I left Sun for a startup that was pretty rudderless and defocused, so IMO, it never went in any particular direction with any momentum. Just floundering, but Sun kind of cratered (not because I left) and it was a half salary as the usual "FTE contractor" during some brutal economic times.

Lowlights were the boss massively overcommitting on a computer installation, and later breaking a lease in the dark of night with a lessor suspected of being armed and pissed off. Neither idiot showed up.

I can't say if I'd have kept the Sun job for long, given its decline and sale to Oracle, or if it was better hanging around in that startup which was legally a business rather than a hobby, but in practice, it's a coin flip. Every time the CEO moved, the office moved with him (or vice-versa, who knew?) (and I had the 32 mile drive across the old 2-lane San Mateo Bridge)

I alllllllmost got a job at a startup that was soon thereafter bought by Google, so that would have been the worst of both worlds.

I came out of it all OK.