"Make people want something that is actually junk." doesn't have quite the same ring to it, nor does it sound remotely more plausible.
Presumably the 10% weekly growth that YC and PG advocate as the default growth metric isn't expected to be in the absence of sales but the contrary, sales plus anything that works that is ethical and not some ponzi scheme.
He provided examples via the link to http://paulgraham.com/ds.html where he describes stripe founders engaging in zealous activities many would call sales despite being the type of startup that could have leaned back and had ample demand.
I skimmed that essay. Zealous activities to make existing users happy seemed to be the emphasis. It's possible that there were zealous activities for acquiring users mentioned somewhere, but I missed them because they were less emphasized.
Presumably the 10% weekly growth that YC and PG advocate as the default growth metric isn't expected to be in the absence of sales but the contrary, sales plus anything that works that is ethical and not some ponzi scheme.
He provided examples via the link to http://paulgraham.com/ds.html where he describes stripe founders engaging in zealous activities many would call sales despite being the type of startup that could have leaned back and had ample demand.