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 · 7h ago
If it were still about something other than going straight for the wallet, maybe we would.
herval · 6h ago
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)
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 · 7h ago
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 · 6h ago
>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 · 2h ago
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 · 5h ago
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?
FirmwareBurner · 4h ago
True, the reason Zuck wen to to him is because he was wealthy(and part of the same Jewish fraternity).
brettgriffin · 6h ago
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 · 5h ago
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.
spacedcowboy · 10h ago
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 · 8h ago
Of course. And he mentioned as such having multiple houses and USD 10M in accounts. There is no gotcha here.
FirmwareBurner · 6h ago
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 · 6h ago
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.
herval · 5h ago
Is that really “set for life” amounts in the US these days? Sounds quite low. I can imagine it being a ton of money in the early 2000s, but not these days (unless you also have a fully paid out house on top of it, at least)
At the "probably safe FIRE rate", 4% interest: $2m -> $80,000 annually, while also preserving the $2m, accounting for inflation
hdjrudni · 2h ago
This is precisely my goal, but 80k isn't enough in the Bay Area I think. Trying to figure out where's best.
jebarker · 4h ago
It depends where you live and what your lifestyle expenses are. You can easily be set for most of your life on $3M if you live in a low CoL area and keep your expenses under control. Old age could wipe you out if you need a lot of care though.
FirmwareBurner · 4h ago
>level of wealth (say, $2-3m) is achievable on a programmer's salary
Not if you live outside the US.
bestham · 5h ago
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.
>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
I don't doubt he said that, especially when you're young, healthy and carefree you don't need much money. But being a millionaire doesn't hurt that feeling when you're no longer in your twenties and don't want to live with roommates anymore, since everyone can end up with unexpected illnesses or issues that can be made batter only by money.
titanomachy · 5h ago
> 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”.
FirmwareBurner · 4h ago
>I’m not sure this is true. I know plenty of miserable rich people.
Because those rich people are only driven by greed and don't know when to stop. They don't see money and and means to and end, but their life purpose is just being richer than the other rich people which is an exercise in futility, leading to misery. Kind of like the men who's life purpose is being an "alpha male".
Having more money doesn't make you more happy, but having a lack of money can definitely make you more unhappy.
anonzzzies · 5h ago
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.
FirmwareBurner · 3h ago
Yes, everyone working in Europe can easily makes millions just like you, that's the norm here and definitely not flex on niche survivorship bis or cherry picking, that's how the average EU income is €37,900 and youth unemployment is at peak, everyone's too busy making millions.
zer0zzz · 6h ago
I think that’s missing the point. This isn’t about glorifying being poor but understanding when enough is enough.
brundolf · 6h ago
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 · 7h ago
> his personality and the ethos he espouses
We have to remember that it is a choice.
vdupras · 9h ago
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 · 9h ago
“Money isn’t everything in life but before you say that make sure you have enough money”
bsimpson · 8h ago
"They say money can't buy happiness. It buys a Sea-Doo. You ever seen a sad person on a Sea-Doo?"
- Daniel Tosh
tchalla · 8h ago
I don’t know Daniel Tosh or what Sea-Doo. Can you explain this quote to me in like plain English where I don’t have to search something?
unclad5968 · 8h ago
Daniel tosh is a comedian and a sea-doo is a brand of jet ski. A jet ski is like a water motorcycle.
moffkalast · 7h ago
Well you've gotten that far, what's a comedian, water, and a motorcycle?
virgildotcodes · 7h ago
Unfortunately those three terms happen to be irreducible.
orthoxerox · 8h ago
Also called an aquabike or a jetski.
spacedcowboy · 7h ago
I was going to complain about the baby-talk naming system, but frankly I’m not sure the others are much better…
dcrazy · 7h ago
Sea-Doo is a derivative of Ski-Doo. Both are made by Bombardier Recreational Products; the Sea-Doo is a “personal watercraft,” and the Ski-Doo is a snowmobile. The Ski-Doo came first, and I’m guessing the name is a pun on “twenty-three skidoo”, which Wikipedia says originally referred to “leaving quickly”, something like “skedaddle”. Obviously, a snowmobile allows one to travel quickly over the snow.
So the etymology appears to be Skedaddle -> 23 Skidoo -> Ski-Doo -> Sea-Doo.
(Edit: I’m wrong! Wikipedia says the Ski-Doo was originally supposed to be called the “Ski-Dog”, but someone made a typo and they stuck with it! So much for my attempt to reconstruct a derivation!)
Jet Ski is also a trademark used by Kawasaki for their personal watercraft. It was designed by the same guy who designed the Sea-Doo for Bombardier.
underlipton · 9h ago
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 · 3h ago
Of course, for most regular people money buys happiness.
paulpauper · 9h ago
but he also had to live with having sold apple stock far too soon. Not that he cares that much .
gazpachotron · 9h ago
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 · 9h ago
> 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 · 8h ago
Noteworthy in what way, exactly?
pengaru · 8h ago
> Noteworthy in what way, exactly?
Being kind to others costs something, the wealthy can inherently afford it.
When they're still assholes it seems dysfunctional to me, like these folks are actively aspiring to be jerks.
What a strange path to choose, when you have so many options at your disposal.
esafak · 7h ago
You said it costs something; getting along with other people, at least. They can afford not to do that.
achenet · 9h ago
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 :)
antithesizer · 9h ago
"While" not "whereas"
spacedcowboy · 7h ago
Perhaps. I think it’s perfectly correct English, personally. If you’re American then your grammar rules might differ, I don’t know…
“Whereas” can be used at the start of a sentence to introduce two contrasting clauses - in this case the first being his own statement, and the second being my rather more cynical money-based reasoning for his continuing wonderful personality.
seydor · 9h ago
not a lot of people dispose it
algo_lover · 9h ago
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 · 8h ago
> 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 · 7h ago
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 · 7h ago
Jobs is ultimately an example of how death doesn’t care what is your net worth.
oceanhaiyang · 5h ago
As is anyone.
nickjj · 7h ago
> 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 · 9h ago
>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 · 9h ago
And perhaps a sense of civic duty: Those tax rates were created (hopefully) by elected representatives.
Zigurd · 8h ago
That attitude about paying taxes is an actually effective altruism.
labrador · 7h ago
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 · 1h ago
I’m glad you made it man. I don’t know how much longer I can hold out
tasuki · 6h ago
> 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 · 6h ago
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__ · 7h ago
Money doesn’t cause happiness, but poverty does cause grief.
sharadov · 6h ago
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 · 8h ago
[flagged]
IncreasePosts · 7h ago
How can you tell how happy or unhappy thiel is?
Zigurd · 7h ago
If Peter Theil was happy we would hear him go mwahaha or twirl his mustache.
LightBug1 · 6h ago
[flagged]
nialv7 · 5h ago
Too bad the world isn't run by people like him.
bmitc · 3h ago
I would be as well.
crmd · 6h ago
To me Woz is a connection back to the hippy-libertarian utopian engineering roots of Silicon Valley, decades before the current leaders, who seem to be much more misanthropic and ethically challenged than the generation of CEOs before them.
paulpauper · 9h ago
It kidna sucks having accomplished so much very early in life and then being "now what?" It's like he was never able to relive that glory of Apple, not that he necessarily wanted to. But it's like, 'what do you do to fill the time?'
kelnos · 6h ago
I think "now what?" is just a lack of imagination. There is so much to do in this world. Hell, there's likely so much to do just where you live.
This idea that we have to keep "accomplishing" things for life to have meaning is unhealthy.
didibus · 7h ago
We must sit opposite, once you gain enough money to live your life freely, why would you keep grinding for glory. The world is now your playground. Travel, meet people, keep learning, keep discovering, and just spend time with your loved ones.
dcrazy · 8h ago
I don’t think he was chasing glory, but he did a bunch of stuff post-Apple. In addition to the things mentioned in the book passage Gruber quoted, he funded the Us festival because he loves music.
wnc3141 · 7h ago
It's true most accomplished people will never catch lightening in a bottle twice. I think it's best to remember that runaway market success is largely not up to you so it's best to pursue something that's useful and authentic to you and something good will come of it.
For every Beyonce, there is an equally talented person who wasn't at the right place at the right time.
achenet · 8h ago
Do things you love with people you love.
If you have kids, go be with them.
Travel, see the world.
Philanthropy.
Start another business if you feel the urge. Meet people. Get into the arts (the founder of my present company, OVH, used his fortune to buy a bunch of guitars and become a performing musician, Ken Block used his DC money to get into car racing)...
A creative soul like Woz will always find something worth doing :)
mrexroad · 7h ago
Confused why this comment is downvoted, as it seems like an appropriate response. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Woz a few times over the years and even getting to spend a few hours with him on two occasions. Your last sentence pretty much sums up what I feel, along with that you can tell he just enjoys being helpful or just make others laugh. I’ve met plenty of other people with similar net worth where I cannot say the same.
Edit: no longer gray by the time I typed this.
martinpw · 8h ago
Probably feels a lot better than the opposite of spending your whole life hoping to achieve something and never feeling you quite did - always becoming and never being.
layer8 · 7h ago
He’s fortunate to have accomplished so much at all, and he seems to be aware of that good fortune.
themafia · 7h ago
I'm sorry, but without your time at Apple, people would probably not pay so lavishly to hear you speak. Your speaking money very much is a continuation of your "Apple wealth." I'm not sure how you can legitimately separate them.
Anyways. Money. It buys happiness. Whoever says otherwise is a fool.
ozim · 7h ago
It seems like all the money Steve Jobs had didn’t help him to be a happy person.
Pretty much what I feel from reading Issacson and fact Jobs died rather early.
themafia · 6h ago
I think Steve loved running Apple more than he ever let on. Is his form of happiness identical to your or mine? Probably not. Was he exactly where he wanted to be in life? Absolutely.
kelnos · 6h ago
I think a better way to look at it is that money is no guarantee of happiness, but it usually doesn't hurt, can often help, and you're much more likely to be unhappy if you're poor/struggling.
wnc3141 · 7h ago
I think it's more of a "it depends" It's everything to someone facing the crushing anxiety of scarcity but "meh" to someone who spent most of their adult life being able to buy anything they want.
markx2 · 6h ago
> Anyways. Money. It buys happiness. Whoever says otherwise is a fool.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44903803 ("Steve Wozniak: Life to me was never about accomplishment, but about happiness (slashdot.org)"—593 comments)
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.
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)
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.
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.
Is the insight here that people with resources have advantages?
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.
At the "probably safe FIRE rate", 4% interest: $2m -> $80,000 annually, while also preserving the $2m, accounting for inflation
Not if you live outside the US.
[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Wozniak#cite_note-2_co...
I don't doubt he said that, especially when you're young, healthy and carefree you don't need much money. But being a millionaire doesn't hurt that feeling when you're no longer in your twenties and don't want to live with roommates anymore, since everyone can end up with unexpected illnesses or issues that can be made batter only by money.
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”.
Because those rich people are only driven by greed and don't know when to stop. They don't see money and and means to and end, but their life purpose is just being richer than the other rich people which is an exercise in futility, leading to misery. Kind of like the men who's life purpose is being an "alpha male".
Having more money doesn't make you more happy, but having a lack of money can definitely make you more unhappy.
Very few people get to that point and then choose happiness instead of ambition
We have to remember that it is a choice.
- Daniel Tosh
So the etymology appears to be Skedaddle -> 23 Skidoo -> Ski-Doo -> Sea-Doo.
(Edit: I’m wrong! Wikipedia says the Ski-Doo was originally supposed to be called the “Ski-Dog”, but someone made a typo and they stuck with it! So much for my attempt to reconstruct a derivation!)
Jet Ski is also a trademark used by Kawasaki for their personal watercraft. It was designed by the same guy who designed the Sea-Doo for Bombardier.
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.
Being kind to others costs something, the wealthy can inherently afford it.
When they're still assholes it seems dysfunctional to me, like these folks are actively aspiring to be jerks.
What a strange path to choose, when you have so many options at your disposal.
So sometimes it's the opposite, you start out needy and the 'rat race' actually brings you to a more abundant world-view :)
“Whereas” can be used at the start of a sentence to introduce two contrasting clauses - in this case the first being his own statement, and the second being my rather more cynical money-based reasoning for his continuing wonderful personality.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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!
Since then, I've seen him a bunch of times, chatting with people and being friendly.
This idea that we have to keep "accomplishing" things for life to have meaning is unhealthy.
For every Beyonce, there is an equally talented person who wasn't at the right place at the right time.
If you have kids, go be with them. Travel, see the world.
Philanthropy.
Start another business if you feel the urge. Meet people. Get into the arts (the founder of my present company, OVH, used his fortune to buy a bunch of guitars and become a performing musician, Ken Block used his DC money to get into car racing)...
A creative soul like Woz will always find something worth doing :)
Edit: no longer gray by the time I typed this.
Anyways. Money. It buys happiness. Whoever says otherwise is a fool.
Pretty much what I feel from reading Issacson and fact Jobs died rather early.
Money allows you choices.
It does not buy happiness.