Point missed. All of the reasons why you say this article should be dismissed, are irrelevant to the article's actual argument.

Here is the key principle.

Suppose that your odds of startup success are dominated by competition with other would-be startup founders. For example you compete for funding, good ideas, competent employees, and markets. If so, then the odds of success are set by the dynamics of that competition. In which case widespread access to effective advice on running startups does not improve the odds for a random founder succeeding. They just raise the quality of competition.

Think of it as being like a boxing tournament. If you learn how to box better, your odds of winning the tournament go up. If others learn to box better, your odds of winning the tournament go down. And even if everybody learns how to box better, we see the exact same number of winners.

Whether or not startups actually work this way is an empirical question. Based on a bunch of different data points, he argues that startups really do seem to work this way. And so the spread of good advice on running startups can't improve the odds of a random startup succeeding.

In which case if you are a successful startup founder who wants to be even more successful, you should give bad advice to your future competitors