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YC Annual Letter 2017

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#71

Post by brudgers »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #14

Companies like Amazon, Facebook, Google, Apple, and Microsoft have powerful advantages that are still not fully understood by most founders and investors....This trend is unlikely to reverse without antitrust action, and I suggest people carefully consider its implications for startups. I think the "startup community" needs to have a serious conversation about this [2]. If we agree that machine learning is going to b…

Twenty years or so ago, only Microsoft would have been on that list. It was being hit with lawsuits and Apple was on the other side because it wasn't on the list. The landscape changed and DEC and SUN are gone and Yahoo (hence the 'or so') and IBM don't have the relevance that they once did.

What happened is that the landscape shifted out from under many of the incumbents...from hardware to software. The one survivor (I won't consider Oracle because Altman didn't), was the one given an excuse to change its very profitable business practices by anti-trust prosecution. Not that it happened fast by internet standards. But super tankers don't turn on a dime and Wall Street beholden oil tankers probably turn even more slowly.

I guess my big take away is that AFGAM is more of a concern if the world is a finite pie and less so if it isn't.

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#72

Post by clay_to_n »

sama wrote: post #21
gregoire wrote: post #8

Is there a reason why this is published on Sam's blog and not on YC's blog? Oh and a remark on the letter's typography: the double spaces after periods should be single spaces.

I had emailed this out to the YC community over the weekend. I got word from a journalist it was about to leak, and I couldn't get in touch with the person that runs the YC blog (I don't yet know how to post on the new one, but I'm sure going to figure it out now). I didn't want to wait, so I just posted it where I could. Also I happen to think documents are easier to read with double spaces after sentences. Surely t…

Agreed that it's not an important part of the post, but as someone currently reforming my ways from double spaces to single, I have to admit they are right. Double spaces after periods are a vestige of the past.

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#73

Post by angersock »

Nice writeup sama, but the history is a bit revisionist:

> We are only about 30 years into the age of software, about 20 years into the age of the internet, and about 2 years into the age of artificial intelligence.

Software has been around--and actively making bank!--for over 40 years. The internet has been around longer in the form of academic institutions, email, and BBS than you mention.

And AI has, of course, been around at least as long as software.

I appreciate you have a message to send, but maybe don't ignore the path we took to get here.

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#74

Post by whorleater »

Keverw wrote: post #41

> In future years, we also hope to explore how something like ‘financial aid’ might work for people that need a small amount of capital to help get their startup going. Sounds interesting. I always kinda hated how people fresh out of high school with zero credit can have so much money handed to them for going to school. While if they wanted to get a business loan or buy a house they would be much more scrutinized. I…

> I always kinda hated how people fresh out of high school with zero credit can have so much money handed to them for going to school. While if they wanted to get a business loan or buy a house they would be much more scrutinized.

That's only because you can't default out of student loans and are government backed. Which if you could default and didn't have government backing, students would never be able to get loans.

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#75

Post by shoyer »

optimusclimb wrote: post #62

> 4) Does this company have a clear and important mission? > Without this, I usually get bored. More importantly, companies that don’t have this usually have a hard time recruiting enough great people to work with them, and thus struggle to become very large. I find this one interesting. When Google started, there were many incumbent search engines. Their mission was to provide better results than what existed, i.e.…

Google's mission has been "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful" since day one [1]. You're confusing mission with strategy.

[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/laszlo-bock-on-google-mission...

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#76

Post by [deleted] »

optimusclimb wrote: post #62

> 4) Does this company have a clear and important mission? > Without this, I usually get bored. More importantly, companies that don’t have this usually have a hard time recruiting enough great people to work with them, and thus struggle to become very large. I find this one interesting. When Google started, there were many incumbent search engines. Their mission was to provide better results than what existed, i.e.…

[deleted]

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#77

Post by dragonwriter »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #69
dragonwriter wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Our antitrust laws have been focused primarily about the anticompetitive aspects of owning a whole market, but has missed the boat so far on the anticompetitive aspects of vertical integration. This is simply historically false; vertical integration has been a central focus of antitrust law from day one (it was a key consideration in the drafting of the 1890 Sherman Act and the 1914 Clayton Act.)

I guess my question then would be, if vertical integration is adequately addressed by antitrust laws, how does a company which is the dominant power in search, mobile, and email manage to exist, while continuing to buy companies that bring it into dozens of other business markets, while proudly proclaiming that integration as a primary feature?

Because antitrust law recognizes that while vertical integration can have consumer harms, it generally does not (and often benefits consumers), so while it addresses vertical integration and includes mechanisms for addressing harms from it, it does not generally prohibit it or even seek to prevent it the way it does monopolization.

Also, most of what you describe is participating in multiple markets that aren't part of a vertical supply chain, so while it is integration, it's not vertical integration.

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#78

Post by pvg »

shoyer wrote: post #75
optimusclimb wrote: post #62

> 4) Does this company have a clear and important mission? > Without this, I usually get bored. More importantly, companies that don’t have this usually have a hard time recruiting enough great people to work with them, and thus struggle to become very large. I find this one interesting. When Google started, there were many incumbent search engines. Their mission was to provide better results than what existed, i.e.…

Google's mission has been "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful" since day one [1]. You're confusing mission with strategy. [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/laszlo-bock-on-google-mission...

Not only that but the actual improvement was so substantial it might have well been a different product - a web search engine that actually works.

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#79

Post by wslh »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #14

Companies like Amazon, Facebook, Google, Apple, and Microsoft have powerful advantages that are still not fully understood by most founders and investors....This trend is unlikely to reverse without antitrust action, and I suggest people carefully consider its implications for startups. I think the "startup community" needs to have a serious conversation about this [2]. If we agree that machine learning is going to b…

> I think the "startup community" needs to have a serious conversation about this...

I think part of the conversation is if Google et al are engaging on new kinds of monopoly practices that are not covered by the law. For example, the balance between the amount of information contributed by users in a platform like Twitter or Facebook vs. API restrictions to consume this information.

At the same time, antimonopoly laws don't help to create competition in, for example, the search engine space. Google innovation is unique in this aspect and even companies with virtually infinite budgets like Microsoft can't compete.

Re: YC Annual Letter 2017

#80

Post by hxta98596 »

optimusclimb wrote: post #62

> 4) Does this company have a clear and important mission? > Without this, I usually get bored. More importantly, companies that don’t have this usually have a hard time recruiting enough great people to work with them, and thus struggle to become very large. I find this one interesting. When Google started, there were many incumbent search engines. Their mission was to provide better results than what existed, i.e.…

All these companies have mission statements. Whether a potential hire, potential investor or anyone else chooses to believe or be cynical about that mission is something else. Seems like there's always a spectrum among employees from the kool-aid drinkers to momentum-seeking remoras just hitching a ride. Still, even when an employee is skeptical or cynical about the company's stated mission initially; the more time someone works somewhere have you not seen man's search for meaning kick in...an employee often will create their own mission why they are there, real or not.
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