Paul, your essays inspired me to quit my job even though I was looking forward to a nice promotion. A couple of years was enough. I'm two weeks into my startup, which I'm basing on a Paul Graham/Joel Spolsky hybrid model. I'm building up capital by taking on some small- to medium-sized projects while prototyping my real idea behind the scenes with a few collaborators.

While my work struggles to find my replacement, I have no problems finding people that A) want to work for me on contract projects, and B) want me to work on their projects (right now there is a queue). I actually work longer now than I did in the office. But I'm not tired. In fact, I have more energy. Additionally, if you normalize my work hours, I am even more productive working on my own. I just generally feel better about myself and am only experiencing "good" stress these days. I encourage anyone who finds themselves agreeing with Paul Graham in his essays more often than not to make the leap.

I fundamentally agree with Paul Graham about the change we are seeing. In fact, my little prototype bets the farm on the premise that this change is indeed happening.

I'm sufficiently capitalized having had a couple of years out of school to make some money that Y Combinator's funding is, quite frankly, an unattractive proposition. Plus, I'm in Toronto and I love the city. I live/work downtown right near the university. I would not want to move. All this said, is there any chance that you will do a talk up here in Canada?