Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

news.ycombinator.com

91–100 of 191 posts

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#91
post #75

I don't do podcasts, I vastly prefer the written word: * I can scan quickly. * I can search for things. * It's easier for me to read things than listen. I don't drive much, so don't have dead time when I can only listen.

I'm with you there. However, it's important to remember how fluid and dynamic verbal discussion can be. It's a great format for creation, even if it's lacking in consumption.

Luckily- my startup; Spreza, transcribes podcasts. We've talked to Kat about providing transcripts for this upcoming series.

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#92
post #75

I don't do podcasts, I vastly prefer the written word: * I can scan quickly. * I can search for things. * It's easier for me to read things than listen. I don't drive much, so don't have dead time when I can only listen.

A good conversation is different from an essay, it would be great if there were transcripts of the podcasts, isn't any YC company working on speech-to-text?

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#93
My answer is going to be boring. Stick to business as usual.

I enjoyed 90% of the guests and learned a ton. I never felt a retooling was needed.

Maybe @aaron needed more hosts, but he did a fine job.

Would love to complain about something, but all I can say from a listener viewpoint is that taking time away to retool wasn't needed imho.

The way you sourced your guests was pretty good, just keep doing that.

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#94

Some ideas that I think are outside of the wheelhouse of typical Silicon Valley thought leaders: 1) Mike Bloomberg: Talk about founding and tech development of Bloomberg Professional Service (don't talk about politics at all) 2) Judy Faulkner: Founder and CEO of EPIC systems, a large privately held Hospital EHR vendor (Epic is one of the largest and most insular tech companies in the world) 3) Jack Ma: Founder of Ali…

Ex-CEO of Nest.

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#95

I'd love to hear "office hour"-style stuff. Somebody who's having a problem, you work on solving it together, then maybe in a month you do a retro on how it worked. Might be cool to wait enough time that the episode has a "before and after" in the same episode.

A company I worked for hired some expert dude who came in and shaped the company into something that could be purchased. That was very interesting. That process that takes raw talent and startup chaos and turns it into something that will get acquired. It'd be great to hear about that process from both sides. There must be some sort of mentor approach, of giving advice that will work for that company.

What was the background of the expert? I am curious what skills and experience he had that led him to this line of work.

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#96
post #61

Some ideas: Antonio García Martínez, author of Chaos Monkeys . Bobby Goodlatte on Facebook's news feed algorithm and the election. Peter Thiel on Trump and what's next, etc. Justin Edmond on early Pinterest and diversity in Silicon Valley. Dann Petty on Epicurrence and design culture in Silicon Valley. Kim-Mai Culter on Initialized Capital and housing in the Bay Area.

I would be very interested in Thiel's take on: * Trump presidency, what the tech/startup should expect from the new Gov. * His views on privacy and ethics (I know, Palantir and everything, but that's why it makes so interesting to hear from him) * His take on the top-10 technologies of the future

Agreed. I'm still scratching my head on why he would back Trump. Reading Zero to One right now and it's great.

But, I guess there's just stuff I don't know about Trump that would make Thiel support him. I'm not trying to say this in a negative way - I just am trying to figure out the connection(s).

So if you could get him on a podcast talking about this, it would be awesome!

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#97
I'd like to hear more failure stories, which could mean startups that imploded spectacularly, but could also mean successes that weren't as big as expected (aquihires, shut downs after an aquisition, etc.) As mentioned elsewhere in the comments, most startup stories have heavy survivorship bias involved, and as a result end up with the same lessons.

It'd also be cool to see some more technology focused interviews, specifically focusing on how technical founders or CTOs built their original prototypes or MVPs and the technical decisions made on the path to get the startup where it is today, although I understand that being completely out of scope for a business focused podcast.

As a black man I'd like to hear from black founders, and other founders that might encounter bias (women, international founders, etc.) about unique challenges they've dealt with, especially when it comes to raising money.

The interviews on the podcast have been interesting and inspiring, but they tend to lack useful actionable information beyond the same generic advice you can get anywhere (talk to users, focus on growth, etc.) I'd like to see more actionable problem solving advice and less about how great a particular startup is or how lucky a particular group of founders was.

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#98
* Elon Musk

* Paul Graham, haven't heard from him lately

* Pieter Thiel (ideally a long interview about Trump, Palantir, seastanding, Libertarianism)

* Sam Altman (sneak peek into the upcoming MOOC, things he's working on, OpenAI)

* OpenAI team

* Failed startups: Homejoy to begin with

Please ask HN for questions, before going to interview people. Ask deep and difficult questions, and avoid boring, generic questions.

Re: Ask HN: Restarting the YC Podcast – who would be most interesting to listen to?

#100
I would love it if you interviewed founders that you turned down but who went on to have some level of success. (For me meaning some level of profitability or improving people's lives rather than calling raising a round a success.)

I imagine a lot of the podcast audience is those that have been or would be rejected from YC at this point in their journey so there might be more lessons there for us than from the outliers that were accepted to YC.

Post reply on HN