The biggest thing that stuck out to me was how long some of your answers were. Everyone seems to always point to Drew's application with all of the short concise answers but it looks like thats not the only way to put together a winning app!
The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
31–40 of 47 posts
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
You mean wealthy people. There are lots of smart people out there who can't afford to go to Ivy League schools.
Your thinking on this is factually incorrect. If you're middle class or worse, and have the smarts, you can basically go to any of the top Ivies for free these days.
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Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
You mean wealthy people. There are lots of smart people out there who can't afford to go to Ivy League schools.
Your thinking on this is factually incorrect. If you're middle class or worse, and have the smarts, you can basically go to any of the top Ivies for free these days.
That doesnt change the overwhelming competitive advantage rich families have when it comes to prestige schools.
Many wealthy families sink tens of thousands of dollars into preparing their child for university admissions - an advantage only the most brilliant middle class students can overcome.
Even then you have to ask yourself what it means to attend a prestige school. Are the students honestly getting a better education? It's not like they use a special set of books reserved for prestige schools only, and I have a hard time believing slave-labor TAs teaching skills would be any different at such schools.
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the issue here is more that our society in general selects these people for "success" more than those "without pedigree" by virtue of various complicated socioeconomic conditions. I don't think it's an active (or even "unconscious", if you'll permit the flawed adjective in describing a group of people) bias that YC has against any one group or another. The simple fact is that it's easier for persons with thes…
"It's a flaw in society at large, not necessarily with YC itself." YC is getting a big pass here. Just like the grade inflation in those good ole ivy leagues.
> YC is getting a big pass here.
The mistake is to regard YC/SV as disruptive. It isn't; it's about generating excess returns for a bunch of previously successful people. They have zero interest in fixing a broken status quo as long as they can continue to benefit.
> Just like the grade inflation in those good ole ivy leagues.
I only heard about this recently. The practice is abhorrent and further reinforces the entitlement complexes of some people.
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the issue here is more that our society in general selects these people for "success" more than those "without pedigree" by virtue of various complicated socioeconomic conditions. I don't think it's an active (or even "unconscious", if you'll permit the flawed adjective in describing a group of people) bias that YC has against any one group or another. The simple fact is that it's easier for persons with thes…
"It's a flaw in society at large, not necessarily with YC itself." YC is getting a big pass here. Just like the grade inflation in those good ole ivy leagues.
I think if YC's mission were to reach out to people who aren't traditionally thought of as "entrepreneurial", but had a bias toward the "pedigreed" people then I could agree. I'm not sure that's the case (in either respect--I haven't actually seen data regarding the provenance of the people who comprise the companies YC has accepted).
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
You mean wealthy people. There are lots of smart people out there who can't afford to go to Ivy League schools.
Your thinking on this is factually incorrect. If you're middle class or worse, and have the smarts, you can basically go to any of the top Ivies for free these days.
Except that plenty of kids don't know this.
I had a pretty good shot of getting into an Ivy League school 10 years ago(4.0 and highest SAT score in the county), but I didn't apply because I thought my parents couldn't afford it.
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#37Don't want to sound like a downer, but I'd also love to see applications where the founders weren't your typical white MIT, Harvard, Yale graduates/PhDs who worked at McKinsey GoogleBookSoft.
yeah, i'm very surprised and disappointed how much YC has allowed itself to be gamed just like any other industry they seek to disrupt.
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/05/05/magazine/y-combinator-s...
"I can be tricked by anyone who looks like Mark Zuckerberg."-Paul Graham
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#38Since today's topic on HN is usability testing. I'm a bit confused by the connection between the goal stated on the YC application and thedailymuse.com. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't see anywhere that says this is a resource for women or "non-traditional candidates". How are you targeting this demographic without being discriminatory in your job applications?
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#39Since today's topic on HN is usability testing. I'm a bit confused by the connection between the goal stated on the YC application and thedailymuse.com. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't see anywhere that says this is a resource for women or "non-traditional candidates". How are you targeting this demographic without being discriminatory in your job applications?
When we applied to YC in 2011, we originally focused on professional women as that is where we saw the biggest need for our content, although 90% of our content was not gender-specific. Very quickly we watched our demographic grow to be 30+% men, and we made the decision to broaden our focus, while continuing to focus on our core: careers. One reason we made that decision is because one of the things we originally wanted to combat was women not feeling welcome in the workplace, so the idea of men not feeling welcome on The Muse (since they were actively using it "in secret" as they said) didn't feel in line with our principles.
More info on that change here: http://www.themuse.com/advice/join-our-new-journey-updates-f...
Re: The Muse's Successful Application to YC W12
#40Don't want to sound like a downer, but I'd also love to see applications where the founders weren't your typical white MIT, Harvard, Yale graduates/PhDs who worked at McKinsey GoogleBookSoft.
White, male, southeastern state school, to quote a VC "literally no fucking pedigree", no engineering backgrounds... we just participated in demo day. YC has been incredible for us and the partners have been amazing to work with.
Hustlers. Recruited PhDs & MSs with great experience/ backgrounds and empowered our team (hire smarter than yourself). Build a product that makes sense and people are demanding you take their money for... we are not perfectly outside the norm, but I would assume we're pretty unusual (at least in education/ experience/ skillset). You can email me any questions re YC.