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Changes at YC

ycombinator.com

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Re: Changes at YC

#421

Post by harry8 »

cm2012 wrote: post #29
djyaz1200 wrote: post #17

I'd be very interested in the specifics of how and why late stage investing is so different that the success of YC in early stages doesn't translate.

Id guess that YC has a much greater competitive moat in the former. It's much "easier" to do late stage investing - a few big transactions instead of many many small ones, and everyone's working with the same information. Very few places have the infrastructure to deal with large volumes of start-ups + a lead flow of small companies trying to join YC, so there's no acquisition costs. Add to that, YC's experience with…

A bunch of possibly clever, technically adept people hang out here even if they work for a bank or something equally dull. Some small percentage of them have a latest idea and also decide to explore pursuing it. Where to go?

Everyone here knows YC is one place. What else have you got? Anyone got a list? How do you find out about the people involved, like on a scale of x to y how shonky are they? etc.

I would guess taking over the slashdot space with some incremental improvement to that formula has created one hell of a pipeline that competitors struggle to match. Hence paying @dang full time here and whatever other costs there are associated.

Re: Changes at YC

#422

Post by nullnix »

weswilson wrote: post #404
bink wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fired -> Let go -> Laid off -> Impacted I'll be curious to see what comes next.

One term I've heard from HR was "Released to the industry." I always wondered if that was focus grouped or something. It was definitely the running joke for a while.

Fifteen years ago I remember my last employer saying in a division meeting that they had "reallocated a number of roles to the mobility pool". A round of confused "what's that then" from more or less all present forced them to be less euphemistic.

Re: Changes at YC

#424

Post by InCityDreams »

spir wrote: post #373
hsn915 wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do they need "taking care" of? Are they fragile school kids? Desparate single mothers who can't make ends meet? What is with this "save our babies!" attitude towards people who are - Well off - Highly skilled ??

Finally some sense-talking. The growing culture of paternalism in the employer-employee relationship is toxic to the foundations of our societal wealth. Personal responsibility and equal opportunity are how we got to iPhones, toothpaste in every corner store, and a store on every corner.

What? As in, could you explain....

Re: Changes at YC

#425

Post by spaceman_2020 »

spir wrote: post #374
7e wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not even a great boast. Their success is due to the Federal Reserve. Oh, sweet summer child.

Are you suggesting that YC's success is because of the long-term US monetary policy climate? That's a very incorrect suggestion. It reminds one of how people like to pretend that Elon's money is because his family had an emerald mine. Do you think that a significant percentage of wealth inheritors go on to immigrate across the world and invent electric cars and reusable rockets? Same thing with YC and the investment…

This is not specific to YC, but there is no way a company like Uber would be around in a high interest rate environment. You don’t get to burn 32B, keep reducing scale, and still be unprofitable unless the market is flooded with money and it has nowhere to go.

The pandemic period was the best example - monetarily, that was the last 12 years compressed into a 2 year window. The amount of money in the system was so immense that anything and everything was being funded at absurd valuations.

Re: Changes at YC

#426

Post by joosters »

fblp wrote: post #368

Wow. First time I've seen a layoff post that starts with boasting success. Summary: "6% of the companies we invest in are worth a billion dollars. We're laying of 20% of our staff. We appreciate their efforts. No comment on how we're taking care of those laid off or remaining staff"

They can't even bring themselves to say the words 'laying off', 'redundancies' or even the milder 'letting go'. The staff are merely 'impacted' by this change in focus!

Execs just feel like they need to retreat to the safety of euphemisms in these kind of announcements, after first boasting about how well the company is doing, of course.

Re: Changes at YC

#427

Post by darthrupert »

spir wrote: post #374
7e wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not even a great boast. Their success is due to the Federal Reserve. Oh, sweet summer child.

Are you suggesting that YC's success is because of the long-term US monetary policy climate? That's a very incorrect suggestion. It reminds one of how people like to pretend that Elon's money is because his family had an emerald mine. Do you think that a significant percentage of wealth inheritors go on to immigrate across the world and invent electric cars and reusable rockets? Same thing with YC and the investment…

I don't know why you are falsely implying that Musk's money is not due to great initial capital. If that was true, it would mean that capital for investment doesn't matter, which in turn would mean that we could just as well place a 100% tax on all wealth above a certain level without any detriment.

It doesn't though, since your claim is bullshit. Elon's wealth is absolutely based on his parents' success.

Re: Changes at YC

#428

Post by HervalFreire »

lmm wrote: post #418
HervalFreire wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Connections in the government? Care to elaborate? How would a government connection increase your success in terms of investing in the right start up?

Palantir is one of their big successes because the government has chosen to pay them for big contracts; a government who thought differently might have not only declined to do that but shut down their whole operation as fundamentally harmful to regular citizens. Likewise Uber and AirBnB built their whole business pretty knowingly on open violations of the law; a government faithfully representing its citizens' intere…

Well this is different. Palantir is a defense contractor, their biggest customer IS the government. So of course connections matter for Palantir. My question pertains more to start ups in general.

Re: Changes at YC

#429

Post by petesergeant »

EngManagerIsMe wrote: post #306

> Unfortunately, this means we will no longer need some of the roles on the late stage investing team. Seventeen of our teammates are impacted today. I hate this passive voice. It implies there was nothing that could be done, that this was just a force of nature. That it wasn't an active choice by YC, but rather just some eventuality. Most of us understand the necessity of hard decisions. Own the outcomes. It's ok to…

I don’t want to pick on your post specifically, but I find this legislating and nitpicking over the exact wording of layoff announcements — that follows every single one of them — to be pretty pointless

Re: Changes at YC

#430

Post by how2start »

ajross wrote: post #377
fairity wrote: post #270

I can think of a few reasons why YC would make this decision without admitting so publicly: 1) Too much negative signaling risk when they don't make follow-on investments 2) Negative returns given the recent downturn 3) The increasing business need to make non-founder-friendly changes in late stage companies (e.g. replacing CEO) 4) Anu/Ali deciding to leave first to start their own fund I wonder if any of these reaso…

Oh, come on. This is three days after their favorite bank got shut down. We all know what the proximate cause is. I think it's clear that the venture world (at least the top of it) had turned itself into an industry on its own. They didn't make money on startup exits anymore, they made it on services. They'd fund startups, get those startups into later rounds by milking less sophisicated VCs[1], push them at their fa…

strange this is downvoted. Serious denial among the wannabes here. Everyone in the know, knows this is true.
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