[Paul Graham via Seattleduck] You need three things to create a successful startup: to start with good people, to make something customers actually want, and to spend as little money as possible. Most startups that fail do it because they fail at one of these. A startup that does all three will probably succeed.

While Paul’s article is a good start, I think the items that Kevin adds are well worth mentioning. In fact, Kevin’s ideas have always personally held true to me about a job, regardless if I was working for some small startup or at Microsoft.

In particular the points regarding the environment (or lack there-of: just see how well Delicious Monster is doing not evening having an office), the ability to work on something that’s simple and enriches your life (see the ‘Pleasure and Experience‘ of software), and that the technology (and business model) should encourage other to build off of it are crucial, IMHO.