Jinx wrote:
>> You can't sustain the activities I listed above, unless your business
>> is profitable. You may have a different opinion, but it will obviously
>> be wrong. ;)
>
> Could you say a 'business' has to be at least self-sustaining to be
> considered in any way successful ? For example could you call a
> non-profit organisation a business ? - it trades, makes money,
> spends money, pays wages, etc, but at the end of the day, or the
> financial year, its bank account may not have changed much.

It's funny you say that, as most is true for most companies. It's actually 
considered bad business practice to keep a large sum in the bank -- the 
money must be invested somewhere (people, machines, R&D, etc). Otherwise, 
you're not using your money to its full efficiency, if I can put it that 
way.

> And
> it probably grew during the year too. Would you consider donations
> as "propping up", like an injection of funds into a commercial venture,
> as without them the organisation would fail or fail to grow ?

It depends, you can also look at donations as profit if you wanted to. In 
exchange for their money, people are getting something in return, if only 
the positive feeling of having accomplished something good. At this point, 
it gets really confusing, because now you can (like Russell) argue that it 
doesn't have to involve money at all. I drink a glass of water on a hot day 
(investment), so I can increase my well-being ("profit"). So I *am*, 
literally, a business.

I think it makes a lot more sense to define a business in terms of its 
goals. Is the main purpose of your enterprise to use the resources available 
at your disposal to make money, or is it something else?

Best regards,

Vitaliy


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