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Some thoughts on my first YC Demo Day

billchambers.me

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Re: Some thoughts on my first YC Demo Day

#31

Post by Brajeshwar »

mkagenius wrote: post #28
Brajeshwar wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know how or why, but I have seen this happen many times. Many of my submissions appear at the front within minutes of receiving 2-3 votes. I have no affiliation with YC, nor are my submissions.

Bruh, the amount of posts you are doing!

I submit about 10-15 and sometimes up to 20 a day.

I have developed a typical routine to submit articles. I tend to gather interesting links during the day, and when America’s West Coast wakes up, I submit them in batches of bursts over an hour or so before I retire for the day.

https://brajeshwar.com/2023/hacker-news/

Re: Some thoughts on my first YC Demo Day

#32

Post by mkagenius »

Brajeshwar wrote: post #31
mkagenius wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bruh, the amount of posts you are doing!

I submit about 10-15 and sometimes up to 20 a day. I have developed a typical routine to submit articles. I tend to gather interesting links during the day, and when America’s West Coast wakes up, I submit them in batches of bursts over an hour or so before I retire for the day. https://brajeshwar.com/2023/hacker-news/

Wow!

Re: Some thoughts on my first YC Demo Day

#33

Post by ecb_penguin »

pfhayes wrote: post #25
ecb_penguin wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> YC is very similar to a university No it's not. It's not even remotely comparable. > There is a small group of companies that create the reputation on which everybody lives Also called luck. YC investors cannot articulate what made them successful, or else they'd have better results. Universities have decades of sustained output. They are not comparable. > you joining some arbitrary YC startup was a bad experience…

Garry Tan posted some data recently on performance investing in demo day: https://x.com/garrytan/status/1927946812364574912 These returns outperform the S&P. Maybe these aren’t typical, but it’s pretty far from “you could flip a coin and beat YC”

You need to read the fine print on the slide you linked. They carefully chose a cohort to show these numbers. It only apply to investors that backed 3 or more companies during a demo day. And, as you can see, the more YC drinks it's kool-aide, the worse it performs. Even years when the market was gangbusters, YC still saw decreased returns year over year.

It's an odd metric to choose, which makes me believe it's one of the few positive ones.

Also, as I've said, Ponzi schemes work great for the early people. You give $50k to an unprofitable company and convince someone else to give them $1m. You get your investment back plus a little bit, and you leave someone else holding the bag of an unprofitable company.

> These returns outperform the S&P.

These very specifically chosen returns outperform the S&P :). That's why it's mostly kids that go through YC.

Re: Some thoughts on my first YC Demo Day

#34

Post by TZubiri »

ecb_penguin wrote: post #13

I didn't realize how poorly YC startups were managed until I joined one. It's mostly a ponzi scheme, where unprofitable companies pass their books off to non-technical investors that love hype. > 1 slide. 1 minute pitches. 1 speaker. This is why YC has such poor results. They're more interested in "1 slide" vs actual financials. > Vertical AI was all over the place. Cursor for X was also prevalent. No thought leaders…

>This is why YC has such poor results. They're more interested in "1 slide" vs actual financials.

Maybe I'm wrong but YC mostly starts investing in pre-seed stage, where companies don't have financials.

Re: Some thoughts on my first YC Demo Day

#35

Post by ecb_penguin »

TZubiri wrote: post #34
ecb_penguin wrote: post #13

I didn't realize how poorly YC startups were managed until I joined one. It's mostly a ponzi scheme, where unprofitable companies pass their books off to non-technical investors that love hype. > 1 slide. 1 minute pitches. 1 speaker. This is why YC has such poor results. They're more interested in "1 slide" vs actual financials. > Vertical AI was all over the place. Cursor for X was also prevalent. No thought leaders…

>This is why YC has such poor results. They're more interested in "1 slide" vs actual financials. Maybe I'm wrong but YC mostly starts investing in pre-seed stage, where companies don't have financials.

> where companies don't have financials

Seems like a pretty good reason to have more information than 1 slide...

Re: Some thoughts on my first YC Demo Day

#36

Post by TZubiri »

ecb_penguin wrote: post #35
TZubiri wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is why YC has such poor results. They're more interested in "1 slide" vs actual financials. Maybe I'm wrong but YC mostly starts investing in pre-seed stage, where companies don't have financials.

> where companies don't have financials Seems like a pretty good reason to have more information than 1 slide...

Oh for sure, I think typical pitch decks have like 10 slides when they are submitted as part of the yc application, plus a video.

This is just some yc demo exercise

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