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Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

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Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#431

Post by dang »

mdekkers wrote: post #423
paxys wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For better or worse, the relocation requirement is probably a good proxy for "can commit to their startup 24x7 without any other responsibilities standing in the way".

That’s nonsense. Startups are only for the young and unencumbered? I’ve had several successful startups and managed to combine that with a family life as well as time off for R&R and mentally recharging. If this is your belief, I strongly advise you to reconsider your life choices and priorities

Please make your substantive points without name-calling (in the sense that the site guidelines use the term - https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html) and without crossing into personal attack. Your comment would be just fine without the first and last sentences.

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#432

Post by houseprovost »

sebastiennight wrote: post #361

Applied for the 3rd time (B2B AI SaaS, 300% YoY growth, $109k revenue last month). Decided to take a risk with the founder video. On my first 2 applications I did what everyone does and shot 100 takes to get one "right"... On this one though, I shot the whole video in one take (with warts and all) and used our own software to edit it, and then used that as the demo as well[0]. In a way, it feels like I can't win on t…

Great idea; good luck.

I don't know if it's just me but your site takes some time to load(on my laptop)

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#433

Post by Rapzid »

swores wrote: post #419
dgfitz wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. They were naming famous people who dropped out of college.

I didn't say it was a good argument, just want their intention was. But they did at least give examples that showed the claim was potentially valid, whereas your example wasn't relevant at all (nor did it make the point you've switched to about them not making an argument).

Yes, within the context of the "conversation" I was pointing out examples of why a required "enter your Ivy League history here" box might push away famously successful subset of startup founders.

You could argue YC wants people that wouldn't be discouraged by that. I'd argue that due to survivorship bias that would be hard to quantify, and that YC is competing with others for the best ideas so they might just end up somewhere else.

To expand a bit; I wasn't actually discouraged.. I was more put-off and slightly offended. It did make me stop filling out the co-founder match in the moment, but I was always planning to swing back around on it.

There is a trend I notice where people just drop low effort argumentative responses. They aren't even fully realized counter arguments. I try not to engage when they are targeting me; it's better for a third party to shut them down. It's super bad on Reddit and unfortunately ruins r/dotnet .

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#434

Post by zh3 »

dang wrote: post #430
dexderp wrote: post #429

I like the quote in your about @ Dang. Very helpful: "Conflict is essential to human life, whether between different aspects of oneself, between oneself and the environment, between different individuals or between different groups. It follows that the aim of healthy living is not the direct elimination of conflict, which is possible only by forcible suppression of one or other of its antagonistic components, but the…

I'm glad! I finally got a copy of the paper and unfortunately that quote was the only interesting thing in it, as far as I could tell. But Milner is fascinating and did many other things - for example she wrote a brilliant book called "A life of one's own" about experiments she did with self-observation. She was already using the word 'mindfulness' in 1934.

The parent comment about conflict made me think that surely Montaigne must have an essay "On Conflict". Not so, but a quick search turned up [0].

More generally Montaigne's writings (which you may well know) are sometimes cited as "mindfulness" long before the term was invented [1].

[0] https://psyche.co/ideas/for-montaigne-verbal-jousting-is-the...

[1] https://thehouseilivein.me/2023/10/21/my-year-with-montaigne...

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#435

Post by brainless »

dang wrote: post #378
brainless wrote: post #323

Thanks for sharing this. I have one question: given similar quality of applications, is it just a dice roll? I am asking this as a trying founder who: - has built early stage engineering at multiple startups - has applied many times and been rejected - is reading about many others who have been rejected and ended up building without funding It does not change my chances but it would expand my perspective.

I don't think it's just a dice roll, no, but it's a helpful metaphor for communicating the 'what have you got to lose' sentiment. But I don't think I understand your question fully - do you want to explain?

Hey, thanks for getting back to me.

What I mean to ask is: given high number of applications, how does YC generally pick within a bucket of similar applications?

Similarity based on domain, product status, etc. If there are 40 which are quite similar, what then?

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#436

Post by deobald »

snowmaker wrote: post #269
ssroovy wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Video is fine(it's just a minute), but why LinkedIn URL is required(not optional)? LinkedIn is about education, career, and networking. I am under average in all of them, so I'm not registered. This is the only thing which holding me back from applying. Otherwise, I work full-time on kick-ass product for months with 1000+ commits.

Sorry about that! Based on this thread, we removed the requirement for a LinkedIn profile.

Thanks for this! I'd like to drop a note of explanation here, for future readers:

Yes, anyone can "just create a LinkedIn account." However, quite a few people across the globe are trying to decrease their online surface area. While many of us (myself included) just have a password manager filled with thousands of entries and 32-character passwords, some folks are not comfortable living that way. I also find myself unsubscribing from or filtering emails from these services at least once a day, so I can appreciate why many folks are increasingly trying to simplify their lives by eliminating SaaS logins.

Even without creating a LinkedIn account, one could fill in a dummy URL to satisfy the JavaScript validation and submit the application. However, we chose not to do this because of how the YC application itself is structured. The submission requirements are intentionally strict (60 second founder video, Having the option to opt out of the LinkedIn field is greatly appreciated.

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#438

Post by dang »

brainless wrote: post #435
dang wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's just a dice roll, no, but it's a helpful metaphor for communicating the 'what have you got to lose' sentiment. But I don't think I understand your question fully - do you want to explain?

Hey, thanks for getting back to me. What I mean to ask is: given high number of applications, how does YC generally pick within a bucket of similar applications? Similarity based on domain, product status, etc. If there are 40 which are quite similar, what then?

I'm not involved in the process so not the best person to answer but I think it boils down to: team, team, team. Not that YC assesses every team perfectly, of course, but it's the principle.

Domain, product, and so on, are relevant, but mostly for what they reveal about a team. If there's already a product with users and/or revenue, it proves that these founders a.k.a. the team is able to build a product that gets users and/or revenue, which is the kind of team YC wants to fund. For example.

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#439

Post by brainless »

dang wrote: post #438
brainless wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey, thanks for getting back to me. What I mean to ask is: given high number of applications, how does YC generally pick within a bucket of similar applications? Similarity based on domain, product status, etc. If there are 40 which are quite similar, what then?

I'm not involved in the process so not the best person to answer but I think it boils down to: team, team, team. Not that YC assesses every team perfectly, of course, but it's the principle. Domain, product, and so on, are relevant, but mostly for what they reveal about a team. If there's already a product with users and/or revenue, it proves that these founders a.k.a. the team is able to build a product that gets us…

Thanks for sharing this.

Re: Tell HN: Ever think of applying to YC? Do it this weekend for S24

#440

Post by rachofsunshine »

april192024 wrote: post #236
rachofsunshine wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of legitimate criticisms to be made of YC and of VCs in general (please do not take this as me going "there is nothing wrong in the VC world at all", because I absolutely do not believe that!), but I don't think excessive academic elitism is one of them. If anything, I think they're quite a bit better about avoiding that elitism than the average you'll find among organizations of comparable wealth and…

>>> "YC is pretty explicit that they try to pick founders, not ideas, most of the time. That approach is all over the Startup School videos, for example; they don't exactly make a secret of it." If Y Combinator truly prioritizes founders over ideas, as indicated in their Startup School videos, repeated rejections might suggest a fundamental mismatch. If you haven't been accepted after one or two tries, it may be a si…

> People do not change that much usually.

I don't know what YC thinks about this, but I disagree with this pretty strongly. None of the skills or advantages I think I have as a founder were things I had five years ago. I would never in a million years have been able to do even the things I've done in the last 24 hours if I had tried to when I first arrived in the Bay Area for my first "real" job.

People's fundamental values and motivations usually don't change that much, but their philosophy, resilience, and pool of cached ideas absolutely can. That's especially true for people who, like me, came in from outside. It takes time to get your bearings and learn how business is done, what things matter and what things don't, what a normal level of "on fire" is, and even a person with a low of raw intellectual ability/domain talent still needs time to train their internal models.

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