[graeme]

This is a bad faith read. He was specifically talking about startup founders. The cliche idea is that one of startup startup founders’ main motives is getting rich. PG said this wasn’t the case in practice, and that fear of failure was more important.

This has no bearing on what motivates people to do things generally in their spare time.

[throwaway35784]

Or startups in general, rather those who survive the yc interview.

Perhaps he selects for those who prepare well to not fail to get his approval.