There are many people who "don't need any more money" but are still working day and night to make more money. For example, Satya or Tim Apple.
So I'll say that I get where you're coming from, but also, I believe him and Brad!
Everything else came out of their pockets or from the super early customers who paid before launch, before they started offering their service for free.
In case you're unaware, these folks made Pebble. Their finances are probably fine.
Some people said it was 4D chess, a brilliant marketing ploy, but after 3-4 iterations I think we can all agree that was not the case. They genuinely believed that Beeper Mini would fly.
There is nothing sinister about being deluded, as a startup founder you might say it's a prerequisite. But nonetheless, they are.
I agree that they believed in Beeper Mini being a reasonable strategy, I'm not contesting that. It definitely wasn't just marketing, they really wanted to bring iMessage to everyone.
But I don't see how Beeper (or the other parts of Beeper Mini) are a delusion. Having a close-enough interface to all of the relevant chat networks is great. It works well and is relatively sustainable, especially if you're targeting the least common denominator of features plus a couple additional things.
iMessage isn't the reason I use Beeper. It's a very cool feature, but I paid for Beeper before I figured out how to register my phone number with iMessage, and I'd still have done so even if I never used iMessage at all.