Really long article, but missed an important point. Technology has atomized the required scale of a new company with reasonable ambitions. It costs cents on the dollar to accomplish what would have taken a scale (10mm+) investment to get done in 1995. The dark side of this is that
1) Only companies with superb prospects will attract large capital investments required for job stability. 2) Lots of risky jobs will be created at little companies versus big "safe" companies.
I think this blog article provides a lot of great concrete actionable advice for evaluating startup jobs. How do HNers feel about the advice?