IMO this kind of small-scale and shortsighted focus is holding SV-style innovation back. Twitter has no route to profit (last I heard) but it is a key factor in modern global events, for good or bad.
We need more Elon Musk-style megaprojects and fewer Facebook killers.
To your bigger point, I actually think nowadays we're finally seeing fewer "me too" type companies--fewer knockoff social companies (early 2010s), fewer "Uber/Airbnb for X" companies (mid-2010s), fewer hot air crypto companies (late 2010s), etc. Granted I'm seeing a proliferation of "AI" companies so that isn't to say that hype is dead, but I'm hoping we'll see something new and innovative over the next few years.
Quite a few smaller, regional Groupon clones were able to sell to either Groupon or living social for very hefty sums when the gold rush was still on.
I would say just the opposite, with a very few exceptions, the entire VC startup culture optimized for three outcomes.
- create a product without any profit motive but to get acquired by a larger company. The acquiring company kills off the product and bought the company as an acqui-hire. The original company then posts a message on their blog about “Their Amazing Journey”
- the company gets acquired by a platform company, and the acquirer either kills off the product for competing platforms (see Apple/TestFlight) or tightly integrates it into another product (see Facebook) or let’s a whither and die a slow death (Google/Yahoo)
- it’s a big Ponzi scheme where the initial investors pawn off the company to the public market and the company has little chance of becoming profitable enough (or at all) to warrant its valuation.
In a large integrated business model you can produce expensive services which make no profit on their own, but make it possible for an entire ecosystem of profitable ones to exist. The last couple of generations of game consoles worked like this early in their lifecycle.
Well, the retail stores do have a separate P&L.
Ironically, if you do things well, and you have product-market fit then you won't be profitable! Why? Because you'll want to take on financing.
Suppose you discover a cure for a major disease and don't want to sell to a major drug co. Well, you'll probably have to take on significant financing. You'll be 'losing money' possibly for quite some time. Which is fine as long as it's backed by growth and the right underlying metrics.
Also, Twitter is profitable.