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I Am Sam Altman, President of YC Group. AMA

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of YC Group. AMA

#201

Post by aantix »

turnip1979 wrote: post #159
santoshimz wrote: post #154

With so many companies like General Assembly offering part time bootcamps without one leaving the job can't YC follow the same approach where one can work on a startup without having to leave the job. This will bring in more ideas and products by people who don't want to quit their day-to-day job.

You know .. this is a quirky but interesting idea. PG started YC because of his experiences/challenges as a tech founder. Maybe someone can address this niche. Obviously, the funding terms would be different. There are legal issues having to do with existing employer contracts .. this could be a rathole. I am not sure doing a startup as a side project is at all useful .. but I might be wrong. One comment I have to ma…

Why is that? If a majority of businesses fail, then finding new ways to minimize that risk should be the priority.

In the context of a side project, can go both ways. The founder is minimizing their monetary/opportunity risks by maintaining their current job. YC should be minimizing their investment and/or offering the basics (the network, office hours, and invites to guest speaker engagements).

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of YC Group. AMA

#202

Post by snowmaker »

ta11 wrote: post #145
sama wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What doesn't work about our process for this?

I have applied again and again and have been rejected each time. I honestly don't mean to be vague but have found that it is very difficult to convey in words. It's a graphical technology that takes just a very brief chat for people to understand. It's a large horizontal departure with wide possibilities. That makes it difficult to explain as a single targeted product

We have a demo video field. You should make a demo video and include the link in that field in the application.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of YC Group. AMA

#203

Post by snowmaker »

pritianka wrote: post #158
sama wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An incomplete prototype is ok. Obviously more is better, but we've funded companies with no prototype at all. You have little to lose by applying.

Would you say that someone who applies in the early ideas stage a few times gets dinged in future applications for having been rejected a few times before?

Not at all.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of YC Group. AMA

#204

Post by xzion »

ikeboy wrote: post #185
xzion wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand that this is an economics problem; the ($5b?) market exists because there is significantly more demand than supply and ticket prices are not adjusted to accommodate this imbalance. Why that's the case I'm not sure. Perhaps that's another avenue to investigate for solving the problem but not what I had in mind (partly because I like affordable tickets). Seeing scalpers as harmful is definitely an emotiona…

The scheme I described above leads to affordable tickets, it's basically a way of enforcing nontransferability. But at its core, disgust with scalpers implies preference for a non Kaldor Hicks optimal world. If someone is willing to pay $X for a ticket, and you're only willing to pay $Y There's no way around that fundamental fact. At some point, if there are more people who want tickets than tickets, some process nee…

I don't understand how your suggestion enforces non-transferability. If the scalper pay $100 for a ticket and the ticket holder receives a $50 rebate at the event, the scalper just adds $50 to the price they resell at.

Like I said, I understand the problem exists because of the economics. But there's nothing to stop us from building a system that enforces non-transferability (through identification), and preventing resale of tickets at increased prices by third parties. It just doesn't add any value for event organisers to use this new system.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of YC Group. AMA

#205

Post by randall »

wwwdonohue wrote: post #181
wpietri wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd especially like to see this in the form of lessons learned. Some of my favorite startup pieces are where a founder sat down, told their story, and said, "Next time, here's what I'm doing different." In the startup world we have to be comfortable making mistakes, but I really want those to be new, interesting mistakes.

Even better, usually, is the second/third-time founder actually operating differently after making those mistakes the first time around. That way it's less "here's how I messed up" and more "here's how I messed up, and I know because what I'm doing now is working a lot better."

Lots of bad data there. Sometimes a company just doesn't work (timing / bad market) and founders learn the wrong lessons.

Speaking from experience.

Re: I Am Sam Altman, President of YC Group. AMA

#207

Post by cjhanks »

How important is technical defensibility? On one extreme I could have a technically sophisticated product with a poor user experience. On the other, an off the shelf software catalog with great user experience. Ideally you have both... Realistically it is difficult given time constraints. Where does one settle for success?
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