<story><title>How Not to Die (2007)</title><url>http://www.paulgraham.com/die.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>diego</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t think &amp;quot;If you can just avoid dying, you get rich&amp;quot; has proven true. I&amp;#x27;ve invested in startups (including YC ones) that followed this to a tee. They never found product-market fit, they could have been going forever, investors forgot about them. Some are still going, some managed to get acquired, some closed shop.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s really a false dichotomy, only a small fraction of the companies that avoid dying manage to explode. You just don&amp;#x27;t hear about the rest.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>pbecotte</author><text>If you have taken enough VC that the only way to get any value at all is through a huge exit, this statement is true. If you run a normal business, it is not true :)</text></comment>
<story><title>How Not to Die (2007)</title><url>http://www.paulgraham.com/die.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>diego</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t think &amp;quot;If you can just avoid dying, you get rich&amp;quot; has proven true. I&amp;#x27;ve invested in startups (including YC ones) that followed this to a tee. They never found product-market fit, they could have been going forever, investors forgot about them. Some are still going, some managed to get acquired, some closed shop.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s really a false dichotomy, only a small fraction of the companies that avoid dying manage to explode. You just don&amp;#x27;t hear about the rest.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>rossdavidh</author><text>Definitely a selection bias going on, but also he did say that you might have to change what you&amp;#x27;re doing.</text></comment>