Yeah for a startup that is kind of true; it depends a bit on what it is, but generally 'doing a startup' is costly. I wouldn't say those mandatory social insurance and other things are very different in different countries (depending on your bootstrapping wallet size). However if you don't go for those typical growths of startups and you just want a few million $ in the end (I guess, according to Wikipedia, that's not a startup), it is not so hard to bootstrap and build + make a good living. I don't particularly need rocket ship money.
As an example; my wife and I started a dating site in one EU country (which was crowded with dating sites) for (in the beginning) around $150/month hosting and 'free' programming (I spent a few weeks on it in my spare time). We spent $250 on marketing and after around 6 months it made more than I made from my other company with almost no work (30-60 min/day). Sold it for very nice money (no mortgage); did a few of those kind of things and invested (part) of the money in 'bigger' things with actually employees. I often like that of model a lot better than stories on HN; simply reasoned; there are only a few Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest like companies; the chance that your millions $ VC company makes it is not that large. It's make or break otherwise the VC multiplier is not large enough.
I think to bootstrap, depending on your company, you need the right group of people and the idea depends on those people. If your wife happens to know all the press in your country, it's far easier to bootstrap a number of companies than when you have to hire PR companies. It's your job as entrepreneur to gather people around you who will help you.
So while I agree with your ; for a typical startup you need a lot of resources to get off the ground, but for any kind of business; nah. It depends on your dreams, but if you just want to supplement or replace your income (or work more or less), it's not that hard.
The rest was worse at marketing and monetization. So you have the huge players (with millions marketing money) and far after that the old ones which were dying anyway and then us and then the 1000s of sites who couldn't manage over a 1000 members (in total, not per month even). And ours was free as well, we had good free marketing and managed to monetize more than the other free ones.
As an example; my wife and I started a dating site in one EU country (which was crowded with dating sites) for (in the beginning) around $150/month hosting and 'free' programming (I spent a few weeks on it in my spare time). We spent $250 on marketing and after around 6 months it made more than I made from my other company with almost no work (30-60 min/day). Sold it for very nice money (no mortgage); did a few of those kind of things and invested (part) of the money in 'bigger' things with actually employees. I often like that of model a lot better than stories on HN; simply reasoned; there are only a few Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest like companies; the chance that your millions $ VC company makes it is not that large. It's make or break otherwise the VC multiplier is not large enough.
I think to bootstrap, depending on your company, you need the right group of people and the idea depends on those people. If your wife happens to know all the press in your country, it's far easier to bootstrap a number of companies than when you have to hire PR companies. It's your job as entrepreneur to gather people around you who will help you.
So while I agree with your ; for a typical startup you need a lot of resources to get off the ground, but for any kind of business; nah. It depends on your dreams, but if you just want to supplement or replace your income (or work more or less), it's not that hard.