Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#101

Post by dang » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:12 PM UTC

rmason wrote: post #40

If I was to guess I'd say HN readers would be more impressed with innovative technology than how the company actually would make money. I would be wary however of learning very much with a one time experiment with only two funded companies. That would be similar to giving a prospective angel investor the advice to invest in two companies in the next thirty days and then no more.

> I'd say HN readers would be more impressed with innovative technology than how the company actually would make money.

I think I have to disagree with you there. Traditionally, HN users are highly interested in the latter.

Your other point is true of course, but we're using the word 'experiment' far more loosely than that. This is not science, it's just 'I wonder what will happen if we try this crazy thing'. Starting bigger doesn't seem prudent.

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#102

Post by personjerry » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:12 PM UTC

kevin wrote: post #34

rabidonrails wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kevin, I really liked this comment because my inherent assumption would be that YC - or VC's in general - would stay away from "shit shows." Is there a method or a signal that YC looks for within a "shit show" that tells you it can be fixed?

You look for grit. What evidence can you find that shows they don't just give up when things get hard? Thing is we don't find out usually until after we invest what the real problems are...so we optimize for people we want to spend a lot of time with and work on these problems/issues whatever they may be. Most founders feel imposter syndrome after they're accepted. The great thing about being part of a batch is you r…

> You look for grit.

It always seems to me that "grit" and "stubbornness" are similar, and being stubborn to the degree of being unable to give up a hopeless dream seems to be a problem for startup founders. How do you distinguish between these very similar traits when you interview someone?

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#103

Post by lowglow » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:14 PM UTC

andreis_ wrote: post #65

Some sort of support for people working on building "lifestyle businesses" as side projects would be fantastic. Not all of us have megalomaniac dreams of running the next AirBnb. Question: would YC Fellowship be a good fit for that?

Happy to have your participation inside the Baqqer community. We're trying to help hackers + makers build better, bigger by community crowdfunding, feedback, and building together. :)

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#104

Post by dang » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:18 PM UTC

exabrial wrote: post #91

You guys need to diversify and try to solve hard problems that have slow paybacks. Sure making the next twitter is cool, but how about funding a startup that makes does cheap inpatient monitoring,ordering,labs,diagnosis, drug interaction, of patients at hospitals? There are huge players in that space:Epic,Cerner, etc but if you look the sheer amount of $ a hospital is willing to spend on EMR systems...

YC funds a lot of startups that do things like that, and I'm sure HN agrees with you too. You're preaching to the choir here!

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#105

Post by dang » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:20 PM UTC

biot wrote: post #83

Curious coincidence? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11315774

I'm afraid so. But an impressive one.

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#106

Post by dang » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:20 PM UTC

nacs wrote: post #89

dang wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may be right, but I'm pretty sure the community would hate it if we didn't consider upvotes at all. The idea is to fit this process in to how HN already works, and see what happens. HN's pretty good for discussing stories about technology and startups, and a lot of those discussions are a kind of vetting of investment decisions and startup pitches anyhow. Why not move that way earlier in the process and see what…

Maybe limiting votes to people who have been registered X amount of days or have X amount of karma would help solve this issue with votes?

Maybe. But let's see how bad the problem turns out to be. One nice thing about ideas like that is they can be applied retroactively.

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#107

Post by newjersey » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:21 PM UTC

kevin wrote: post #21

Hey everyone! I manage and run the Fellowship program at YC. I just want to build on top of what Dan wrote about being nice. We’re not asking you to do this because we think it’s good manners. We actually believe it’s the right way to think and act like the best investors. It’s easy to form some really bad habits when you sit in a position of power to judge the potential of a person, a team, an idea and their executi…

As much as I'd love to hold power over other mortals, I'll have to recuse myself here. I publicly made fun of Drew Houston and gang when they started and again when they reportedly rejected Apple's advances. Without a crystal ball, it just feels like we're just betting here.

Are we betting on the viability of a product or idea? Are we betting on the founders? Are we betting on the team's ability to deliver? So many questions... I can't answer any of them but I'd welcome people thinking bout loud and look forward to reading these ideas. (:

Edit: recuse not revise

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#108

Post by pcmaffey » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:25 PM UTC

personjerry wrote: post #102

kevin wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You look for grit. What evidence can you find that shows they don't just give up when things get hard? Thing is we don't find out usually until after we invest what the real problems are...so we optimize for people we want to spend a lot of time with and work on these problems/issues whatever they may be. Most founders feel imposter syndrome after they're accepted. The great thing about being part of a batch is you r…

> You look for grit. It always seems to me that "grit" and "stubbornness" are similar, and being stubborn to the degree of being unable to give up a hopeless dream seems to be a problem for startup founders. How do you distinguish between these very similar traits when you interview someone?

The difference is in adaptation: when challenged with new perspective / data, do they incorporate it into their vision or ignore the data?

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#109

Post by dang » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:26 PM UTC

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #38

If it will not bring about complications, can that category of submission be open for say one week. Then the feedback and comments would be open for say another week. Putting time restraints would help give applicants approximately the same amount of attention. And also allow members take out time and ask all questions they want. In addition, can the submission be restricted too so we do not see 400 words submissions…

I appreciate the concern for fairness but those things would be more complicated to do and I'm not sure they would really help that much. Let's wait and see how this shakes out, and then if we do it again we can iterate.

Re: Ask HN: Pick startups for YC to fund

#110

Post by faizshah » Wed, Apr 06, 2016, 8:27 PM UTC

Great idea, I have a couple of questions.

Since YC Fellowship is intended for startups at the idea stage/prototype stage, is ApplyHN a catch all for businesses at the idea stage looking for feedback from the HN community?

Can you do an ApplyHN twice? Presumably once you get feedback from your initial ApplyHN idea post, you might flesh it out more and have a stronger application the second time.

If you're at the prototype stage normally you might do a ShowHN, should you create a separate post for an ApplyHN if you want to apply?