A little bit non-cs thoughts:)

As a purely computing geek, most of the time I am focusing on things related to CS. However I also very interested in things like investment and economics. If I were 5 years younger with my current knowledge, I might choose Business/Finance as my major instead of CS:)

In fact, I have got a little bit training in those fields. During my study in China, I have taken courses like International Trade, Financial Accounting, Modern Management, Government Budget Plan and so on. These courses have established some basic ideas of business/economics for me. However, it is when I start working that I realize the importance of investment and business. Sometimes a technology geek just cannot avoid thinking about how to spend his salary for a house or a car. Obviously he could not just use a calculator to divide the expense by his salary:) Also, books that I have read like Money Changers, On the road with Jim Rogers Investment Bikers and Triad Power. These three books influenced me so much that I could not bear leaving my salary in the bank without doing anything. There's an old motto in China: no advances means falling behind. This motto well applies to money and currency. Due to inflation, our money is becoming less and less valuable. The interest we could obtain could not completely make up the loss of inflation. If we could make use of our current money to produce more, why don't we have a try then?

One interesting fact is that Bill Gates withdraws from Microsoft, but he puts almost all his money under the management of Warren Buffett. A boss like Bill Gates knows the importance of investment and obviously he is not lack of money, then there is no doubt that a poor programmer like me should pay special attention to investment for expanding my assets:)

Another interesting thing to investigate in the future:)