Speaking of numbers games, you use "median" when we all know that median exit is valueless without information about distribution. Mode is much more valuable. B

Speaking of numbers games, you use "median" when we all know that median exit is valueless without information about distribution. Mode is much more valuable. But that data is not available. However, if you pay attention to the publicized acquisitions which happen fairly often, the amounts are most often under $10m. As for whether my number comparisons make good dialectic sense or not, it doesn't matter. This isn't dialectic, it's rhetoric. It's a tool for thinking about something. There's no point in pretending we're even attempting to approach Absolute Truth here. As a tool for thinking about something, a contrast of M&As vs lightning strike injuries is quite valuable. Because we all "know" people who have been bought, but very few of us know people who have been injured by lightning. This shows us that we're in a bubble, a slice of unreality, where the availability heuristic skews our deeply felt understanding of likelihood. Finally, yes. Dow Jones Venturesource tracks only venture-backed companies. Everyone on HN seems to agree that achieving venture funding is not only important for growth, but important for the connections the VC has to people who would buy the startup. Presumably that belief has some grounding in fact. This leads us to the conclusion that an acquisition is more likely when there is VC involved than not.