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Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

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Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#251

Post by light_hue_1 »

bko wrote: post #162
jedberg wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason they want you to apply is twofold -- the application itself is a good exercise in getting you to think about things you should be thinking about. Honestly even if you have no intention at all of applying to YC you should still fill out the application for yourself, it makes you think about important things. And the second reason is that they get to see as many options as possible, because that's obviously…

I'm convinced those that say "I think its a good exercise filling out an application" have never actually read the application Here are a few questions: "How far along are you?" "What tech stack are you using, or planning to use, to build this product?" "Why did you pick this idea to work on? Do you have domain expertise in this area? How do you know people need what you're making?" "Who are your competitors? What do…

Ah youth. That's how I used to think too.

Then I started to interact with founders and listen to pitches. Oh boy. I used to think that then VCs are just exaggerating when they say they're like 15 minutes into a conversation and have no idea what the founders are saying. Wow. That's so not true.

The whole ecosystem would be better if every founder at last filled out that sheet.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#252

Post by qq66 »

KerryJones wrote: post #190
qq66 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He won't be starting such a fund for awhile, because the two of us are building company to make technology to foster a creative and curious childhood. We would be a good fit for any investors trying to do (3) though :) https://cartwheelcomputer.com/ amal@cartwheelcomputer.com

This feels like a side tangent, but why have you focused on technology for creative and curious childhood? I'm curious if you have considered the following: I.e. Maria Montessori (founder of the Montessori methodology of teaching) did a pretty good job showing that's the natural state of kids, and there's quite a bit in her teachings about the importance of physical things, being outdoors, etc. There's some pretty st…

I definitely don't think babies should have iPads or preteens Instagram, but I believe that technology can be great for childhood because I had a computer from age 4, in 1987, and it was great for me. I learned how to program, I wrote an entire ~50 page book (which I wouldn't have done with pencil and paper), and by middle school I was sitting down with adults and showing them how to use the computer, which was really empowering for me.

Balls and blocks and Magna-tiles and Legos are forms of "technology" that we universally recognize as good for kids, and a semiconductor junction doesn't magically make something bad for kids. What makes today's technology bad for kids is that it's designed to be hyper-addictive and hyper-extractive.

In short, I am a huge fan of Maria Montessori, and the company we're building, to a first approximation, might be what Maria Montessori would have built herself if she was a TypeScript developer in 2024.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#253

Post by jorvi »

skeeter2020 wrote: post #220
jhanschoo wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's just hard to convey the sense from the early days of YC that they really didn't care about the return, or the progress so far, or VCs, or fads, or anything. That said, I really was at the right place at the right time and got very lucky. It seems to me that there was an early '10s milieu that enabled YC to behave like it did. Web apps and mobile fundamentally transformed everyday life and communication in very…

There were a lot of preferable options for connected, generally non-technical people after the dot-com implosion, for the first ~15 years of the 2000's. I joined a comp sci grad and his engineer brother in a software startup because we couldn't get jobs with an established company, big corp, investment bank or other much more likley "sure thing". The equation has completely changed, and the startup landscape with it.

Startups went from “let’s become the next Google” to “let’s get acquired by Google”. FAANG+ have become way too big and have effectively become a multi-opoly (oxymoron and a half) that has ossified the entire market.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#254

Post by gfourfour »

thornewolf wrote: post #212
a1371 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the uninitiated like myself, PearAi just took the source code of continue.dev (not fork, they copy pasted) and did some clunky work on it. That was their entry to YC.

for additional uninitiatedness: one of the founders is "Frying Pan", a popular youtuber. There has been previous discussion on the fact that the cost to build software is approaching 0. If that is given, maybe "taste" is all that matters. Funding a ~productless popular youtuber is a great way to test if "taste" and "brand" is better to invest in than tech in the years to come.

“Taste” is something that’s developed through repetitive exposure to differentiated items in a particular set, combined with extremely high abstract analytical abilities, and that’s something completely different from having marketing or personal branding skills.

I think you’re right that that’s the evaluation happening, but it’s totally misguided. If you’re indexing for differentiating levels of taste I would be very wary of empty vessel young influencers. Taste is built over years and years and imo requires a certain disdain for the crowd. Look at Linus Torvalds as a pinnacle of taste in code for example.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#255

Post by Sammi »

jhanschoo wrote: post #143
dgreensp wrote: post #106

Full disclosure, I'm a YC alum whose last start-up was acquired by Google, who applied to this batch and didn't get an interview. YC is not the stamp of quality it once was, to be sure, though it still works as social proof, because investors (especially VCs) want to invest in companies other investors like (or failing that, companies they imagine other investors would like). YC would say that they aren't trying to b…

> It's just hard to convey the sense from the early days of YC that they really didn't care about the return, or the progress so far, or VCs, or fads, or anything. That said, I really was at the right place at the right time and got very lucky. It seems to me that there was an early '10s milieu that enabled YC to behave like it did. Web apps and mobile fundamentally transformed everyday life and communication in very…

10-20 years ago the internet was still an unpopulated continent that everyone was rushing to settle. It just isn't the same wide open green pastures it used to be. This is my guess of what is the largest reason for the declining success of YC companies.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#256

Post by satvikpendem »

cal85 wrote: post #119
paulgb wrote: post #8

IMHO this post misses the fact that YC becoming a prestige institution is itself a sort of failure mode. You don't want to attract founders who figure YC is a low-risk alternative to grad school that will look good on their resume. It's tough to avoid that outcome while still conferring positive signal to VCs/potential employees, though. I'm sure YC/Garry see something in the PearAI founders' ability to market themse…

Just looked up the etymology of prestige and it’s interesting. It comes from Latin praestigium ("delusion, illusion"), then 1500s French prestige meaning “deceit, imposture, illusion”. In the 1800s it started to mean “an illusion as to one's personal merit or importance, a flattering illusion”. I would have wrongly guessed it originally meant “good reputation” (same as the article author meant it, I assume) and that…

Hence the name of Nolan's movie.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#257

Post by mike_hearn »

mlhpdx wrote: post #232
mike_hearn wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not inexplicable. There's not much interest in it because a lot of things founders believe about climate are false and believing false things is a quick way to lose money. Tuvalu is a good example of this phenomenon. If you'd invested in a startup planning to make money by protecting Tuvalu from global warming, you would have lost all your money because Tuvalu is growing, not shrinking. https://www.nature.com/…

The study you reference is from 5 years ago, perhaps the impacts cited here[1] are less “incorrect”. My anecdotal evidence of VC’s level of knowledge is very consistent with people at large. That is, flawed. [1] https://zenodo.org/records/8069320

Kench et al is a historical study of satellite imagery. Unless they made a counting error there's no way for a new study to invalidate it.

But let's take a look. That document starts by admitting that it's motivated reasoning:

"this report is written in support of the objectives of the Rising Nations Initiative (RNI), enabled by the UN Global Center for Climate Mobility"

and it goes downhill from there. They're providing ammo for their clients, not attempting to neutrally answer questions. As a consequence they never mention the fact that Tuvalu is growing. They very carefully avoid the topic of whether the country is getting bigger or smaller despite that this is the entire problem the report is predicated upon, indeed they don't even seem to cite Kench et al, let alone try a refutation. Instead they rely heavily on presenting a few isolated data points followed by model predictions (of the type that were already proven wrong) and give you a good hard inferential shove in the direction they want you to go in.

This isn't scientific but it is what the UN Center for Climate Mobility needs in order to advance their own mission of maximizing immigration. It's clever in a way: when someone calls them on it, they just say "oh! well we never said Tuvalu was sinking, that's all in your head, don't blame us we're just scientists it must be journalist's fault".

Which is the problem I'm highlighting. There's lots of misleading material out there. You could read this report and very easily conclude Tuvalu sinking beneath the waves is a great problem to devote your life to. Investing in solutions to non-existing problems can sometimes work temporarily, but it won't give you a new Google or Apple.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#259

Post by rurban »

mlhpdx wrote: post #232
mike_hearn wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not inexplicable. There's not much interest in it because a lot of things founders believe about climate are false and believing false things is a quick way to lose money. Tuvalu is a good example of this phenomenon. If you'd invested in a startup planning to make money by protecting Tuvalu from global warming, you would have lost all your money because Tuvalu is growing, not shrinking. https://www.nature.com/…

The study you reference is from 5 years ago, perhaps the impacts cited here[1] are less “incorrect”. My anecdotal evidence of VC’s level of knowledge is very consistent with people at large. That is, flawed. [1] https://zenodo.org/records/8069320

Apples and oranges. The 2018 study shows increasing landmass at the coast lines in middle to large non-sand islands during the raising water levels.

The newer 2023 study merely shows the rising sea levels, as also shown in the first study. It concentrates on the risks of more salt water intrusion, so they'd need to invest in closed sewing systems or salt water filtering systems.

Re: Y Combinator Traded Prestige for Growth

#260

Post by AbstractH24 »

jorvi wrote: post #253
skeeter2020 wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were a lot of preferable options for connected, generally non-technical people after the dot-com implosion, for the first ~15 years of the 2000's. I joined a comp sci grad and his engineer brother in a software startup because we couldn't get jobs with an established company, big corp, investment bank or other much more likley "sure thing". The equation has completely changed, and the startup landscape with it.

Startups went from “let’s become the next Google” to “let’s get acquired by Google”. FAANG+ have become way too big and have effectively become a multi-opoly (oxymoron and a half) that has ossified the entire market.

But two decades earlier couldn’t you say the same thing about Microsoft?

It’s part of the cycle.

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