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How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

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Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#4
I think 4 out of 39 startups have had a female cofounder. This reflects fairly accurately the proportion of women among the applicants.

I think the reasons there are so few women are that (a) fewer women are fanatical about technical stuff, and you have to be kind of a fanatic to start a startup, and (b) fewer women are willing to have their lives consumed by work, which is what happens to most founders of successful startups.

Y Combinator itself has a female co-founder:

http://foundersatwork.com/jessicalivingston.html

We've talked about the question a fair amount, and I think she would agree with the explanation above.

[edit: changed 3 to 4]

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#5
post #4

I think 4 out of 39 startups have had a female cofounder. This reflects fairly accurately the proportion of women among the applicants. I think the reasons there are so few women are that (a) fewer women are fanatical about technical stuff, and you have to be kind of a fanatic to start a startup, and (b) fewer women are willing to have their lives consumed by work, which is what happens to most founders of successful…

Would it not help to have a cofounder who is fanatical about the service itself rather than its implementation? Such a cofounder could take on something like a program manager role.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#8

For the same reason guys don't apply to "America's next top model". There just aren't enough female geeks. Which is a pity, since they are mathematically better tuned.

None do? I'll bet there are *far* more men that do than women who start and stick with tech startups.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#9
post #5
post #4

I think 4 out of 39 startups have had a female cofounder. This reflects fairly accurately the proportion of women among the applicants. I think the reasons there are so few women are that (a) fewer women are fanatical about technical stuff, and you have to be kind of a fanatic to start a startup, and (b) fewer women are willing to have their lives consumed by work, which is what happens to most founders of successful…

Would it not help to have a cofounder who is fanatical about the service itself rather than its implementation? Such a cofounder could take on something like a program manager role.

YouTube's spokewoman upon the acquisition received approx. 5 million dollars. The 3 founders together received more than 750 million dollars.

Your co-founder should be able to provide more in tech side of the start-up because thats what is important in the beggining.

Re: How come no girls choose to apply to y combinator?

#10

I'm curious - how many YC companies have girls involved? How many founders have a mixed founding team?

According to Jessica Levingstone, it is 4. And according to Paul, it is 3. The rest of us can take the mean and agree upon 3.5 females.
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