I think you may unintentionally be implying that there aren't lots of people in the "startup culture" that do in fact consider getting funding to be an intrinsi

I think you may unintentionally be implying that there aren't lots of people in the "startup culture" that do in fact consider getting funding to be an intrinsically important achievement. It seems to me that raising a large VC round does have an intrinsic and lasting value, I'm not sure whether it should. Kevin Rose is a great example of this type of success. He's started 4 or 5 companies that I'm aware of, out of those AFAIK Revision3 is the only one that I believe had an exit based on the merits of the company (Milk, was a successful exit but seemed like an acqui-hire). We also continually get messaged that having founded a company once even if it fails is going to be a leg up when raising money for your next venture. Anyway its hard to say "raising money" doesn't have intrinsic value, when Silicon Valley (and I don't mean "startup culture" I mean the players actually doing deals in SV) continually signals that it does.