic Jurassic Park. And now has his own Political party named after himself with candidates in every seat in the country.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clive_Palmer_(businessman)

I don't see how these projects serve humanity.

Maybe they want to own a building for each one of their childrens children.

It's rare that the creative types end up being billionaires. Note that even Steve Jobs was kicked out of his own company, and then later only barely squeaked into the CEO slot, and only because the company was about dead anyway. He'd never have gotten the job if Skulley hadn't screwed things up quite so bad.

Yes, although I feel the need to point out Jobs wasn't the genius behind Apple in the early years, it was Wozniak. Different time, different man.

Yeah, if anything Steve Jobs was exactly the "business type" your parent is speaking about.

“I was so close to Steve Jobs I could never really see the transition,” Wozniak said. “I just wanted to be in engineering only – I never wanted to run a company, never wanted to run things, step on other people – Steve very clearly did, and wanted to be a top executive and a really important thinker in the world.”[1]

[1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/8956282/Steve-Woz...

I think Jobs is definitely a creative type, he had a clear and distinct vision that went beyond what most CEO's would ever dream of let alone approve to drive resources into.

Being a creative type does not necessarily mean being an engineer.

Absolutely, but his vision (the Lisa) was the wrong vision at the time. He refined his vision at next (taking in a lot of other people's good ideas along the way) and returned to Apple at just the right time: when the average consumer was ready to pay a bit more for a refined product.

I'm more surprised that more billionaires don't build crazy monuments of themselves or just some crazy ones with their name on it.

You mean like Sheikh Hamad Bin Hamdan Al Ahyan: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2016841/Al-Futaysi-i...

WOW - he looks like an arabic George Bush.

One of North Korea's major exports is, apparently, giant statues of people.

E.g. (sorry it's a WSJ link...)

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870390620457502...

I hope all billionaires look at Batman for inspiration.

sadly that is what politicians do.

as to billionaires and there use of money, I am more than happy how some of them turned their fortune into good use. the most obvious being Gates.

This was pretty common behaviour in Rome.

"Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"

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