If I could I'd retire tomorrow, I have so many projects I would like to take on, I have the feeling I could fill 3 lives with them: gardening, learning math, system programming, wine tasting, carpentry, sport, traveling etc... There are *so* many interesting things to do and so little time. I guess time will tell but at the moment I have a hard time imagining myself getting bored.

He could start by reverting the removal of "Don't be evil" from Google.

It's interesting that he's returned to work on Gemini and that it has been central to Google's rejuvenation in that time. I am curious how much of this marries up with traditional founder driven companies being successful (Jobs returning to Apple, Jensen Huang, etc) compared to being adrift without their original founders. How much was he driving as part of Gemini? Or was he just chipping in?

Retirement isn't quite applicable to billionaires.

They never have to work. They do it because they want to.

Retirement implies there was work you didn't want to do. You did it because you had (or wanted) to make some money. Now you have enough money. You've retired.

Hell, it isn't even applicable to many wealthy software engineers who got rich from tech startups. Many are coding as much as when they were working.

Hard to believe he did it "out of boredom".

It lines up with the AI arms race kicking into overdrive around ChatGPT's triumph in late 2022. Brin pops out of hiding right then, admitting Google "messed up" and starts coding, analysing losses, and basically playing dictator with his super-voting shares to shove the company back on track.

Rivals like OpenAI yanked him in and now he's in the office daily because the "trajectory of AI is so exciting" - translation: his ego couldn't handle watching his empire get outpaced, and with those voting rights, he can bulldoze through bureaucracy to keep the throne.

Ultimately, it's less about some profound quest for purpose and more about a control freak safeguarding his legacy and billions as the tech world burns. He never really let his kingdom go.

I retired when my first kid was born. I had plenty to keep me busy playing with her, taking care of her, traveling with her. And then we had the second one, and were extra busy.

But I was still "working" the whole time. I was running a small startup, and still keeping up on tech and taking speaking gigs. I was not great at fully retiring.

I unretired when the second kid got to 1st grade. We could no longer travel on a whim and the house was empty 6 hours a day. I didn't seek work, but someone reached out with an interesting job and I didn't say no.

Funny enough, my wife and I were just talking about how we were both bad at retirement (she also retired and has since gone back to work). But we talked about how the next retirement will be better, because the kids will be gone and we'll just sit around making art and building Lego all day.

We'll see if that actually happens!

Proposal for new word: "employtainment"

I look forward to the sweet kiss of death to solve the retirement funding issue, and forever declining health while working struggle. Working for "The man" takes everything someone has.

Really weird clickbait subline

"The tech founder’s return to full-time work is a reminder that even billions can’t guarantee a happy retirement if you don’t also do this. "

It’s funny when people ask you what you want to do after you retire, and you tell them you are going to sit behind your PC and do exactly what you are doing now.