I think they absolutely could play the VC valuation game and would be spectacularly successful at it. I'm not trying to take away anything from their success. I

I think they absolutely could play the VC valuation game and would be spectacularly successful at it. I'm not trying to take away anything from their success. I greatly respect them and have read and agreed with a lot of what they write. Most of what they write and that I've read so far has been welcoming and encouraging like you say, and has encouraged me even. All that being said, these last few posts about Mint and people who cash out and now this about Twitter have had quite a different tone. I remember the first time I read a 37signals post, they wrote something along the lines of, the 37signals way of doing things is not for everyone. These last few posts make them sound bitter that people are succeeding at doing things a different way.