Excellent set of answers, this was my first foray into Quora, btw; if other answers are half as good, it's a great resource. Among other key decisions they got

Excellent set of answers, this was my first foray into Quora, btw; if other answers are half as good, it's a great resource. Among other key decisions they got right (and some lucking out), the one thing they got absolutely right is the culture. Not just perks, food, etc. because during the boom almost all cool startups had these (or better), it's much more than that. The culture components ones that I think were most influential were the 20% time and committee decision making (with actual engineers, not suits). Having the right culture is not sufficient for success, but without it, I think, all most certainly will be lost.