There's a difference between even screwing over your best friend ("The Social Network"-style) and leaving them to die alone in a frozen desert of hell, where their mummified remains will stand for years to come as a grim reminder that someone left them behind.
Sure, there's some very distant analogy, but it's really a different kettle of fish.
I feel like there's a sort of mutual understanding of the risk among all parties going into these situations. Yes one is much more grim than others, but in concept at least.
Especially when "screwing over" means settling a lawsuit with gazillions of dollars.
I agree, I don't see much of a similarity between startups and risking death--literally.
It seems tantalizing and there is lots of vague overlap in attitudes and risks but that is something startups share with anything requiring lots of hard work, passion and commitment.
People like to glamorize their business endeavors. Some guys at computers building a web-app just isn't that exciting to people without a lot of fictionalization or likening it to something more exciting.
Sure, there's some very distant analogy, but it's really a different kettle of fish.