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Caveat - The best type of mentors for founders are other founders. VCs, Incubators, are not optimal mentors, rather those are key folks to have in your pocket. My suggestion for all founders - find a mentor who is a founder & builder.
Couldn't you substitute YC for mentorship, coaching, advisement, etc? Or even peers trying to accomplish shared goals/vision?
Surprisingly this article has little to even say about users, but more about YC users (i.e. founders in the program).
I was hoping to read something applicable to how little companies actually talk to users and how practicing zero-distance between them will make you successful regardless of how much money you raise. Instead, this read like an ad for YC.
When something unusual happens (every partner needs to keep track of more startups) and the result is unexpectedly more success instead of less, doesn't that suggest that the partners were counterintuitively wrong about feeling wrong?
An experiment might be in order.
I adore pg’s essay. But this time something is tripping my spider sense, so I had to take a closer look (at my spider sense, and a bit on the essay too). This is the first time an essay feels like a sale pitch. Specifically, a sale pitch for YC. I’ve read pg’s essay about YC for about 15 years, and this is the first one I have that feeling. This one is a bit too abstract. I’m getting the idea that YC can help founder…
There’s really nothing concrete about what he’s learned from users, other than “they have similar problems” (with zero information about what those problems are) and “they’re wrong about what’s important for their businesses” (again with zero details). If anything, this reads like an essay of someone who aggressively DOESN’T listen to his users.
I occasionally bang on about "Million Startups". Some back of the envelope maths and I reckon one could finance a literal million startups with what SoftBank might call a bad year (around 30 billion). When YC started they funded people with 5k per founder.
I am not saying fund the next fusion machine, but put momentum into cities and groups across the globe.
And if what pg says is true (there are few new problems) then guiding those startups must be more feasible then "million" sounds. Yes 60 to 80 is a big leap but 80 to a million is only slightly bigger :-)
Anyway - saying more startups on HN is very much preaching to the choir so Inwill stop now.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
i've got an ultrawide screen god i wish he'd centre texts
My browser never exceeds 40-50% of my total screen width in my tiling window manager. Keeps my eyes from shooting all over the place. For websites that are properly optimized, you don't really lose out on anything. And for the websites that aren't, a quick keybind to go fullscreen for a bit is nice.
This was a surprisingly bad essay (and I generally enjoy PG’s essays). It claims to be about “what PG has learned from YC users (startup founders)”, but basically just says “founders are wrong, YC is amazing,” then descends into a YC elevator pitch. There’s really nothing concrete about what he’s learned from users, other than “they have similar problems” (with zero information about what those problems are) and “the…
I adore pg’s essay. But this time something is tripping my spider sense, so I had to take a closer look (at my spider sense, and a bit on the essay too). This is the first time an essay feels like a sale pitch. Specifically, a sale pitch for YC. I’ve read pg’s essay about YC for about 15 years, and this is the first one I have that feeling. This one is a bit too abstract. I’m getting the idea that YC can help founder…
I adore pg’s essay. But this time something is tripping my spider sense, so I had to take a closer look (at my spider sense, and a bit on the essay too). This is the first time an essay feels like a sale pitch. Specifically, a sale pitch for YC. I’ve read pg’s essay about YC for about 15 years, and this is the first one I have that feeling. This one is a bit too abstract. I’m getting the idea that YC can help founder…
Were you looking for testimonials embedded in the essay to meet your expectations?
Of course, this wouldn't be acceptable as it would turn the piece unmistakably into a sales pitch for his product cementing your suspicions about the nature or motives behind authoring this post, a viewpoint which by the way I don't necessarily share.
This type of reporting that you're specifically looking for is best served with other formats like featured stories or in-depth analyses done by news organization; where they get to interview YC partners, alumni and startup founders, and solicit their opinions and thoughts about their experience with the organization, but even this reporting needs to be balanced and informative otherwise it will be mistaken for an advertorial or, as you guessed, a sales pitch.