There's a legit distinction, though, between startups and other businesses - startups are designed to grow fast. [0]
I respect and admire pg as much as probably anybody on this board, but I still reject the idea that he has any particular standing to declare his subjective definition of "startup" to be "the" definition by fiat.
I would argue that "startup" actually refers to "businesses that are designed to grow big", where the speed at which you do so is mostly irrelevant. If one wants to raise VC money and tie themselves to that particular time-boxed constraint, that's great. But you can just as well do it "slow and steady" by focusing on early profitability and continually and incrementally reinvesting profits back into the company for growth.
Neither is "better" or "worse" than the other, except in context, just as with the quarter-horse/camel example.
the definition I've used for years is "a startup is a business creating a new business model or service over the internet". Because there were so many people around me who were/are part of the startup scene, building businesses that were/are definitely "startups" and yet not focused exclusively on growth.
I respect and admire pg as much as probably anybody on this board, but I still reject the idea that he has any particular standing to declare his subjective definition of "startup" to be "the" definition by fiat.
I would argue that "startup" actually refers to "businesses that are designed to grow big", where the speed at which you do so is mostly irrelevant. If one wants to raise VC money and tie themselves to that particular time-boxed constraint, that's great. But you can just as well do it "slow and steady" by focusing on early profitability and continually and incrementally reinvesting profits back into the company for growth.
Neither is "better" or "worse" than the other, except in context, just as with the quarter-horse/camel example.