Founder status within a decade displaced stable employment as the cool option
Evidence
As Jeremy Stop-pelman, the founder of Yelp, said, “In 2005, it was not necessarily cool to have a start-up. It was cooler to work for a great company or have a job that was layoff free. And so now, the pendulum [has] shifted back to you’re uncool unless you’re a founder of a company.” Being “safe” isn’t cool, and brands you as a fuddy-duddy tied down to someone else’s dream. If you are a rank-and-file employee, it is better to be one at a hot startup than a large company; there’s more risk, but more chance of getting rich by proxy. While the chance for massive wealth rarely pans out—something like 85 percent of startups fail—it is this hope that fuels entrepreneurs and workers alike. — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 182
Categorization
- XREF: Connects to broader cultural shifts toward risk-taking and hustle culture in tech and social media. — connects to: Even failed startup founders outrank employees at successful companies — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 182; Startup prestige rests on independence, risk-taking, and fuck-you money — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 182; Entrepreneurial heroism persists as a core value across millennial and Gen Z culture. — W. David Marx, Blank Space: A Cultural History of the…, 820 (+3 more)
Broader Connections
- Startup prestige rests on independence, risk-taking, and fuck-you money
#expands(0.85) — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 182 - Entrepreneurial heroism persists as a core value across millennial and Gen Z culture.
#corroborates(0.80) — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 820 - Entrepreneurship became a generalized ideal pervading personal identity and relationships
#expands(0.75) - Millennial cool substituted earnest aspiration for the old detached cool
#qualifies(0.75) — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 338 - Web 2.0 repackaged American mythologies like rags-to-riches entrepreneurship into startup culture
#expands(0.72) — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 22