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Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

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Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#31

Post by dang »

jameskegel wrote: post #28
dang wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This breaks the HN guideline against bringing up same-old flamewars. Please don't. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Please don't start with this flimsy retort. GP has a legitimate question that happens to contain race as an important factor to his hypothesis

Moderation is guesswork, but I doubt a legitimate question that "happens" to contain race would "happen" to take the form of the most common race-troll trope around. We've all heard these arguments a million times. A few people are obsessed with this stuff, the rest of us are bored past tears, and it's off topic for Hacker News.

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#32

Post by anilgulecha »

Peer5 - This is malware on your browser, and they are abusing the webrtc protocol for their business usecase.

Until they provide a clear opt-in usage behavior, this opinion will not change. Clearly if their proposition is about better streaming service/quality, this is trivially testable by how many users opt-in to their network when viewing videos.

Their endpoints should be added to easylist. This is very big concern for metered users, who'll see their usage spike. Is there a list of peer5 endpoints?

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#33

Post by [deleted] »

jameskegel wrote: post #28
dang wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This breaks the HN guideline against bringing up same-old flamewars. Please don't. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Please don't start with this flimsy retort. GP has a legitimate question that happens to contain race as an important factor to his hypothesis

[deleted]

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#34

Post by rhizome »

telesilla wrote: post #16
usaphp wrote: post #2

> "Tress – A social community for black women’s hairstyles" I wonder what would black women say if there was an app "Social community for white women's hairstyles", would not it be considered racist?

I'm a white female who grew up where there were no (at the time) African or other-similar-haired women. Not Paris, New York or London safe to say. It was only after spending time in the U.S. that I was introduced to things such as weaves, nappy hair, extensions, wigs.. it goes on. A huge industry and it's completely different from how I and my fellow-caucasian friends approach hair, which is essentially shampoo, cond…

Yes, thank you. Black hair, both men's and women's, is a full-on subculture that doesn't exist in caucasian circles. The role of the barber/salon in black culture cannot be overstated.

GP is simply ignorant.

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#35

Post by usaphp »

dang wrote: post #29
kmbriedis wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This actually is a genuine question with good answers! It is not like he brought the topic out of thin air PS. I also didn't know such market exists

I agree with you that some of the answers were surprisingly fine, but credit for that goes to the answerers. Trollish questions typically lead to useless spats.

Trolling? It was a genuine questions and I really liked the answers...

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#36

Post by Radim »

a_d wrote: post #22

"Enterprise sales" is a very interesting problem. There are 4 companies in this batch that are attacking it from different sides: (1) Scribe – Automating sales development representatives (2) Upcall – Outbound calls as a service (3) Clover Intelligence – Voice analytics for sales (4) Riley – Lead qualification as a service B2B businesses rely heavily on sales - a great sales team can make or break the company. But fo…

It's generally much harder to poo on professions, after you've had to walk in their shoes.

Personally, I found that ML consulting gave me a valuable perspective on this process. So many hats to wear: research & development, lead gen & marketing, sales, support, product management, legal & IP, administrative & taxes.

Consulting definitely teaches you humility. You will no longer be "that researcher" who thinks whatever happens after their precious math formula or the 5-line Matlab prototype is "unworthy stuff for code monkeys".

Or that engineer who thinks "the suits" are out to ruin your perfect towers of code and logic, with their silly deadlines and requirements...

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#37

Post by joshfraser »

anilgulecha wrote: post #32

Peer5 - This is malware on your browser, and they are abusing the webrtc protocol for their business usecase. Until they provide a clear opt-in usage behavior, this opinion will not change. Clearly if their proposition is about better streaming service/quality, this is trivially testable by how many users opt-in to their network when viewing videos. Their endpoints should be added to easylist. This is very big concer…

WebRTC allows you to connect directly to the IP addresses of other people viewing the same video as you (no fixed list), but their JavaScript could easily be detected & blocked. The value prop isn't a better streaming experience. It's that their customers don't have to pay hardly anything to serve their content and it's distributed so it's far more resilient to network outages. It shouldn't be tough to tell if someone is on a metered connected by looking at their ASN. I'm hoping they do that.

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#38

Post by dang »

usaphp wrote: post #35
dang wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you that some of the answers were surprisingly fine, but credit for that goes to the answerers. Trollish questions typically lead to useless spats.

Trolling? It was a genuine questions and I really liked the answers...

Ok, I believe you. But that exact form of question is commonly used to start the flamiest flamewars around.

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#39

Post by mistermann »

laser wrote: post #11
usaphp wrote: post #2

> "Tress – A social community for black women’s hairstyles" I wonder what would black women say if there was an app "Social community for white women's hairstyles", would not it be considered racist?

There's an asymmetry you're not recognizing. Focusing on a subgroup is a niche, while focusing on the majority while excluding a subgroup is discriminatory. Which even then, might be okay, were it not for the history of oppressive discrimination.

Very well said.

Re: Startups that debuted at Y Combinator W17 Demo Day 2

#40

Post by tyre »

orb_yt wrote: post #14
tyre wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For most teams, YC's financial investment is the least valuable part of the program. Much more valuable: - 3 months of intense focus on product and growth with feedback - access to and advice from YC partners - community of other founders in the batch who are going through similar issues - access to other YC founders (partnerships, advice, etc.) - social proof to investors, press, customers of having done YC

Sure, but they still need to build a plane, and not just any plane, but an aircraft never before built. What do you think their game plan is moving forward?

The team needed to build such a plane might be far removed from the network or knowledge needed to raise the money necessary to build such a plane.

In that case, YC is tremendously helpful in giving the platform to raise enough money to do all of the hard things involved in building a plane that's never been built.

Time is the most precious resource in startups. One way to get more time is to have a phenomenal team, so you do things faster (either by building the right things faster, having the expertise to not build the wrong things, etc.)

Another way is by having more money, so you have a longer time to figure things out. When I say that the $120k isn't what is valuable about YC, I don't mean money in general. The fiscal benefit just tends to come indirectly, from access to platforms (Demo Day, press), investors, and pitch advice.

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