181–190 of 399 posts
The announcement's discussion of 'good founders' led me to view this as supporting individuals, as well as teams. In contrast to YC's stance on only really exceptional solo founders, could this program be more tailored to a solo founder, perhaps still looking for a co-founder?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/networth/article/Average... 12k is a small sum of money in SF. Assuming the founders don't want to live together in a studio, looking at >5k month in just rent. Other costs of living are also high. This leaves almost nothing for any actual start up costs. Makes some sense if you're 22 and have no dependents, but 12k wouldn't be persuasive for a Bay Area founder with a family.
There is plenty of less expensive real estate along BART. Take a look at San Leandro, for example. Other costs can be reduced as well. I consider living in SF as an unnecessary luxury.
If you're like me and prefer to draft writing elsewhere, here's a Google Doc you can copy with the questions and word limits: https://goo.gl/K5M3LM Update: Document is fully public now.
I'm not sure why it is repeated over and over that 12k is small sum of money. 12k can easily pay off 2-3 months rent, server costs, marketing stuff, even a few flights. That's mental peace for 12 weeks to build something with 100% focus. That's an extremely high value priviledge. This should make sense for a lot of startups.
12k per team . Ideally founders colocate but that isn't an option for everyone.
Best bet is to beg friends/family to look after to you (or to save up for living expenses) then chuck the $12k into the business idea where it is best used. I guess it is a test of resourcefulness, which one will definitely need to succeed in that game.
*That said it is $12k of strings-free money, and a very generous offer from a private company!
Kat from YC here. Sam, Matt Krisiloff and I are happy to answer any questions about the Fellowship. You can also send questions to fellowship@ycombinator.com.
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In CA with no income, health insurance is 100% free even with really strong income in the previous calendar year.
But does that include situations in which you quit your job to do something like this?
> $12000 France gives you a lumpsum of your unemployment benefits if you start a business. If you were paid an average engineer salary, 2200€ net pm, it makes 42000€, and it's called ACCRE. The condition is to be fired, and not on our heavy fault. Most of my friends negotiate giving cash to their employers to get fired, so they could get ACCRE. There are other grants (e.g. 6000€ for being a woman) and loans (28000€ f…
YCF offers office hours for 8 weeks, two events with the partners and the alumni network. And the $12k and €42k are not mutually exclusive. How many €10M+ companies got started with ACCRE money? Probably not even as many as there are $1B+ YC companies.
There's just no way we could create an Apple in France. It's too agressive, therefore we would forbid it.