[anamax]

I trust that you're not going to complain if they quit your project for a project that does offer them equity.

FWIW, no one is indespensible in a startup; some are merely harder to replace than others. I'll bet that "original idea" guys are getting equity even though they cease to be indespensible.

[hga]

"no one is indespensible in a startup"

I have been in too many startups that died because they lost or failed to recruit one particular person---or in the case of LMI survived (for a while) because I recruited one indispensable classmate who made their LAMBDA processor work---to believe this.

A reverse example would be the receiving clerk at Intel who single-handily almost killed them as mentioned in Chringley's book.

In my experience, just about every founder of a startup is "indispensable" after you shake things out a bit---make a single mistake with any of them, and you're not likely to survive.

[anamax]

The fact that a startup dies when someone leaves doesn't imply that said person was indespensible.

[hga]

I am relying on "inside information".

I suppose that means this is an "appeal to authority", but, still, if a person critical to making software work is gone, and the company fails specifically because they can't make their software work, what else am I to assume?

(Needless to say, sometimes I've been that person.)

[anamax]

I'll buy that a company can be set up so it is dependent. Outside of some special cases (subset of technology and relationships), I think that doing so is usually unnecessary and the "indespensable" label is typically untrue, especially when it comes to biz folk.