> I could have tried roughing it without venture funding, what the industry calls “bootstrapping.” The venture world has a condescending label for bootstrapped companies without scale potential: a “lifestyle” business, which roughly translates to: Good for you, now back to the sandbox until you’re ready to play with the big boys. Given my professed aim, this could have made sense. But there was so much funding for the taking, and part of me figured that if I was swinging, I may as well swing big.<p>From this bit (and honestly the whole first half of the article) it sounds this guy just wanted to gamble on the lottery instead of being a businessman. You could replace this guy's bio with that of a professional poker player and not change many words. Did he even want to run a business, or did he just want to spin the wheel for a low-probability chance to turn as little time as possible into as much money as possible? I know this is heresy on a site hosted by a VC firm, but the world needs fewer of these "entrepreneurs" and their gambles and more of those icky "lifestyle people" and their actual businesses that serve people.