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I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

#321

Post by WWKong »

hoodoof wrote: post #239
henrymercer wrote: post #191

Last March, you mentioned on twitter that you are a customer of/financially support Shanley Kane's organization, Model View Culture. Since since then (and before then too), she has made a variety of racially and sexually charged statements, such as, "fire some fuckin white guys to get it done" ( https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:KtAdEv... ). Do you or Y-Combinator still patronize or support Model…

Is this really the place/time to ask such questions? Or are you hoping for an answer because you feel Sam is trapped into answering here?

It is AMA. Not "ask me what I'm comfortable answering". In such a forum there is always some controversial discussions. Being trapped might not be the right perspective. And at this time Sam has answered.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

#322

Post by orky56 »

mlchild wrote: post #26

I'm intrigued by your comments that you're interested in funding social networks—it seems like a new one launches on Product Hunt every day, but few are able to overcome the chicken-and-egg problem and achieve scale. What's your take on the best way to make the network useful on day one for a small number of users? What are you looking for in a YC app for a social network (with or without traction)?

I recommend validating your market with a newsletter or some other channel that already has social engineering baked in. In the case of Product Hunt & Mattermark, this allowed them to demonstrate value with curation of highly valuable content for a particular group of people. Once you have validated it, creating the application seeded with those users will ensure you have the well in place. Spending time building the app without having the ability to iterate first on the differentiating aspect might be a waste or at least an inefficient use of early resources.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

#323

Post by carlisle_ »

foobarqux wrote: post #289
carlisle_ wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jason is a bully. I've heard plenty of horror stories of people who have worked for him. I'm not surprised in the least and I'm extremely glad to see people standing up to him.

Care to share any specific ones?

I'm specifically thinking of an incident where he yelled at a dev until she cried in the middle of the open office at Mahalo.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

#326

Post by apsec112 »

falsestprophet wrote: post #308

Does this statement risk a tortious interference with business relationship suit? You have published a statement that could reasonably interpreted as Jason Calacanis mistreats founders by bullying them, changing offers, sharing their confidential info and other things. That intentionally obstructs Mr. Calcanis from entering into valuable business relationships with startup company founders. It seems very risky unless…

No, sama is not obligated to censor his honest opinions about random people he doesn't like. The First Amendment (and in some states, SLAPP statutes) protect him from legal threats of censorship.

Interference with business relationships is only a thing if (among other conditions) the two parties already have some type of agreement. It does not apply to investors approaching founders they don't even know yet.

Slander/libel is only a thing if (among other conditions) the statement is of fact ("Bob is an asshole" etc. are considered opinion and not fact), the statement is false, and the author knows it is false and publishes it anyway.

Here's what happens when dumb lawyers try to censor negative opinions with threats: https://popehat.com/2013/06/25/criticize-your-dentist-thats-...

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

#328

Post by rsp1984 »

Obviously YC can't enter into NDAs with applicants but can you shed a little bit of light on what YC does to protect the applicants' business ideas?

Some might be discouraged from applying because they fear if the idea is interesting (but not the team or there's another reason it's not accepted) that someone from within YC or a related ecosystem might just take the idea and look at the product so far and decide to just do it themselves (but obviously with more resources, connections, etc and obviously holding more equity).

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

#329

Post by amelius »

jonstokes wrote: post #313

I'm working on a piece about universal basic income, and I have the following summary of the how I think that many tech people like yourself believe UBI is going to work: 1. Companies innovate by doing things more cheaply with automation than human workers can do them. 2. As a result of automation, the more efficient companies reap all the profits in a market as they drive the less efficient companies out of business…

> wealth that, again, exists because the winning companies' machines were able to do things more efficiently than the losing companies' human laborers

Losing companies also produce wealth, perhaps even more so, because e.g. they didn't spend enough on advertising. However, in this winner-takes-all economy, the losers have to give up.

All wealth does not exist only because of winning companies.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of Y Combinator. AMA

#330

Post by phibit »

DKnoll wrote: post #311
phibit wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very thought-provoking question but you've now completely diverged from the original topic.

You suggested that those in 'dire straits' are treated differently, and I responded that, yes, they are, however it takes a significant amount of time and lives lost for us to recognise this.

It seems like you just joined a conversation about work Visas, but you had already decided you wanted to talk about Syria today.
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