I appreciate your perspective and reassurance, and I agree with nearly everything you said, but wow, that's a pretty damning view of things. You made it sound like I've missed the boat that left in 2006! I do feel a bit antsy that once we have a high-profile collapse of a company like Groupon or Zynga that the rest of the startup ecosystem will be dragged down with it.

After reading your comment, I ought to clarify a few things:

(1) I have in fact been unemployed for several months, mostly because I needed the break and have decided that I should be more careful about where I choose to work next to avoid going through the same nightmare again. Even so, I'm not in a hurry to get a paycheck and am willing to take the time for finding a good match. But I'm aware that many employers look upon this rather negatively and will be rather "curious" about what happened.

(2) The "bureaucracy" aspect I was whining about was not so much dysfunctional relationships as it was pure cluelessness and red tape. Think 6-month wait times for a 15-minute procurement job, or crappy tools that were "standardized" in the company based on some sales pitch delivered at the VP level. I'd imagine it's this type of situation that is more easily avoidable at a startup.

I have a vague hunch of what you mean by "VC darling" and am taking all mentions of high-profile backers with a grain of salt, but I'm curious about what you consider "Real Technology" -- in what ways are the technical challenges, from usability to scalability, of a social media "joke" startup substantially different from those of a business that you'd take seriously?