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I liked this part: "Startups have been systematized, mythologized, culturally and socially de-risked; reduced down to formulas and recipes. Yet, there is no enduring formula for creativity and rebellion."

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Most of these startups would be just regular corporate projects except for the fact that corporate stinginess and lack of vision is at an all time high. Startup "CEOs" are just project managers on a shoestring race to the bottom, as observed in the long hours and extreme personal sacrifice involved.

The reason the strategy works so well is that corporate politics are even more stifling to experimentation than VC-istan (but not by much).

In ten years, there'll be an open-allocation (Valve style) company that has figured out how to solve this for realz.

Some companies seem to be like a VC in disguise: I would think of Supercell(http://blog.idonethis.com/post/48277151394/least-powerful-ce...) and Google when it had 20% free time. I liked the 20% free time model, people have some freedom to pursue their goals without worrying so much about money. It probably leads to more innovation being done as it takes money out of people's concerns. I don't know how it's done now on Google.

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