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How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

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Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#11

Post by amichail »

volida wrote: post #9
amichail wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would it not help to have a cofounder who is fanatical about the service itself rather than its implementation? Such a cofounder could take on something like a program manager role.

YouTube's spokewoman upon the acquisition received approx. 5 million dollars. The 3 founders together received more than 750 million dollars. Your co-founder should be able to provide more in tech side of the start-up because thats what is important in the beggining.

Whether or not a startup succeeds has probably more to do with understanding what users want rather than anything to do with the tech side. Tech is important later when you need to scale the service to support millions of users.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#13

Post by volida »

amichail wrote: post #11
volida wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YouTube's spokewoman upon the acquisition received approx. 5 million dollars. The 3 founders together received more than 750 million dollars. Your co-founder should be able to provide more in tech side of the start-up because thats what is important in the beggining.

Whether or not a startup succeeds has probably more to do with understanding what users want rather than anything to do with the tech side. Tech is important later when you need to scale the service to support millions of users.

with "the beggining" i was reffering at the "later" you are talking about. the scale and the success of the web start-up is its beggining. And you need the people that will do that. Expect if you are the investor and paying them to do so...

To my mind and my experience unfortunately, if you have a co-founder who is doing only business without any other contribution (e.g. money) and he has same equity of your company as you then he is ripping you off. Better go to YC and give them 5-10% and access their network if you need a what u call program manager...

the reason you decide to start-up, is that although you don't know everything, it means you already know or u are willing to use other skills too and/or learn the rest (including those you are reffering to) , in order to encompass more characteristics --enough to take the risk to become a founder. Otherwise using one skill (e.g. programmer) should get you a job somewhere.

an non-YC example with female co-founder I am aware of is Emily Boyd of www.rememberthemilk.com

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#14

Post by pg »

python_kiss wrote: post #10
sharpshoot wrote: post #2

I'm curious - how many YC companies have girls involved? How many founders have a mixed founding team?

According to Jessica Levingstone, it is 4. And according to Paul, it is 3. The rest of us can take the mean and agree upon 3.5 females.

Oops, it is 4. I forgot one.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#16

Post by sharpshoot »

volida wrote: post #13
amichail wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether or not a startup succeeds has probably more to do with understanding what users want rather than anything to do with the tech side. Tech is important later when you need to scale the service to support millions of users.

with "the beggining" i was reffering at the "later" you are talking about. the scale and the success of the web start-up is its beggining. And you need the people that will do that. Expect if you are the investor and paying them to do so... To my mind and my experience unfortunately, if you have a co-founder who is doing only business without any other contribution (e.g. money) and he has same equity of your company…

volida, can you qualify what yu mean by "only doing business". A good product is nothing without distribution, good product management and a keen sense of copy, branding, and the ability to sell. Building the product is only part of the battle.

If you mean, the business guy can't read code, doesn't know how interfaces should look and can't visualise the direction of the product i guess you are right. But, strangely business guys are needed to get users and thats pretty hard - even if you are myspace or bebo. Bottom line - doesn't matter how great your tech is - someone who gets business makes or breaks your product.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#17

Post by volida »

sharpshoot wrote: post #16
volida wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

with "the beggining" i was reffering at the "later" you are talking about. the scale and the success of the web start-up is its beggining. And you need the people that will do that. Expect if you are the investor and paying them to do so... To my mind and my experience unfortunately, if you have a co-founder who is doing only business without any other contribution (e.g. money) and he has same equity of your company…

volida, can you qualify what yu mean by "only doing business". A good product is nothing without distribution, good product management and a keen sense of copy, branding, and the ability to sell. Building the product is only part of the battle. If you mean, the business guy can't read code, doesn't know how interfaces should look and can't visualise the direction of the product i guess you are right. But, strangely b…

yeah, basically i mean someone who is not willing to be part during the development cycle and is interested only in pushing the product or finding the users.

The problem is that in the beggining there is not a product to push! And if there is and is launched even with some minor features showcasing the idea, then you'll receive feedback from the users, so you get this help from your users. This means, that having more features to produce you do need someone who is technically capable while the product/service is maturing.

Now if there is a product/service and that product needs someone to find clients that will pay for, and not relying in word of mouth, like most low budjet web start-ups do, then ok, you need someone who will help you with this, but does it really worth it giving up equity equal to yours?

For me, no because I believe that if its your idea (refering to 1 or more people), then you know it better. So, being the soul you can pursue becoming capable to talk about it and make others even invest in it.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#18

Post by amichail »

volida wrote: post #17
sharpshoot wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

volida, can you qualify what yu mean by "only doing business". A good product is nothing without distribution, good product management and a keen sense of copy, branding, and the ability to sell. Building the product is only part of the battle. If you mean, the business guy can't read code, doesn't know how interfaces should look and can't visualise the direction of the product i guess you are right. But, strangely b…

yeah, basically i mean someone who is not willing to be part during the development cycle and is interested only in pushing the product or finding the users. The problem is that in the beggining there is not a product to push! And if there is and is launched even with some minor features showcasing the idea, then you'll receive feedback from the users, so you get this help from your users. This means, that having mor…

Why do you think users will be interested in trying out your service and giving you feedback in the first place? You need someone to help you understand what users want.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#19

Post by cnaclerio »

python_kiss wrote: post #3

For the same reason guys don't apply to "America's next top model". There just aren't enough female geeks. Which is a pity, since they are mathematically better tuned.

"America's next top model" has only asked for women participants. The criteria for judging male models and female models is different, and the places for them to model (ads, runway shows) is different, so it wouldn't be a fair comparison to have them competing on the same show. Given the opportunity, I think you would find plenty of men wanting to apply for a similar show.

As for the "mathematically better tuned" comment, I've always disliked the arguments that one sex is better suited for anything, especially when talking about the brain. I think socialization has a lot more to do with brain development then sex, and since we've got hundreds of years of gender roles to overcome before we find out for sure, I think we're better off judging individuals, rather then genders.

As for why there aren't more women in startups, or women geeks for that matter, I return to socialization. Bill Gates made it cool to be a nerd for guys, we still don't have a female in that category. A largely successful role model that makes it ok for women to not be entirerly obsessed with their appearence. Maybe when I get my own start up...

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