[ke88y]

Or, you’re building a thing you can sell to others for a reasonable price, because it actually works.

This won’t get you a Stanford professorship. That’s something you can cry about from your mountain chalet or beachfront vacation home.

[bonoboTP]

Sure, but many people who go for a PhD aren't the entrepreneur type. And in a corporation there are also "games", where building things that actually work may not be your best strategy. You need to work on visible, flashy, new things that looks good in a performance review and can get you a promotion. You have to deliver legible value.

[ke88y]

Yes, that’s all correct. There’s always a meta-game.

Part of the meta-game of academia is that feedback timelines are long enough that you can play the “wrong” meta-game and still come out ahead. If you don’t want a professorship — or are willing to settle for a super cushy “professor of practice” as an early retirement non-profit thing to keep ya out of the house — then a PhD can be a good place to do hard tech pre-seed work.