I found a better analogy to be a fire.<p>Think of products&#x2F;startups as fires, they start small, can&#x27;t use large logs straight away, need constant attention, you could use a lot of petrol (financing) to get it started faster, but it could also just fizzle out immediately if the large logs don&#x27;t catch fire as well.<p>Once they get going, you don&#x27;t have to watch it so closely, you can just add a log here and there, maybe remove some ash.<p>The goal of the fire is to get people to gather around it. The warmth in this case matters a lot, but also the people gathering around the fire.<p>In fact some people might pick another fire because it has people who are interested in the same things as them.<p>Sometimes a fire gathers TOO many people, and it gets crowded. The maker of the fire didn&#x27;t make sure it grew large enought to provide warmth to many people  - and so people on the outside get cold and go to another fire.<p>Most of the time though, if someone is by a fire that provides enough warmth for him and he likes the people around it, there is little compelling reason to go to another one.