Unless those people giving you money are employees vesting their stock options. Perhaps I've been misled, but I don't think it's common for employees to be given preferred stock.
In the case where you have this situation where an employee is both putting his money by investing in a round and working to vest some ISOs, the stock he would get through the round would be whatever the round lead negotiated, the call options though would still be for common stock.
Right, employees are getting common stock so they don't get to jump to the front of the line when a company is sold. But they are also paying the common stock price, which is a fraction of the price paid by the preferred stock, so it makes sense that each share they own has less rights associated with it vs. the shares the investor pays a premium for.
Exactly. The preferred stock is paid for with real money. The common shares I bought as an employee was at single digit pennies a share. While I am not exactly happy how I got wiped out, I did less badly than many VCs did.