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I didn't get into YC – here's my project

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: I didn't get into YC – here's my project

#81

Post by motocycle »

gault8121 wrote: post #64
motocycle wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

nice homepage. i love the text on the mission page actually. why nonprofit? can you try selling this to schools? my team also embrace the "learn by writing" concept and recently launched www.dailythem.es -- we are reaching out to English as a Second Language students and schools in Asia to develop something more classroom specific because teachers just don't have time to grade enough students' essays

We are a commercial nonprofit, and we do intend to sell to schools. We're a nonprofit because we're looking to build a sustainable revenue, but we are not looking for an exit. Our main focus is on collaboratively building educational resources, and being a nonprofit encourages people to volunteer their time to contribute. We're open source, and if you're interested, you can pull out code here - https://github.com/emp…

That makes sense. All the best. I will be keeping out on your site let my school contacts know

Re: I didn't get into YC – here's my project

#82

Post by hunvreus »

netpenthe wrote: post #17

http://www.inputfarm.com

Not bad. However, any decent front-end guy will likely hack his way directly in the browser to see how things would actually look like. Build an extension that allow them to snapshot their CSS/DOM hack on actual code (I believe there are already a few doing similar things) and send that back to users instead of a simple document. Probably more actionable for the potential customers.

Re: I didn't get into YC – here's my project

#83

Post by Smudge »

hybrid11 wrote: post #24

http://buyable.me - A wishlist that lets you know when products go on sale

Just last night I asked my girlfriend if she would find something like this useful. (We had been eying a piece of furniture that was on sale, when suddenly on refreshing the page the sale disappeared...)

Re: I didn't get into YC – here's my project

#84

Post by gault8121 »

motocycle wrote: post #81
gault8121 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are a commercial nonprofit, and we do intend to sell to schools. We're a nonprofit because we're looking to build a sustainable revenue, but we are not looking for an exit. Our main focus is on collaboratively building educational resources, and being a nonprofit encourages people to volunteer their time to contribute. We're open source, and if you're interested, you can pull out code here - https://github.com/emp…

That makes sense. All the best. I will be keeping out on your site let my school contacts know

Cool. Reach me at peter at quill dot org if you'd like to learn more.

Re: I didn't get into YC – here's my project

#87

Post by jakejake »

gault8121 wrote: post #60
jakejake wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is actually nice looking and has a great purpose. Maybe they didn't select you because there's no billion-dollar exit strategies for education services..? I think it could make a really great product though.

We are a nonprofit. We are a commercial nonprofit, and intend to make a sustainable revenue, so we really don't fit into the nonprofit mold. We probably would have had a better chance as a for profit. The nonprofit app was surprisingly sparse.

Ah. Well, as they say on YC they are being extremely selective with non-profits and considering them to be "charity" (their own words). I personally wouldn't take it to heart at all if YC didn't select your company.

Re: I didn't get into YC – here's my project

#88

Post by capsule_toy »

sam1r wrote: post #30

http://uguru.me - We are a team of technical UC Berkeley students graduating in January. We have a couple of funding options but our first choice was YC. Read more about it here: http://uguru.me/about

I'm not a huge fan of the differentiators in your pitch. Last minute help and non-monetary compensation seems like it'll run into logistical and scalability issues. Not taking a cut of the money makes me wonder how you'll make money. Take away these differentiators and you end up with another tutoring service.
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