YC without being in YC • Hacker News Board

Re: YC without being in YC

#31

Post by thaumasiotes » Sat, May 04, 2013, 2:36 AM UTC

jaf12duke wrote: post #10

aashaykumar92 wrote: post #4

Great post. It was surprising to see this type of post from a YC alum but I guess it has to for legitimacy purposes. I agree with almost all the points, but as someone looking from the outside in, I see YC as the most prestigious fraternity in the tech space. What do I mean by this? I go to the University of Michigan; coming in as an out of stater, I didn't know what to expect but I kept hearing this one piece of adv…

You bring up some good points. A very powerful part of the YC network is simply being surrounded by awesome people. I've found that type of community throughout the startup ecosystem. When I lived in Boston, before ever getting into YC, I found it at Betahouse in Central Square. While in NY, I found it at General Assembly. Now I see it at RocketSpace in SF.

this comment serves the purpose of a bookmark

Re: YC without being in YC

#32

Post by dakrisht » Sat, May 04, 2013, 3:45 AM UTC

aashaykumar92 wrote: post #4

Great post. It was surprising to see this type of post from a YC alum but I guess it has to for legitimacy purposes. I agree with almost all the points, but as someone looking from the outside in, I see YC as the most prestigious fraternity in the tech space. What do I mean by this? I go to the University of Michigan; coming in as an out of stater, I didn't know what to expect but I kept hearing this one piece of adv…

Great comment. Very accurate anecdote, it really is all about finding a small community if like-minded, driven, talented individuals to purse ideas and do great things. A lof people, especially here in LA, are consumed with raising a quick buck and dropping the "change the world" statement without actually having any idea what that means or any intention of doing so. It's just "the thing to say" these days. It's disappointing. And as someone who has quite a few friends in the Valley, living in LA is very difficult when it comes to finding technology oriented people.

I need to find a YC environment here in Los Angeles... If anyone has ideas, let me know. Or we'll just start our own!

Re: YC without being in YC

#33

Post by dakrisht » Sat, May 04, 2013, 3:46 AM UTC

tarof wrote: post #6

"Sell before you build" This is what I learned from YC. It was from Paul Buchheit.

Would love to hear you elaborate on this...

Re: YC without being in YC

#34

Post by skbohra123 » Sat, May 04, 2013, 3:50 AM UTC

aashaykumar92 wrote: post #25

lanstein wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

fixed :)

Thanks! Not sure how you fixed it (or how you know its fixed) but if you're an admin, I'd love to know why anything I submit is automatically 'dead'. Email is aashayk@umich.edu, thanks again :)

Probably he fixed up just by up voting.

Re: YC without being in YC

#35

Post by nwenzel » Sat, May 04, 2013, 4:20 AM UTC

Great post. I think one key to the whole program are the weekly deadlines. And of course the big deadlines. It's the same as not having a boatload of startup cash. It forces you to figure out what is really important.

The trick is, deadline only work if there are consequences. There can only be consequences if you feel accountable to someone or something. So, tell someone you're going to accomplish something by a certain date.

I'm going to contact 25 potential customers next week.

Re: YC without being in YC

#36

Post by austenallred » Sat, May 04, 2013, 5:54 AM UTC

Would anyone be interested in having a YC for those out of YC? You could organize meetups for those in the Bay Area and show off your tech that you built in the week, do a bit of a book club instead of having PG at your side... it obviously wouldn't be the same, but yo could mimic a lot of the features, especially the feedback and accountability measures. I'd be happy to work on putting something together if there's interest.

Re: YC without being in YC

#37

Post by petercooper » Sat, May 04, 2013, 7:00 AM UTC

dakrisht wrote: post #33

tarof wrote: post #6

"Sell before you build" This is what I learned from YC. It was from Paul Buchheit.

Would love to hear you elaborate on this...

I can't speak for Paul B but there's a great book called Ready Fire Aim by Michael Masterson that focuses on this technique that I'd recommend.

Re: YC without being in YC

#38

Post by killermonkeys » Sat, May 04, 2013, 10:23 AM UTC

We did something pretty similar to this when we didn't get into YC in W13: https://plus.google.com/u/0/115851397461982481700/posts/AUX1...

On review, the meetings and advisory help were effective, trying to track a peer group of startups was not. I would highly recommend it for any kind of serious project you're taking on.

Re: YC without being in YC

#39

Post by JVIDEL » Sat, May 04, 2013, 6:05 PM UTC

austenallred wrote: post #36

Would anyone be interested in having a YC for those out of YC? You could organize meetups for those in the Bay Area and show off your tech that you built in the week, do a bit of a book club instead of having PG at your side... it obviously wouldn't be the same, but yo could mimic a lot of the features, especially the feedback and accountability measures. I'd be happy to work on putting something together if there's…

Isn't that like YC Reject? no idea what happened to that though.

Re: YC without being in YC

#40

Post by jrmattox1 » Sat, May 04, 2013, 7:08 PM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #7

On a sort-of semi-related note... has anyone here participated in nReduce? The "Open Source YCombinator" that launched to much fanfare a while back? They seemed to get quite a bit of buzz out of the gate, but I haven't heard much about them lately. Anybody gone through the program and care to write up your experiences and submit here? I, for one, would love to read something like that.

I hadn't heard of nReduce. Very interesting. My take is that if you are accepted to YC and are willing and able to move to SV, then there are clear benefits in doing so: network, external validation, brand, access to capital, etc.

If you are not accepted and/or are unable to relocate to SV, then a MOOC version of YC makes sense for the reasons that MOOCs make sense in higher ed: location & time independent, high quality learning, structured peer review, clear milestones and deadlines, tuition free, and most importantly ... it is far superior to the alternative, which is often doing nothing.