- <i>"And it is built specifically for use with Sustainable Aviation Fuel, a cleaner alternative to ordinary jet fuel — albeit one that costs several times more right now."</i><p>I've been thinking about this for a while, in the context of multiple different startups. There's this (anti)pattern I see repeatedly: a startup says they're doing something that's an <i>obviously</i> an overwhelmingly bad idea from a business sense, but that creates positive PR in the short term. "We're limiting ourselves to exotic jet fuel multiple times more expensive than our competitors'" is such an example. I've seen so many others, I'm beginning to wonder what's going on.<p>Is it bait-and-switch? Start out by promising something you don't plan to deliver, to garner goodwill and investment in the near term? And then switch to the "correct" mode later.<p>Is it unseriousness? Are they not 100% focused on doing everything to get the startup to succeed? Imposing artificial limits on your company isn't the action of a success-at-all-costs mindset. Do they expect to fail and are just coasting?<p>I'm overlooking something obvious and reasonable. Most founders are smart (?); there has to be a sensible business explanation for this.<p>(edit: Not that carbon-neutral jet fuel isn't a great idea for a startup. But this is a supersonic airplane company, not a jet fuel company. If your startup's success requires succeeding at two <i>different</i> extremely difficult novel things at the same time, your success probability goes from "epsilon" to "epsilon squared").