I worked for 4 startups that were operating for years at a loss with revenue, all are profitable today and all were acquired.

My current startup is also not profitable, we're burning money but we're already signing big contracts and I hope in a year or two we keep growing rather than become profitable (1B+ valuation in a year).

Becoming profitable, even at this point is just a matter of deciding to stop expanding - but neither us nor our investors want this given there is so much potential for growth and more revenue streams on the line.

this is ycombinator's news aggregators, I suspect you're not going to get a "don't take risks and build things" vibe - it's a startup accelerator after all :).