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YC S20 Remote Batch

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#61

Post by mangoman »

I've worked remotely for the past 3.5 years. As one of two employees at a small statup, at a startup that started remote friendly and then revoked it, and now at a startup that is moving towards being remote equal (25% and rising).

Not that long compared to others here, but long enough to have seen things that work and seen things that don't work, and with sufficiently varied approaches. I think there's reasons why this will work, but I also wonder if they would have screened the startups slightly differently if they knew they were going to do the whole batch remotely. Working in an all remote environment require different communication skills than working in an office.

I also wonder how easy it'll be for founders to put in 16+ hour days while working from home. It's easy to 'stay late at the office', but I think it is harder to contain myself in my office while doing that. Maybe that's just a me thing, but I think it can be a real issue... I wonder if founders will simply hole up in the same living space somehow during quarantine; I could see that working, that's basically I've seen friends who've been in YC do anyway. It just might be harder to do in this environment.

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#62

Post by rw2 »

Looking forward to this if we are accepted, I think on the company's end, a lot of us worry about transmission of covid 19 and this just provides a safer environment.

This crisis is a test of a company's flexibility, since the lockdown started we had to do a hard pivot from onsite to remote services and we're just getting traction.

Remote work is here to stay and so is remote services. It's a new frontier/market to explore.

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#63

Post by alias_is »

Save your time and do not read this rant:

If they know the application is sure to be rejected, why don't they reject it fast? I really don't understand why can't people reject things fast enough! University takes 5 months to reject the application, interviews take 2-3 weeks to reject. If they just happen to know, reject immediately. This whole process is too slow.

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#65

Post by sudosteph »

mangoman wrote: post #61

I've worked remotely for the past 3.5 years. As one of two employees at a small statup, at a startup that started remote friendly and then revoked it, and now at a startup that is moving towards being remote equal (25% and rising). Not that long compared to others here, but long enough to have seen things that work and seen things that don't work, and with sufficiently varied approaches. I think there's reasons why t…

> I also wonder how easy it'll be for founders to put in 16+ hour days while working from home. It's easy to 'stay late at the office', but I think it is harder to contain myself in my office while doing that. Maybe that's just a me thing, but I think it can be a real issue...

Yeah, I think that's just a personal preference thing. I've always found offices to be much more distracting, and actually I tend to put less time in overall when there's an office involved. Mostly that's because commuting (even if it's a relatively easy commute, like a 15 minute walk) takes extra time, effort, and planning - and because there are more auditory and visual distractions to tune out in an office, which makes me fatigue more quickly.

I also felt just emotionally on edge from going to the office every day. For example, I would feel very resentful when I was phoned outside of work hours, because I felt that my limited time to enjoy myself and re-coup my energy with my family was being threatened. Now that I've been working primarily remotely now for about 3 years, I don't feel bothered when I need to step up and do extra work outside of normal hours. I'm less grouchy in general because I control the environment I work in and don't have the overhead of a commute looming over me.

I think most of the YC Founders will be able to do fine, since learning to work effectively remotely is a skill like any other. From my experience too, remote working is 10x better when every person involved is remote. The worst-case scenario is to have a split group of people (part remote, part in-office), because it leads to the in-person group having side convos that leave out the remote people, which harms the remote people's ability to bond with the in-person group and generates resentment when the remote workers inevitably get left out of a conversation that matters.

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#66

Post by sudosteph »

alias_is wrote: post #63

Save your time and do not read this rant: If they know the application is sure to be rejected, why don't they reject it fast? I really don't understand why can't people reject things fast enough! University takes 5 months to reject the application, interviews take 2-3 weeks to reject. If they just happen to know, reject immediately. This whole process is too slow.

The thing that gets me is the whole "apply early to have a better chance" is almost certainly not true. My team's unlisted video had all of two views from mid-february, when it was submitted, and that's it. The world is a very different place today due to covid, and I regret not waiting til closer to the deadline to submit so we could factor that into the plans.

Edit: Also because we made a lot of progress between February and March, and while I was able update the application with some of the biggest stuff, I recognize that the initial impression was still the important one. If and when I apply to the next batch, I might start he application early again - but I don't think I will submit it more than a week before the deadline.

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#67

Post by xchaotic »

kick wrote: post #51
jedberg wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The market of "Germany" is actually the entire EU, which is bigger than the US.

Only slightly bigger, much of it is dramatically more poor, and a sizeable portion of it can't understand English, much less German.

Where do you get the dramatically more poor from?

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#68

Post by eloff »

xrendan wrote: post #59
eloff wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm watching it all with some amusement. I've worked remote my whole career, first because it was the only option where I lived, and then later by choice after I returned to the developed world. I'm trying to start a company, and I wouldn't dream of doing it any other way than remote. There's advantages and disadvantages, but I don't want to be paying SF office rent, SF salaries, SF benefits, and competing with the u…

What are you working on?

Kind of a zapier thing, but aimed at developers ( so different power vs ease of use tradeoff). Will be at apimate.com when I launch it.

Interestingly zapier are a remote company.

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#69

Post by bpodgursky »

xchaotic wrote: post #67
kick wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only slightly bigger, much of it is dramatically more poor, and a sizeable portion of it can't understand English, much less German.

Where do you get the dramatically more poor from?

Poland, Bulgaria, Romania, Greece have a lot of very smart and hard workers, but they are not (yet) wealthy countries. People in eastern Europe simply do not have the disposable income that Americans or western Europeans (usually) have.

Re: YC S20 Remote Batch

#70

Post by hef19898 »

vikramkr wrote: post #57
hef19898 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My impression was that investments in US entities requires, kind of, a lawyer. So not that much different, if you ask me. With Germany being in the EU, you can also incorporate in whatever EU country you want. The UK is obviously out for now, but take Estonia for example. Makes taxes a lot more complex for the company, but much less so when compared to YCs way of transforming into a US Inc. with a German / EU local e…

From what I understand, The us market is way way easier than most foreign markets you dint need a lawyer to incorporate or frankly to deal with the first few hundred thousand bucks of investment using standard terms, and the amount of bureaucracy and red tape is far far less here. Caveat: I cant speak to Germany specifically and can only speak to my experience with building a company in the us and what I hear from fr…

True that, in ermany you legally have to pass through a notary, while in the US it would simply be wise to do so.

The incorporation of my company in germany, including documentation, notary fees and registration, cost me less than 1.000 € and took 7 days from notary to registration. VAT registration took almost 5 weeks, so. But that was independent from the legal entity.

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