Contrary to the stereotype, startups are a marathon, not a sprint. The truth is, you are not going to be a billion dollar company or acquired in the next 18 months.
In some fields the way to succeed is to have a vision of what you want to achieve, and to hold true to it no matter what setbacks you encounter. Starting startups is not one of them. The stick-to-your-vision approach works for something like winning an Olympic gold medal, where the problem is well-defined. Startups are more like science, where you need to follow the trail wherever it leads.
If you have a list of all the things you shouldn't do, you can turn that into a recipe for succeeding just by negating.
In a sense there's just one mistake that kills startups: not making something users want.
What's wrong with having one founder? To start with, it's a vote of no confidence. It probably means the founder couldn't talk any of his friends into starting the company with him.
Darwinism may be a fine theory in other contexts, but in startups, intelligent design works best.
We knew we'd need more funding to reach that goal. We also knew that the boom was going to end. Since we didn't expect investors' faith in our mission to survive the coming crash, we moved fast to raise funds while we could.
A startup is the largest endeavor over which you can have definite mastery. You can have agency not just over your own life, but over a small and important part of the world. It begins by rejecting the unjust tyranny of chance. You are not a lottery ticket.