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Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#131

Post by andr »

Am I the only one thinking that Facebook's IPO was actually a success? The point of the IPO is to sell your company shares at the best possible price and Facebook did it.

Compare to an A/B/C round for a startup. If you know investors are willing to pay $50m for the round, but you settle for $25m, then you just lost $25m and gained nothing.

I think the main reason FB is falling now, is not because the stock was not worth $38, but everyone that expected it to quadruple overnight is now selling.

Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#132

Post by timlindinct »

timlindinct wrote: post #128

Isn't it a bit early for someone like pg to be calling this? Calling it publicly essentially creates the effect, especially from an accelerator lead.

Anyways, at least pg's making more founders angry with FB & Zuckerberg. Only good will come of that. ;-)

Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#133

Post by rehack »

kamaal wrote: post #126
rehack wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree transactions will make money for somebody. Let me take just take one example of 'movies' from your sentence. Would you think of Youtube or Facebook as a natural choice for watching paid videos/movies? Likewise, IMO, there will be specific things for specific purposes. I will proffer that the specific purpose for FB usage are things like vanity and managing one's image (how one wants to be seen in their social c…

>>Recently I am seeing some 'xyz watched some on Social cam' kind of statuses on FB, of some xyzs who I am sure have not noticed such broadcast to their friends. These kind of mistakes, might just result in some very embarrassed and angry people. This is true. Since I observed this. I take care to log out of Gmail/Facebook/Twitter once I am done with them. And I never browse anything when I'm logged into into one of…

I don't logout, but try to open any links from within FB in 'incognito' mode.

Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#134

Post by jkahn »

betterlabs wrote: post #93
po wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect it's because investors think that one of the few routes to 'exit' a company and cash out your investment just got closed down, at least in the short term. That increases the risk of investing and therefore lowers the valuation.

I believe investors and startups that are / were looking for Facebook as an easy exit were not building a company / business anyway. Such a situation is better overall for everyone - only the teams that are focused on building a real business survive and create value for everyone involved.

It's not about a Facebook acquisition no longer being an exit, it's about an IPO no longer being an exit.

Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#135

Post by mtkd »

kamaal wrote: post #102
jcampbell1 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a cryptic comment. Yes, Wall St views Facebook as a powerful coil, but no one knows if it is compressed or stretched, but it certainly is. All it takes is for Facebook to go from $4 a user/yr to $8, or for teenagers to say "email me, I don't check facebook often". A powerful coil indeed.

>>"email me, I don't check facebook often" Facebook exists because I would not like 500 friends to email me every day about their photos or jokes. That sort of thing doesn't scale well with emails.

Social networks exploded because they created an interaction that previously wasn't possible.

They have now become a tax on life - like email. A set of hygiene actions you have to perform every day.

Do not underestimate how much the next generation does not want to conform to the restrictions of the previous generation.

It's entirely possible future generations do not want to be tracked and targeted 24/7 - they may choose to just switch off and drop out.

50% youth unemployment in some first world countries right now. These guys may just decide to do things differently - what is social technology doing for them right now?

Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#136

Post by mcosta »

jkahn wrote: post #134
betterlabs wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe investors and startups that are / were looking for Facebook as an easy exit were not building a company / business anyway. Such a situation is better overall for everyone - only the teams that are focused on building a real business survive and create value for everyone involved.

It's not about a Facebook acquisition no longer being an exit, it's about an IPO no longer being an exit.

Since long ago Facebook is too big to be adquired. Now even less. Who can pay so much money?

Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#138

Post by JustNick »

"The best solution is not to need money."

This always is a good rule for any kind of business. not only about startups.

Paul, you're trying to explain basics of business processes.

In YC application, Faq there is an item in which you're asking to state is there any programmers in startup team, and explaining that if not, you better should have one. I think you should add one more item, on which YC team should have experienced and successful project manager, businessman who make startup profitable and successful.

Re: Paul Graham's Letter to YC Companies

#139

Post by wateverer »

pg wrote: post #22

Note incidentally that I'm talking about the performance of the IPO, not the performance of Facebook itself. I think Facebook as a company is in a strong position. The problem is simply that Mr. Market ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Intelligent_Investor ) doesn't think so at the moment.

Jew ! Jew ! Burn him !
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