The point is that a business (at least from this point of view) is an entity in its own right. The founders are a bit like a life-support machine – if you switch them off, does the business die? (Of course, even a profitable business might die if the business can't hire some people to replace the founders.)
Because the business is supposed to be an entity in its own right, you have to value the founder's contribution somehow in deciding whether it is profitable. One way might be to consider what the salary would be to hire someone to take it over such that it continues to produce the same revenue. Another way might be to pay the founders their living expenses (ramen-profitable.) But discounting the cost of the founders working on it to zero? As the article says, that is meaningless.
It's like the old joke: Q: How can you quickly make a million dollars? A: Invest two million dollars in $TOPICAL_RISKY_ACTIVITY
If you hack it together on weekends and with no oversight it is reliably making a $100 more than hosting a month and will do for the foreseeable future, it's profitable (albeit at a small level and not necessarily sustainable).
But if you're living off savings and working full time on it, and it's making $1000 dollars a month, its not profitable.
Because the business is supposed to be an entity in its own right, you have to value the founder's contribution somehow in deciding whether it is profitable. One way might be to consider what the salary would be to hire someone to take it over such that it continues to produce the same revenue. Another way might be to pay the founders their living expenses (ramen-profitable.) But discounting the cost of the founders working on it to zero? As the article says, that is meaningless.
It's like the old joke: Q: How can you quickly make a million dollars? A: Invest two million dollars in $TOPICAL_RISKY_ACTIVITY
If you hack it together on weekends and with no oversight it is reliably making a $100 more than hosting a month and will do for the foreseeable future, it's profitable (albeit at a small level and not necessarily sustainable).
But if you're living off savings and working full time on it, and it's making $1000 dollars a month, its not profitable.