Startup founders often talk about life or death moments for their company, but when Chris Koch risked his life in a failed marketing stunt for his firm Pop!, he knew he had gone too far.

He had reason to be confident in taking risks. He and his co-founder, Chad Stephens, had sold their first business, 1Form, for $15 million to the REA group just months before, and Pop!'s software, which promised to manage a user's individual data across all websites and services, had many similarities.