I disagree that a startup should commonly start with an "idea". Start with an unmet need people are willing to pay for. Or take an existing category with a lot of bad products and make a truly better one that improves every aspect of the experience. Often, you'll see many startups working on the same "idea". Something like Google is truly rare (a genuinely innovative approach to search).
Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
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Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#52Sam kept bringing up the 10 year number
But: YC (and therefore every YC company) is What startups succeeded after this long (AND were still actually considered startups)
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#53Don't get me wrong I love Sam Altman I love y-combinator but a small part of me is thinking that a good first step to start a startup is to not watch that video and find your own way. Not because it's probably not great but because a startup is not a formula. Your path is your own.
Disagree strongly. These lectures are about 40 minutes and seem jam packed with good advice. A start-up isn't a formula but it does follow certain trends. Doing it wrong is a disaster and if you're taking on what can be a 10 year commitment without spending less than 20h exploring advice from some of the best data and people in start-ups you probably have misaligned your priorities. I suspect heeding the advice in th…
Doing it wrong might actually sometimes mean doing it right.
Ycombinator companies have access to this advice yet most of these companies fail. Thats just how it is. You can get structural advice from a laywer the rest is up to you to explore.
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am pretty sure you are right. Whether that value is intellectual or actionable is what I am not so sure about :)
I found it was more "here's what you should notice" than "here's what you should do".
Yes it's all fine. All I want to say is that most ycombinator companies fail even though they have access to this advice.
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#55[deleted]
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#56Don't get me wrong I love Sam Altman I love y-combinator but a small part of me is thinking that a good first step to start a startup is to not watch that video and find your own way. Not because it's probably not great but because a startup is not a formula. Your path is your own.
There's still going to plenty of "finding your own way". I suspect most founders and early employees could find a lot of useful information in the material.
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#57Why did we submit questions if the video was just going to cut out at the Q&A
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#58Sam: "Step 1, build something that users love"
How does this compare with an MVP approach where you put something out there first and test the market. Then there is the issue of runway. With enough time, you can start with an MVP and iterate in private beta until users love it, but in many cases a founder is not going to have that kind of runway. They have just enough resources to put something together, and they're going to have to go out to the market with that and iterate on the fly. Unfortunately, once you do get out there and need to take on all of the other responsibilities, then that's time taken away from building a great product.
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#59Don't get me wrong I love Sam Altman I love y-combinator but a small part of me is thinking that a good first step to start a startup is to not watch that video and find your own way. Not because it's probably not great but because a startup is not a formula. Your path is your own.
There's still going to plenty of "finding your own way". I suspect most founders and early employees could find a lot of useful information in the material.
Not disagreeing. But whether it's actionable is what I would question.
Re: Lecture 1 – How to Start a Startup [video]
#60I find it artificial when the lecturer reads the presentation - it's not a joy to listen.
I'm definitely looking forward to hearing from the people who have built companies with their presentation abilities