>Well, I think most refutations to PG's essay are based on an assumption: "Focusing on growth leads to being evil". It is probably due to too many negative stories in media about cheaters. But as we all know, cheaters can not sustain their own games forever due to the cheats violate some underlying fundamentals.

The idea behind startups is that they don't have to "sustain their own games forever", just until they get bought...