I wasn&#x27;t necessarily arguing with you, just trying to highlight that even just having a little bit of SV startup influence on your life is still &quot;living in Rome&quot;. The phrase, &quot;All roads lead to Rome&quot; comes to mind.<p>You want Rome in your life, having Rome there is way way better than not having it there. But Rome is <i>dangerous</i>, precisely because of the infectious nature of Roman ideas. When you &#x27;live in Rome&#x27;, you are ceding control over your life over to Rome in exchange for a more exciting future. You&#x27;ve sold the family farm, uprooted yourself and moved to the big city.<p>I don&#x27;t want to live in Rome. I don&#x27;t want Roman ideas controlling my life. I want to live out here in the periphery, maintaining as strict a boundary as I can between myself, my lands, my family, and Rome.<p>I don&#x27;t want little bits of Rome on my lands. If Rome wants to come to me, offer me a fat salary and a cush job right inside my kingdom, I&#x27;m going to examine that gift horse extremely carefully to make sure it&#x27;s not hiding a bunch of soldiers inside, or, more likely, ethical failings on the parts of the founders that can wreck my life along with my kingdom. I can&#x27;t fight Rome, Rome is unstoppable, but by keeping my head up and not falling prey to ego and hubris, I can enrich myself and my kingdom through Rome rather than get destroyed by it.<p>Hacker News is how I get exposure to that ecosystem while still maintaining control over my life. It&#x27;s perfect for me, no less than I need, no more than I can handle.