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YC Changes

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: YC Changes

#51

Post by anonymoose7191 »

snowmaker wrote: post #40
errythingisneat wrote: post #35

What the world needs is a solution to funding orders of magnitude more startups than currently get funded. YC is in the incredibly fortunate position of having this opportunity but instead it looks like Sam Altman is falling into the same trap Larry Page did with Google. He's turning it into a bit of a rich guy's playground... On behalf of the world that wasn't born into a world of wealth and elite connections: Pleas…

YC would like to fund a lot more startups. We're working on this. Also, being connected doesn't help people get into YC. We have no connection to most of the companies we fund.

I think the net needs to include people who know people that were funded by YC and not just the partners themselves.

Re: YC Changes

#52

Post by gmarx »

reflexive wrote: post #49
erikpukinskis wrote: post #37

I realize it's a joke, but it also seems quite unlikely to be true. To me, this is the biggest weakness of YC as an organization: a pernicious belief that what applies within their community applies to all communities. I have to wonder what kind of world Graham sees, if it's one in which all communities would welcome a person like Sam as leader. No disrespect to Sam and his substantial leadership qualities. Edit: It'…

> using people of color as ideological puppets You assume if they practice cannibalism, they must be "people of color"? Edit: context: parent states that PG's use of the phrase "an island full of cannibals" is "a commonly recognized form of racism"

Do you know of an island of cannibals which are white Europeans?

Re: YC Changes

#53

Post by gmarx »

idlewords wrote: post #46
baldajan wrote: post #29

PG wasnt joking when he said: "You could parachute [Sam] into an island full of cannibals and come back in 5 years and he'd be the king." - PG 5.5 years ago[1] [1] http://paulgraham.com/fundraising.html

Let's do it.

Agreed. Depending on what he's allowed to pack I'm betting against him

Re: YC Changes

#55

Post by reflexive »

gmarx wrote: post #52
reflexive wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> using people of color as ideological puppets You assume if they practice cannibalism, they must be "people of color"? Edit: context: parent states that PG's use of the phrase "an island full of cannibals" is "a commonly recognized form of racism"

Do you know of an island of cannibals which are white Europeans?

Yes, Pitcairn and Roanoke come immediately to mind. Notice also that Paul writes "an island full of cannibals", not "an island of cannibals", so you may want to avoid making subtle and potentially misleading distortions to the original text.

Edit: When you say "island of cannibals" it implies an indigenous, or at least long-established, population, but "island full of cannibals" could easily mean a group of recent settlers who shipwrecked or marooned and then turned to cannibalism, as was likely the case in Pitcairn and Roanoke.

Not to mention - do you really think cannibalism was historically unknown on white European islands like the one on which Paul currently resides?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2141858/Tough....

Re: YC Changes

#56

Post by Dowwie »

dhawalhs wrote: post #26

Obligatory link to How to Start a Startup Stanford class by Sam Altman: http://startupclass.samaltman.com/ As the founder of a MOOC search engine, I am excited. Its good for my business :) P.S. You can follow the class on Class Central [1] and we will send you an update whenever the course dates are actually announced [1] https://www.class-central.com/mooc/7130/startup-school?follo...

class-central is great! I follow your twitter notices to keep up with upcoming courses

Re: YC Changes

#57

Post by [deleted] »

raldi wrote: post #34

My understanding of a provost's role is to be as senior as possible without having to do any administrative, managerial, or executive duties -- so they can focus entirely on academic topics. Is that basically what you're going for with the PB analogy, except s/academic/startup-mentoring/ ?

[deleted]

Re: YC Changes

#58

Post by [deleted] »

reflexive wrote: post #55
gmarx wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you know of an island of cannibals which are white Europeans?

Yes, Pitcairn and Roanoke come immediately to mind. Notice also that Paul writes "an island full of cannibals", not "an island of cannibals", so you may want to avoid making subtle and potentially misleading distortions to the original text. Edit: When you say "island of cannibals" it implies an indigenous, or at least long-established, population, but "island full of cannibals" could easily mean a group of recent se…

[deleted]

Re: YC Changes

#59

Post by Qworg »

snowmaker wrote: post #40
errythingisneat wrote: post #35

What the world needs is a solution to funding orders of magnitude more startups than currently get funded. YC is in the incredibly fortunate position of having this opportunity but instead it looks like Sam Altman is falling into the same trap Larry Page did with Google. He's turning it into a bit of a rich guy's playground... On behalf of the world that wasn't born into a world of wealth and elite connections: Pleas…

YC would like to fund a lot more startups. We're working on this. Also, being connected doesn't help people get into YC. We have no connection to most of the companies we fund.

RE: "We have no connection to most of the companies we fund."

This certainly isn't the perception on my part - the flood of posts from previous YC companies who talk about how they had help from other YC companies to polish their pitch makes it seem like current YC companies are definitively connected to previous YC companies.

Re: YC Changes

#60

Post by anonymoose7191 »

I expect to be downvoted but my YC interview with Michael a couple summers back left a bad taste in my mouth.

I'm not really sure he asked more than "how is this a billion dollar company?" multiple times during the 10 minutes. I'm not sure why YC would pay $1k to fly us to Mountain View if that question was that important and wasn't already answered by our application.

Hope that was just a fluke though... Good luck YC!

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