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YC is Wrong About You

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: YC is Wrong About You

#11

Post by david927 »

I'd like to add a couple things to this:

1. This is the 'gatekeeper' problem. You have a handful of people deciding if you're making "what people want". They can't possibly know what all people want. JK Rowling got rejected by, what, 20 publishers? They can't know. They can only do their best. The 'gatekeeper' problem also means you get idiosyncrasies, such as (essentially) a ban on single founders, etc.

2. Some ideas are easy to pitch, others nearly impossible. Take this year's Best Film Oscar winner, "Slumdog Millionaire", and try to pitch the plot in a way that's not ludicrous. You won't succeed. But take any cheesy, crappy B-flick and you can perfectly summarize it and even make it sound good. Now, I'm not saying there's a correlation between a good idea and difficulty in pitching it. (Ok, but I will say there's a clear correlation between mediocre ideas and ease of pitch.) So if you didn't get accepted, your idea either isn't very good or it's great.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#12

Post by whatusername »

xenoterracide wrote: post #7
xenoterracide wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

not to mention, yc prolly has a ton of applicants, they didn't even see yours. I'll apply earlier next time myself, but hopefully I'll also have a co-founder by then.

now I want to know why I've been marked down? I think it's a good way to look at it. my application is too far down in the pile, nothing personal, I don't think mine was worse, it just never got reviewed because there are too many applicants farther up on the stack who were just as good that there was no need to get to mine.

In a positive thinking / karmic kind of sense - that's a good way to look at it. From a TRUTH perspective - it's just wrong - the applications are all looked at.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#13

Post by swombat »

tsally wrote: post #3

Not to be an internet hardass, but if a YC rejection crushes you beyond all belief, you probably shouldn't be founding a startup. Every single successful startup has experienced at least one defeat as large as a YC rejection. A healthy dose of confidence and ignorance about your abilities is necessary. Preferably a combination of both.

Every single successful startup has experienced at least one defeat as large as a YC rejection

A YC rejection is not a large defeat.

I'd say that most successful people (start-ups are shorter-lived and may skip this) have experienced many situations where they thought they had it all, everything was going their way, they were at the peak of their game, and suddenly everything came crashing down disastrously and unexpectedly.

What made these people successful isn't the defeat, but it's that they then picked themselves up and started again from the bottom.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#14

Post by froo »

david927 wrote: post #11

I'd like to add a couple things to this: 1. This is the 'gatekeeper' problem. You have a handful of people deciding if you're making "what people want". They can't possibly know what all people want. JK Rowling got rejected by, what, 20 publishers? They can't know. They can only do their best. The 'gatekeeper' problem also means you get idiosyncrasies, such as (essentially) a ban on single founders, etc. 2. Some idea…

(Ok, but I will say there's a clear correlation between mediocre ideas and ease of pitch.)

yeah, "index all of the world's information" is such a mediocre idea, even though it is a very easy pitch, those Google guys will never make any money.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#15

Post by edw519 »

nostrademons wrote: post #8
tsally wrote: post #3

Not to be an internet hardass, but if a YC rejection crushes you beyond all belief, you probably shouldn't be founding a startup. Every single successful startup has experienced at least one defeat as large as a YC rejection. A healthy dose of confidence and ignorance about your abilities is necessary. Preferably a combination of both.

Four YC rejections, however, is pretty rough.

Walt Disney got a yes from the 996th bank he approached. I'm such a pussy that I would have quit after 950 attempts. He never quit. That's the point. I expect that you won't either.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#16

Post by pxlpshr »

swombat wrote: post #13
tsally wrote: post #3

Not to be an internet hardass, but if a YC rejection crushes you beyond all belief, you probably shouldn't be founding a startup. Every single successful startup has experienced at least one defeat as large as a YC rejection. A healthy dose of confidence and ignorance about your abilities is necessary. Preferably a combination of both.

Every single successful startup has experienced at least one defeat as large as a YC rejection A YC rejection is not a large defeat. I'd say that most successful people (start-ups are shorter-lived and may skip this) have experienced many situations where they thought they had it all, everything was going their way, they were at the peak of their game, and suddenly everything came crashing down disastrously and unexp…

Hear hear, happened this summer. The second time around I'm the founder and not just an early-employee, and instead of $3M we only had $10k to kick things off.

What's kept me from applying to ycom is having a technical co-founder that I believe in. But that hasn't kept me from launching and running a relatively successful (in 4 months) mobile startup.

I love reading HN and following the ycom companies, the quality discussions definitely impact my thought process and decisions in the company.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#17

Post by fiaz »

No they are not.

YC has more experience than you.

YC has more success than you.

If they turned you down, listen to the "why" and make the adjustments necessary to be successful.

Consider it a badge of honor that they even gave you the time of day. Take the information, feedback, advice, and rejection to heart and grow a pair.

Success is not static, it is dynamic.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#18

Post by bcx »

Just to put things in perspective the next round of YC is not exactly a 'no luck' process either. Basically PG and company meet with you for 10 minutes to meet the team, and discuss the project and plan. Now, tell me, how they can possibly judge people and projects in 10 minutes, in a rational even-handed way.

I'd say Ycombinator is more about winning the lottery, than doing everything right. I am fairly confident that YC receives far too many really good applications to be able to really vet everything. And also, to be fair if you are looking for mentorship, I can imagine this year will be a little different from normal, as the number of teams has doubled, and PG and Jessica have a new addition to the family. As for connections, if your scrappy you can make your own connections -- and $25K for 5% is really not that great of a valuation.

Re: YC is Wrong About You

#19

Post by danielzarick »

fiaz wrote: post #17

No they are not. YC has more experience than you. YC has more success than you. If they turned you down, listen to the "why" and make the adjustments necessary to be successful. Consider it a badge of honor that they even gave you the time of day. Take the information, feedback, advice, and rejection to heart and grow a pair. Success is not static, it is dynamic.

You are missing the point. The people that got turned down for interviews didn't even get feedback. It is just a glorified "sorry and we really appreciate you" letter with a "let us know if we're wrong and you do something awesome" attached to the end.

So this is also the stage where many people hang their heads down and go back to their normal routine of nothing. But this is the only flaw in the YC system. It takes people who are not entrepreneurs and wholly dedicated to their idea and gives them an opportunity because they are a good hacker. Now once it gets to the interview stage they access how dedicated you are, but who wouldn't be at that point?

So please don't make some hugely dramatic post. Paul and Jessica would (and do) say that they are wrong about many startups. Not only the ones from interviews, but even with the applications. There are so many high-level applicants that it is hard to access who fits where.

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