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Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

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Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#21

Post by freshfunk »

pg wrote: post #19
blader wrote: post #14

I was rejected the first time, got in the second time, but dropped out a week later to run a different company. We were profitable at 32 employees and got acquired by Zynga last month.

It is probably not an accident that this is phrased in such an odd way, with the subjects of the sentences missing. It should read " we got in the second time, but I dropped out a week later." What happened is that Siqi and a cofounder started YC, then a week in Siqi bailed and left his cofounder in the lurch because a side project of his had unexpectedly taken off. We suggested making the side project be the focus o…

That sucks.

Oddly enough I actually know (well, actually met) Siqi back in the day when he was at Powerset. It's interesting to hear this kind of story.

Go figure. :\

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#22

Post by freshfunk »

mrtron wrote: post #16
blader wrote: post #14

I was rejected the first time, got in the second time, but dropped out a week later to run a different company. We were profitable at 32 employees and got acquired by Zynga last month.

That is serious business.

More like treacherous business. (Sorry, I could not resist.)

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#23

Post by jacquesm »

tophercyll wrote: post #18

I don't have a "YC missed out on investing in our insanely profitable company" story, but I did get rejected before finding myself at a YC company anyways. Evan Miller (emiller) and I applied for Summer 06. Evan had to do most of the work on our application because I had deadlines with my publisher on my Ruby book. I was proud that I was writing a book, so I mentioned it in my bio. In retrospect, I wonder if that doo…

That's a hell of a story. I can't imagine that the book thing is what blew the application though, after all that could have been discussed in the interview if it would come to that.

Good to see you're still going!

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#24

Post by pg »

jacquesm wrote: post #20
pg wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is probably not an accident that this is phrased in such an odd way, with the subjects of the sentences missing. It should read " we got in the second time, but I dropped out a week later." What happened is that Siqi and a cofounder started YC, then a week in Siqi bailed and left his cofounder in the lurch because a side project of his had unexpectedly taken off. We suggested making the side project be the focus o…

That's pretty low. Has YC changed its contractual agreements with new YC companies to avoid such treachery in the future ?

No; the biggest danger of people doing bad things to you is that it will make you paranoid, so we've made a conscious effort not to accumulate a lot of defensive cruft. E.g. to this day we don't ask startups to sign any kind of LOI at the the point when we agree to fund them.

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#25

Post by pg »

smanek wrote: post #7

My company was rejected from YC W09, but raised $1.5M in VC 2 months later. We just buckled down, and launched anyways (ahead of schedule!). Once you get users and have some promising data, raising money is definitely doable.

We totally blew it that time. IIRC you did fix the thing we were most worried about when we were talking to you.

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#26

Post by pg »

We've definitely missed good startups. But one advantage of having so many competitors is that we're much more likely now to learn when we screw up. When a startup from one of the other YC-like organizations does well, I often check their YC application to see how we missed them. Usually it's because they were good guys but working on a terrible idea, which they later changed. So in response to that we now make a conscious effort to pay less attention to the idea and more to the people when we read applications.

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#27

Post by gridspy »

pg wrote: post #24
jacquesm wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's pretty low. Has YC changed its contractual agreements with new YC companies to avoid such treachery in the future ?

No; the biggest danger of people doing bad things to you is that it will make you paranoid, so we've made a conscious effort not to accumulate a lot of defensive cruft. E.g. to this day we don't ask startups to sign any kind of LOI at the the point when we agree to fund them.

If only the security organisations of the world could share your attitude.

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#28

Post by ryanwaggoner »

pg wrote: post #19
blader wrote: post #14

I was rejected the first time, got in the second time, but dropped out a week later to run a different company. We were profitable at 32 employees and got acquired by Zynga last month.

It is probably not an accident that this is phrased in such an odd way, with the subjects of the sentences missing. It should read " we got in the second time, but I dropped out a week later." What happened is that Siqi and a cofounder started YC, then a week in Siqi bailed and left his cofounder in the lurch because a side project of his had unexpectedly taken off. We suggested making the side project be the focus o…

Umm, hold on a second. So I have a cofounder and a startup, but I also do little side projects here and there on my own, mostly for fun / learning. Am I to understand that if one of them blows up and I elect to leave and pursue that instead of my current startup, I've committed "treachery" against my cofounder? If my cofounder had something like that happen to him, I'd be incredibly happy for him (and a little jealous), but I wouldn't consider it treachery unless he tried to take his equity or it was competing with our startup or something.

I know that it's popular to compare picking a cofounder to picking a spouse, but they're not the same thing, and if you start a company with someone who later decides to move on, that's just how it goes. Am I way off?

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#29

Post by Harj »

freshfunk wrote: post #11
jeromec wrote: post #4

AfterTheDeadline was rejected, and got acquired last year by Automattic (WordPress). http://blog.afterthedeadline.com/2009/09/08/after-the-deadli... Edit: I should note that Paul Graham mentioned in his interview on Mixergy that picking companies is one area where they are weak. That may be true, but I'd wager the YC batting average would be higher than typical Angels/VCs.

Hmm don't know. With all due respect to PG and crew, VCs and angels seem to do their homework as well. Actually their initial filters are probably much more restrictive so I guess it would depend on how you calculate the batting avgs.

VCs do months of due diligence before they'll write you a check. We review an application from and write a check after speaking with you for 10 minutes.

Re: Ask HN: Who got rejected in earlier cycles of YC application and made it anyway?

#30

Post by SwellJoe »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #28
pg wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is probably not an accident that this is phrased in such an odd way, with the subjects of the sentences missing. It should read " we got in the second time, but I dropped out a week later." What happened is that Siqi and a cofounder started YC, then a week in Siqi bailed and left his cofounder in the lurch because a side project of his had unexpectedly taken off. We suggested making the side project be the focus o…

Umm, hold on a second. So I have a cofounder and a startup, but I also do little side projects here and there on my own, mostly for fun / learning. Am I to understand that if one of them blows up and I elect to leave and pursue that instead of my current startup, I've committed "treachery" against my cofounder? If my cofounder had something like that happen to him, I'd be incredibly happy for him (and a little jealou…

As in everything: It depends.

I don't know this story beyond what two people have just said. But, I know that if I commit to something, I expect my co-founder to also be committed to it (within the bounds of what we've agreed upon). Working on other projects now and then is fine and normal...it's what hackers do. But, if you've committed to build a business with someone, it's not really the idea that makes the business. It's the combined effort and execution of the team. So, splitting your time between building your "private business" and your "co-founded business", and then taking off when the private business has some bit of success, is probably not what an honest business person would do. If you don't believe in the co-founded business idea, anymore, you talk it over with your co-founder, and you try to fix the problem.

But, shit happens. If you give up your equity in the co-founded startup, apologize for flaking, etc. then I guess you've done the best you can. I wouldn't expect the co-founder to ever be willing to do business with you again, but it's probably not what I would call "treacherous", either. I think the story of Evan Williams and Blogger (and Odeo/Twitter, for that matter, maybe even moreso) would sound kind of similar when told by different involved parties, and we don't consider Evan treacherous.

Then again, we are talking about one week later. He had to know that he had other irons in the fire and probably wouldn't be involved in the company much longer. So, yeah, this actually does sound kinda nasty.

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