What risk? They are slightly less rich?

Vs putting up years of your life, working hard, dealing with the stress of an early stage company, and then walking away with what you would have made working at a big company anyway.

No, I'm saying that the founders and early employees (most of whom made comparatively little) took an irrational risk. They had to go more or less all in on one company for years of their lives.

The investors took very little risk; they diversified it with tens or hundreds of other investments.