[pg]

YC's preferences on companies that they would like to invest their time and money in doesn't necessarily equal "the best way" for all entrepreneurs under all situations and circumstances.

That is certainly true. We would never claim otherwise. YC invests in startups, and only a tiny fraction of the millions of small companies in the US are startups. Nearly all are service businesses whose prospects for growth are minimal.

Startup founders are a very small subset of entrepreneurs.

[AmberShah]

This is interesting to me. I consider what I have a startup, but what is the distinction? I'm not sure what about the $200K statement makes me an entrepreneur and not a startup. I'm assuming we are talking about scalable tech business, not consulting.

EDIT: Updated for clarity.

[pg]

I don't know what you're doing, but consulting is not the only way to have limited growth prospects. A company could also be making a product for a niche market (and not be doing it merely as a way to get started engaging with users). I believe some people call these niche software companies MicroISVs.

[netcan]

I think you need to start qualifying 'startup'a little more, particularly when the topic tends towards hair splitting.

It looks like the definition a lot of people use is one that includes your startup as a subset.

I find it so frustrating reading through threads like this that get all bogged down in semantic nitpicking. It also opens a door to a particularly annoying type of quasi-trolling or baiting. Maybe 'startups that exit' or something

[pg]

I've found the best strategy (as with most words) is just to use the word the way it's used in standard, educated usage.

In standard usage, a startup does not mean any newly created company. It means a newly created company designed to scale dramatically. Most of the 20 million businesses in the US are not startups, because they aren't designed to scale. They're either service businesses or niche product businesses.