I dont think there's anything wrong with companies that cater to highly specialized niche markets.

I think the reason people knock on GoPro is because they raised VC money and went to market. By taking on VC, they signaled (imo) that there was a huge market opportunity ($XXB) for them beyond a highly specialized niche market.

Absolutely nothing. But GoPro obviously had much larger ambitions than being an action camera for people who jump off cliffs even though they used that tie-in to try to pull is a larger audience.

Climbing equipment is relatively niche as well. But manufacturers don't really try to pull in a broader audience. (Though climbing gyms do, in part, aim for casual climbers.)

Many of the companies that are in focus here have simply grown too big to be sustainable in the niche they cater for, either through aggressive funding or by riding a finite hype wave (e.g. Gopro, no idea if they also suffer from overfunding)

Absolutely nothing wrong with it, IMHO. But our business culture in the United States looks down on these sorts of companies. Growth is king.

But I fully agree with you. It doesn't have to be this way, and it's (IMHO) incredibly harmful.

These Americans you witness see themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires looking for moonshots to catch their big break which will never come.