Swag is no good if no one uses it, so put that before cost or branding. The reason YC t-shirts are gray instead of orange is simply that the gray shi… - Paul Graham

Money is a side effect of specialization. In a specialized society, most of the things you need, you can’t make for yourself. If you want a potato or a pencil or a place to live, you have to get it from someone else. How do you get the person who grows the potatoes to give you some? By giving him something he wants in return. But you can’t get very far by trading things directly with the people who need them.

Venture capitalists have a list of danger signs to watch out for. Near the top is the company run by techno-weenies who are obsessed with solving interesting technical problems, instead of making users happy.

It would be very hard to make yourself read a lot if you didn't like reading. Even if you made yourself "read" lots of books, you wouldn't do it with sufficient attention. So only people who enjoy reading will be able to write well.