1. Working
2. Not working

Most small companies start up in a boot strap phase, where the people running the business simply bring their home computing habits (ie, performing little to no maintenance) with them to the office. They work within that framework until they *can't do something*, then they pay just enough money to get that something working again.

Most new companies fail, and it's tough to blame people for not spending the money on IT. After all, every dollar you pay for IT, you can't spend on things that may be more directly linked to revenue, like sales or marketing.

Ultimately, I think your post proves their point. The neglect *almost* cost them downtime. And while I've seen many such (from my perspective) "penny-wise, pound-foolish" decisions, it's hard to argue that their decisions in this case actually caused a problem.