Related to this, I do think the question of what should or shouldn't be legal is a bit of a separate question. Of which this data is only one part. (to be transparent, I'm the author of the post)
The advice about cloning a regulated startup is wise in that meeting a certain set of regulatory requirements can be a great differentiator. That said, the specific experience, network, and skill set required by a team to crack a particularly regulatory regime is if anything tougher to assemble than to crack a particular technical problem.
Big raise from these guys. Plus they've lowered their processing rates to 0%. It's a race not only against other mobile payment startups, but also against the Walmarts and Targets of the world.
I welcome efforts to help small business owners, but we shouldn't pretend that small business in general drives the economy. The huge jobs and productivity growth that we associate with startups comes from a very small % of disruptive companies, mostly in high tech. (I wrote a bit more about this here: http://bostinno.com/2012/02/17/bailouts-for-startups-tough-l...)
I'm biased as I'm a writer covering Boston, but it's worth noting that New York's rise is tilted in the direction of a specific area: internet/mobile startups. But if you look at other innovation sectors like healthcare, energy, robotics, etc. New York is still extremely nascent.
For me, exercise is key. If I get in 30+min of exercise after work it's like hitting the reset button on my energy and I can squeeze out another couple hours of productivity.
Good piece, with major implications for public policy. Encouraging more people to go into startups is great, but funding more R&D (especially in energy) is crucial as well. Also, Steven Johnson's Where Good Ideas Come From makes this case very well at book length.
I file this one under Wrong But Interesting. There's still a ton we need to do in terms of innovation for prosperity, notably in medicine and energy. And I think we're in the early stages of seeing total disruption of social organization (open source software model of p2p production applied elsewhere). But still an interesting piece and useful thinking exercise.
A lot of bitterness on behalf of the author against, essentially, people who don't have kids and choose to spend more of their time coding. Sure we don't want to drive people over the edge by encouraging everyone everywhere to work all the time, but this post makes it seem like anyone who makes different life choices than the author (not having a family) is somehow just getting swindled.
From a societal point of view, I'm a bit troubled. It's an encouraging trend that high talent individuals who would have gone into finance or consulting are considering startups. Should we really be turning them away? That said, I certainly understand your hesitations.