What I learned from this article: 1. Privilege opens doors not available to others. 2. Those with privilege are often oblivious to the advantages they have.
Author here. I completely agree that privilege opens doors not available to others. But my intention was that it’s possible to break into Silicon Valley and succeed (to the extent you can consider going through YC success...) even without privilege. I saw another comment saying that I went to MIT around the same time as YC. It was actually after — going through YC enabled me to apply to MIT and get in without a high…
I am curious, were these jobs actually internships?
If so, were they unpaid?
How were you able to support yourself so young and inexperienced in the Valley?
As someone who had some small success early in life I want to send a message directly to this kid that may be unpopular on Hacker News: Pace yourself, do NOT pin your happiness on the occurrence of great wealth or success early in your life, spend a large amount of time appreciating the great success you've already had, take things slowly and experience as much "normal" life as possible - get a girlfriend, try out a…
Author here. I appreciate you sharing this message and I completely agree — I think it's really important to separate happiness from being dependent on success. So much of success comes from luck and timing that basing happiness off it is a recipe for being unhappy most of the time.
Have you read The Courage to be Disliked or A Guide to the Good Life? These books resonated with me and it seems like you may enjoy them too :)
It may be easier if you have credentials, but it’s certainly possible without them. I’d argue how your business is running is 10x as important as credentials. (I dropped out of a non-prestigious school and had work experience at one company, have raised $120m+ in <4 yrs).
> It may be easier if you have credentials, but it’s certainly possible without them. So they care a lot, but it’s not everything to them?
How many people are not going to MIT because they are financially unable? I’m curious.
Now that I'm on the "other side" (got my PhD from an Ivy League uni), I constantly meet people who don't even begin to grasp how far away growing up poor puts you from things and resources they take for granted. Even stuff that may seem obviously within reach. I'll give you an example from my own life. My dream schools were Duke and MIT. I applied to Duke, but didn't even apply to MIT. Want to know why? Because it co…
I know for me personally, when I was in high school nearly 20 years ago they didn't tell us anything about applying to colleges until late mid April before I graduated. This is typically months after most decent schools end their deadlines.
How many people are not going to MIT because they are financially unable? I’m curious.
Now that I'm on the "other side" (got my PhD from an Ivy League uni), I constantly meet people who don't even begin to grasp how far away growing up poor puts you from things and resources they take for granted. Even stuff that may seem obviously within reach. I'll give you an example from my own life. My dream schools were Duke and MIT. I applied to Duke, but didn't even apply to MIT. Want to know why? Because it co…
Your skin color, who your parents are (educated or not), where you live have a big impact on your life. The effect of parents and mentors (if you are lucky enough to find even one) have an out sized impact on your choices, I've observed this through personal experience. In high school, we had kids who i didn't think were that exceptional by any means but they got funneled into ivy leagues/top universities due to the fact that their parents were educated upper middle class types that push their kids, and give them proper guidance as to how the world really works. The talented poor kids were pushed to go to the local state universities by the parents who though top schools were out of reach/too expensive. The folks that went to the top schools went straight to SV/NYC/Boston, while the talented poor kids kinda stayed in our local Midwest cities, talk about a huge opportunity cost of being born poor.
I have a lot of thoughts about this. I'm glad he's seen some success! That's great for him! I just don't know that all or even much of what he's learned is transferable > I was able to get a job in SF with a single cold email and zero connections This seems like sheer dumb luck. For every one of him (or you, if you're reading this) there's a lot of people who thrash and struggle. I went through 80+ job applications b…
> This seems like sheer dumb luck. For every one of him (or you, if you're reading this) there's a lot of people who thrash and struggle. I went through 80+ job applications before I got one offer last search, and that's less than I thought I would need Author here. There was definitely luck involved (the luckiest part imo was that Teespring was an incredible company to work at and I had no idea when I reached out),…
That's totally fair, and congrats on that working! I don't want to take away at all from what you've accomplished!
It's very interesting looking at how you - a successful newcomer - view silicon valley compared to the way I see it - as somebody who grew up there and left.
The other interesting bit is how you got here. It looks like you've been coding and elbows deep in computers forever. I'd hazard a guess that also helped you over folks like me who are quite a bit less certain of where we want to go
I have a lot of thoughts about this. I'm glad he's seen some success! That's great for him! I just don't know that all or even much of what he's learned is transferable > I was able to get a job in SF with a single cold email and zero connections This seems like sheer dumb luck. For every one of him (or you, if you're reading this) there's a lot of people who thrash and struggle. I went through 80+ job applications b…
> Silicon Valley doesn't care about your background
This is both true and false at the same time. We were able to go through YC without much background (Bottomless.com YC W19), however the post-YC fundraise was a bit more of a slog. It turns out analysts for major VCs will look up the founders on LinkedIn before bringing you in for a conversation.
Regardless, it's only been a minor headwind. We still raised post YC based on results.
How many people are not going to MIT because they are financially unable? I’m curious.
Now that I'm on the "other side" (got my PhD from an Ivy League uni), I constantly meet people who don't even begin to grasp how far away growing up poor puts you from things and resources they take for granted. Even stuff that may seem obviously within reach. I'll give you an example from my own life. My dream schools were Duke and MIT. I applied to Duke, but didn't even apply to MIT. Want to know why? Because it co…
This was a really important perspective to hear, thank you for sharing your story. At my school (Caltech) we are reviewing our admission and inclusion policies - application fee waivers are already in place, but are just one aspect of this process, as your story illustrates.
I have a lot of thoughts about this. I'm glad he's seen some success! That's great for him! I just don't know that all or even much of what he's learned is transferable > I was able to get a job in SF with a single cold email and zero connections This seems like sheer dumb luck. For every one of him (or you, if you're reading this) there's a lot of people who thrash and struggle. I went through 80+ job applications b…
> This seems like sheer dumb luck. For every one of him (or you, if you're reading this) there's a lot of people who thrash and struggle. I went through 80+ job applications before I got one offer last search, and that's less than I thought I would need Author here. There was definitely luck involved (the luckiest part imo was that Teespring was an incredible company to work at and I had no idea when I reached out),…
i read some disparaging comments below that just say "privilege." I hope you aren't discouraged, even with privilege, not many could have done what you have done at a young age, kudos to you and keep going.
I agree. You can certainly do it without the "background", but we specifically had to get some well-connected "right-backgrounded" people involved before folks would answer our calls because all our principals had degrees from schools they never heard of (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev) and experience in little niche defense contractors that aren't "cool" by SV standards. (However, we did what we needed to do--ge…
That's a little disappointing. It's still more about who you know?
Marc Andreesen gave a talk where he frames it as one of the first hurdles in building a company. If you have a hard time finding some folks in the VC's network for initial contact, you'll probably have an even harder time reaching customers, advisors, engineers, etc.