Well, I stayed at a big tech instead of going to an early-stage startup after I got burned in a startup. I knew the founder of this startup, but I needed money I can touch not paper money, they exited and everyone that was there when I could have joined have been handsomely retired for a few years now while I sweat about job stability and retirement.
I left Sun for a startup that was pretty rudderless and defocused, so IMO, it never went in any particular direction with any momentum. Just floundering, but Sun kind of cratered (not because I left) and it was a half salary as the usual "FTE contractor" during some brutal economic times.
Lowlights were the boss massively overcommitting on a computer installation, and later breaking a lease in the dark of night with a lessor suspected of being armed and pissed off. Neither idiot showed up.
I can't say if I'd have kept the Sun job for long, given its decline and sale to Oracle, or if it was better hanging around in that startup which was legally a business rather than a hobby, but in practice, it's a coin flip. Every time the CEO moved, the office moved with him (or vice-versa, who knew?) (and I had the 32 mile drive across the old 2-lane San Mateo Bridge)
I alllllllmost got a job at a startup that was soon thereafter bought by Google, so that would have been the worst of both worlds.
Lowlights were the boss massively overcommitting on a computer installation, and later breaking a lease in the dark of night with a lessor suspected of being armed and pissed off. Neither idiot showed up.
I can't say if I'd have kept the Sun job for long, given its decline and sale to Oracle, or if it was better hanging around in that startup which was legally a business rather than a hobby, but in practice, it's a coin flip. Every time the CEO moved, the office moved with him (or vice-versa, who knew?) (and I had the 32 mile drive across the old 2-lane San Mateo Bridge)
I alllllllmost got a job at a startup that was soon thereafter bought by Google, so that would have been the worst of both worlds.
I came out of it all OK.