Being full of engineering-minded people, Hacker News has a strong bias favoring the idea that if you hack away and create an interesting piece of technology, then that is what is required for a successful startup business.
That idea is wrong. That idea is more of a love of inventing and obsession over technology rather than successful business.
A successful business doesn;t need neat technology or having brilliant engineers.
It requires a product/service meeting consumer demand at the right time in a sustainable way at a cost that enables a profit for the business.
That's where Google Wave failed. Despite a huge financial backing in engineering and promotion, people didn't want it.
The core for a successful business is not innovative technology-- it's Business Operations.
If the business operations are wrong -- ie a product isn't fulfilling a consumer demand or has an sunsustainable cost-- then the startup is going to tank. (unless angel investors keep throwing money at it, but eventually they won't anymore)
On the other hand... if the business operations are right, ie. there is strong sustainable consumer demand for the product/service and a cost enabling a profit, then the the company will prosper regardless if the engineers are decent, great or so-so.
There are plenty of companies making good profits year after year, growing there business and equity sustainably, which have just ok engineers and average non-innovative software.
It would be nice to see more startup-related articles here on Hacker News showing technology failures, not wasting money on too much engineering and the importance of the business operations side of things.