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Comment by mlLK | Hacker News Reader

Here is a question that's been beating at my brain lately and this post help catalyze my thoughts into text: how do we know what we're working on is worth it? In other words, how do we measure what we're doing? This question begs another set of questions, which is: What do you value? Do you value what you do? More often than not, I find money as a poor system indicator for determining the value of what people are doing.

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Look, it's like this. Nobody knows what's the right thing to be working on.

Yes, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs both betted on the personal computer. And those were the right decisions, and they knew it. But how many times have they created stupid, failed products? Microsoft Bob? The Apple Cube? These guys appear like they know everything they should always be working on, but they've gone through years of trial and error with various approaches. They have been around the block.

I would say both of these guys are so dedicated that they may not necessarily have the "right" idea, but they constantly tweak their ideas. Jobs successfully launched Pixar. Doesn't that make you wonder that having the types of traits that he does would make you successful in virtually anything you do in life? By the way, he has a very specific set of traits about him that allow him to see such consistent success. I recommend picking up "Inside Steve's Brain."

You don't know what's right. Zuckerberg launched failed businesses before Facebook. I know a lot of millionaire entrepreneurs who failed at 6 or 7 startups before they got it right. How does the saying go on the bicycle? You can't move forward if you're standing still, and you can't change directions until you're moving forward.

Off the top of my head, there are four criteria I can think of that determine the value - to myself - of something I'm doing professionally: how much money it'll bring me, how much I'm learning, how much I'm enjoying it, and how beneficial it is to society as a whole.

If I'm not getting at least 2 out of 4, then it's probably not worth doing. Learning might be the only exception.

There is a pressing need for entrepreneurial thinking into social and environmental problems - social entrepreneurs like Tim Smit of the Eden Project think the financial crisis could be a huge opportunity for social enterprise. In terms of measuring impact, I think we need a new form of accountancy, which rates social and environmental impact as importantly as financial impact.

> In terms of measuring impact, I think we need a new form of accountancy, which rates social and environmental impact as importantly as financial impact.

That assumes that the "social and environmental impact" are going to be measured honestly and not just used as an excuse for control.

For example, even if you believe all of the AGW stuff, the "account for environmental costs" tax is around $2/ton of carbon. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi...

That's a large pile of money, but it isn't going to have the "side effects" that the AGW people want. Those will require much higher taxes on "bad" things. So they'll have to either give up on the rant against said bad things or go with "sin carbon" taxes, which pretty much proves that they're not interested in carbon but sin.

This is a deep question; I think the answer is a mix of economics and philosophy. Depending on how interested you are, consider maybe "History of Western Philosophy" by Bertrand Russell.

except this book does nothing to address that point because it is as the title says, a history of western philosophy. it is about OTHER philsophers. on the internet you have to be careful about talking up books, someone may actually have read it and call you out

Sorry, I'm meaning to order this from Amazon -- it got a lot of props in an ask.mefi thread. Didn't mean to imply that I had read it. Do you have a better suggestion?

how do we know what we're working on is worth it? In other words, how do we measure what we're doing?

you charge someone (an advertiser or customer) for attaching their name to or using your product/service and they agree???? we even have units to measure this, we call them dollars!!

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