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How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

joncrawford.com

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Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#111

Post by jeromec »

aquateen wrote: post #110
jeromec wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right about Phil Jackson. He's a basketball genius. LA has always been able to attract top talent, but raw talent alone doesn't equal multiple championships at NBA level.

It's not extremely common for people to list their location in their profile, but for some reason I was compelled to click on your username. What a surprise I see "Los Angeles."

Yeah, like the OP says it's good to network on and offline so I include a location and contact email in my profile.

But I used to watch the Lakers religiously. In fact I've got a signed jersey from Eddie Jones hanging up right now. One fan appreciation day starters were meeting briefly with fans, who could line up to meet Shaq, Kobe, Eddie and others. My friend and I chose Eddie Jones who was our favorite Laker at the time.

Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#112

Post by jhrobert »

scottkrager wrote: post #17

Wow really shows how Y Combinator values co-founders... No co-founder....no soup for you! To be fair, they did get accepted based on having the whole team. Do you think you would have been excepted if you applied as just yourself?

"My team? well... it's me and my computers."

"What? they don't count as 'co-founder''? you must be kidding, this is XXI'

Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#113

Post by pg »

idiopathic wrote: post #109
pg wrote: post #66

Every batch there are some groups that fall apart between when we agree to fund them and when YC starts. Sometimes we tell them not to worry about it and do YC anyway, and sometimes we tell them they should take some time to repair the damage and reapply for the next cycle. It depends on how bad the breakage is. If a team of 3 loses 1 person, that's no problem. Whereas if a team of 3 loses 2 people, that's bad. In th…

Paul, thank you for adding your point of view, and I understand that it was a bad surprise to hear the bad news to late. But if I understood correctly: 1. he was not planning on applying to YC, you asked him to 2. he had a good living situation and local contacts, and you asked him to move to SV 3. he had a functioning company wit income and co-founders, and you asked him to do something (move to SV) that blew up the…

No, you have the story wrong. We didn't push him to apply to YC. And he definitely didn't split up the company for us. He hadn't yet done it when he arrived in SF, and when we learned he was planning to, we advised him not to.

Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#114

Post by idiopathic »

pg wrote: post #113
idiopathic wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paul, thank you for adding your point of view, and I understand that it was a bad surprise to hear the bad news to late. But if I understood correctly: 1. he was not planning on applying to YC, you asked him to 2. he had a good living situation and local contacts, and you asked him to move to SV 3. he had a functioning company wit income and co-founders, and you asked him to do something (move to SV) that blew up the…

No, you have the story wrong. We didn't push him to apply to YC. And he definitely didn't split up the company for us. He hadn't yet done it when he arrived in SF, and when we learned he was planning to, we advised him not to.

I am sure I do have the story wrong, if only because I was not there. I just went on what was posted so, could the original author of the story either correct the story, or correct PG?

For "We didn't push to apply to YC", the original posting had said "I hadn't really considered an incubator like YC because we already had a product, customers, and whatnot and I thought I really just needed cash to hire a bunch of people. But one of the guys at breakfast really liked what we were doing and wrote an intro email to Harj, one of the partners at YC. It was mid-May so the application deadline for the Summer 2010 session had already passed. But Harj and I had coffee the next day, and he liked what he saw so he invited me to come interview for late acceptance."

And for "he definitely didn't split up the company for us", I was going on "So the day before YC started, I sent Paul and the gang an email letting them know that my team was changing. I didn't think it would be a huge problem. I (naively) thought that they'd just give me advice on how to navigate the new situation. But alas, Paul was not happy with the changes and told me it might put us in jeopardy of getting funded by them." In other words he did not say that you had told him the company should stay put, you had told him you would not fund him, now that the company had split up in trying to fulfil YC's requirement for SV location.

By the way, I am entirely aware of a third possibility, i.e. that you are both right, and that two different people can have correct but different memories of the same situation. But the story as it was written did not make YC look good, even though the author is promoting it with cheeriness as coming through adversity.

Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#115

Post by Keyframe »

anmol wrote: post #91
pg wrote: post #66

Every batch there are some groups that fall apart between when we agree to fund them and when YC starts. Sometimes we tell them not to worry about it and do YC anyway, and sometimes we tell them they should take some time to repair the damage and reapply for the next cycle. It depends on how bad the breakage is. If a team of 3 loses 1 person, that's no problem. Whereas if a team of 3 loses 2 people, that's bad. In th…

To me, Jon seems to have demonstrated exactly like the type of resourcefulness YC asks for in its applications [1]. Unfortunately there was no way for YC to predict the Jon had these chops at the time. The fact that YC can make such predictions with high-accuracy, from simply an application and a 10-minute conversation, is very impressive. There are bound to be borderline calls now and then. If you have de-identified…

I think YC here demonstrated that type of resourcefulness is not what they ask for. Looks to me they are more on the side of reliable, steady, old-school business with team values vs resourceful ingenious type of people that stop at nothing. Makes sense business-wise to rely on steady signals vs riding the wave, but in any case YC is just a business.

Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#116

Post by NewMonarch »

idiopathic wrote: post #114
pg wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you have the story wrong. We didn't push him to apply to YC. And he definitely didn't split up the company for us. He hadn't yet done it when he arrived in SF, and when we learned he was planning to, we advised him not to.

I am sure I do have the story wrong, if only because I was not there. I just went on what was posted so, could the original author of the story either correct the story, or correct PG? For "We didn't push to apply to YC", the original posting had said "I hadn't really considered an incubator like YC because we already had a product, customers, and whatnot and I thought I really just needed cash to hire a bunch of peo…

That's a battle I just don't care about winning.

Times were crazy, and missteps and miscommunications may or may not have happened. But I've got nothing but love for these people. Going forward, I'm way more interested in being "a guy with $1.5m looking for top people to build an amazing company with" than "the guy that got kicked out of YC".

Thank for going to bat for me, though! :)

Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#117

Post by rgrieselhuber »

zackattack wrote: post #102
mlinsey wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

YC accepts single founders, the bar is just higher. Applying with co-founders and having them disappear is probably worse than applying as a single founder, because co-founders jumping ship is one of the things that often happens shortly before a startup dies. I'm sure YC was acutely aware of this pattern, and that makes the Storenvy story all the more impressive.

Cool story bro. I was asking Ray what made him an exceptional single founder.

I'm pretty much good at only one thing: not giving up. The rest just seems to work itself out.

Re: How I Got Kicked Out of Y Combinator and Then Raised $1.5m for My Startup

#118

Post by Mistone »

IMHO - one of the very best HN posts ever. no way for YC to be right about founders every time but the rejection feels devastating (we got interviewed then rejected for Winter 2010). But truth is that the vast majority of startups don't do YC or other incubator programs. Hustle, more than anything stands out as the factor that turned a rough situation into a success. good stuff Jon!
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