If you're in SV/SF, over 26, and haven't made at least a million dollars for yourself through an exit yet, you're not in the cool crowd. Bonus points for an Official Exit and not just an acquihire.

Your street cred can wain though. The Powerset acquisition by Microsoft was okay for the time, but now it shows up as essentially an acquihire. If that sale was going through today, it would probably be a $200 million to $500 million acquisition instead of the $50 million bauble they got at the time.

I'm in SV/SF, and this attitude is completely silly. That isn't to say that it doesn't exist, but I would say it's far from the norm, even in tech circles.

It is often self-inflicted, which makes it difficult to get over. But the culture reinforces it subtly as well.