Titan sounds interesting, but I feel like the value they provide is dubious for the fee (1% of AUM!) they charge.
Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
81–90 of 97 posts
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#82I can't help but wonder what would happen if YC and all its influence was to be focused on only a bunch of startups per year doing truly far fetched things - namely space, biotech, finance, robotics, computing and VR. Is focusing on social networks for grandkids, instant food, the 50th sticker app and countless B2B products truly worth it when it could be directed towards the former? Who could possibly, genuinely wan…
I get the point you're tryin to make, but, then again, who are we to judge what is and is not worthy, especially this early? A lot of "unworthy" things have been extremely value to us as a society in hindsight, let alone things that have stemmed from them. > countless B2B products truly worth it? "B2B" is a very vague and extremely overarching term. Computers, internet, and cell phones were all, at one point, very mu…
Microsoft owns the end user experience. I'd say it's as much B2C as it is B2B.
Being able to purchase any book (any knowledge) it's amazing. Definitely not even close to instant food.
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#83There are maybe, maybe 10 promising companies in the mix these past two days. YC has really lost its prestige by diluting its batches so much, IMO. There are better pathways to funding nowadays for promising startups that don’t require surrendering 7% equity.
I think this would have been said at the start as well.
"really, a company that is renting out air mattresses" "another Digg clone" "sync my folders? there are a million tools for that"
Though your knee-jerk reaction is correct, it is specifically this which makes YC stand-out. They often seem to pick the things that don't seem promising, and yet those turn in to stand-out successes.
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#84What is up with listing the pedigree of the founders? I noticed it on the demo day 1 article, also. Does being an ex-FAANG employee correlate with successfully running a startup, or is it just the easiest signal VCs have for "This person is probably smart"? It seems like a lot of YC's current model is to throw money at ex-FAANG employees with ideas.
Yes, good smart founders correlate with successfully running a startup and it gives notoriety.
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#85I can't help but wonder what would happen if YC and all its influence was to be focused on only a bunch of startups per year doing truly far fetched things - namely space, biotech, finance, robotics, computing and VR. Is focusing on social networks for grandkids, instant food, the 50th sticker app and countless B2B products truly worth it when it could be directed towards the former? Who could possibly, genuinely wan…
The problem is those ideas except maybe finance and computing don't convert well. When was the last one to go IPO. B2B, on the other hand, converts extremely well because they are solving real problems
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#86There are maybe, maybe 10 promising companies in the mix these past two days. YC has really lost its prestige by diluting its batches so much, IMO. There are better pathways to funding nowadays for promising startups that don’t require surrendering 7% equity.
I think this would have been said at the start as well. "really, a company that is renting out air mattresses" "another Digg clone" "sync my folders? there are a million tools for that" Though your knee-jerk reaction is correct, it is specifically this which makes YC stand-out. They often seem to pick the things that don't seem promising, and yet those turn in to stand-out successes.
That's exactly what some people did say, at least about Dropbox (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9224)
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#87What is up with listing the pedigree of the founders? I noticed it on the demo day 1 article, also. Does being an ex-FAANG employee correlate with successfully running a startup, or is it just the easiest signal VCs have for "This person is probably smart"? It seems like a lot of YC's current model is to throw money at ex-FAANG employees with ideas.
As someone who went through YCombinator (my company failed), an Ivy-League and one of the tech giants——I can certainly say they're screwing up. To invoke Dyson, should you be investing in the frog or the bird? Let's see:
Every single company in YCombinator's portfolio these days, with rare exception seems visionless, they're single product businesses, that's why they always exit (how many went to IPO?); which is inherent with the 'people they invest in'. What is the intersection of characters of the founders of Microsoft and Apple, of Bill Gates and Paul Allen compared to Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak? One was an idea man, whose credentials or lack there of allowed him to be, and partly the predisposition for the former to be the case, a subversive generalist; the other was a technical specialist who spent much time focusing on the intricacies of engineering. Who do you think will have a better idea? The individual who did everything right because he was told it was right or the man who didn't do everything right because he tried to trust himself? The latter's neglecting of extreme specialization along with making his own choices, which forbid him from certain credentials of supposed proof of success, gave him the time to explore more areas than the exhausted specialist. As a specialist I can tell you my ideas suck, I haven't been able to understand the big picture yet because I've spent all my time thinking in terms of these small technical details that don't allow for creativity. I'm a frog, that's why my company failed.
The specialist chose problems because he was told to do so, he never had time to exercise this broad judgement, while it's the opposite for the apparently less successful generalist. Who would be more likely to correctly identify a market niche in an overall anthropological system, the frog or the bird respectively?
Regardless, given that this is controversial, should a VC really be investing in people over the quality of the business? Whatever happened to finding people who work smart not hard? Are VC's so inept that they can't trust themselves on potential businesses and instead are forced to trust institutional credentials which signal the exact opposite of a capability for original rigorous, creatively destructive, thought?
The portfolio of YCombinator actually sucks. They invest in products that almost always exit and get bought for their single product, they all sell because they have no vision. Those products are almost always shut down eventually too: they're just bought for insurance purposes of potential disruption from the same VC delusion. Who doesn't sell? The people who have vision, the people who don't have the credentials like the founders of Stripe.
Whatever happened to investing in the Goddards, the Newtons, the Wrights, the Pitts, the Edisons's, the Jobs, the Rockfellers, the Jack Mas, and the Cubans of the world? And let me tell you, you'll reject these people, everyone will, but they're use to it——that's why they become so great. They'll find a way to make the next Fortune 500 company without you.
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#88There are maybe, maybe 10 promising companies in the mix these past two days. YC has really lost its prestige by diluting its batches so much, IMO. There are better pathways to funding nowadays for promising startups that don’t require surrendering 7% equity.
I was at Demo Day, and couldn't disagree more. If you actually believe that, go ahead and pick the ten companies you think are worth something, and I'll take the "unpromising" part of the batch. We can put a five year bet into longbets that the top ten companies of my group will outperform your ten companies, as scored by either exit value or value of last round raised. Picking winners is hard, and most great compani…
I'd be more than willing to do this. How do you want to proceed?
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#89What is up with listing the pedigree of the founders? I noticed it on the demo day 1 article, also. Does being an ex-FAANG employee correlate with successfully running a startup, or is it just the easiest signal VCs have for "This person is probably smart"? It seems like a lot of YC's current model is to throw money at ex-FAANG employees with ideas.
As someone who went through YCombinator (my company failed), an Ivy-League and one of the tech giants——I can certainly say they're screwing up. To invoke Dyson, should you be investing in the frog or the bird? Let's see: Every single company in YCombinator's portfolio these days, with rare exception seems visionless, they're single product businesses, that's why they always exit (how many went to IPO?); which is inhe…
Just imagine if public equities were invested with this VC/YC approach. Our economy would be dead—imagine Blankfein boasting, "who cares about potential for future revenue, the CEO and his minions went to Harvard". Benjamin Graham, Warren Buffet, et al. all invest without a single care for the credentials of the education of the top 10 executives. Buffet invested in the Korean stock market without understanding a lick of Korean.
Re: Startups that launched at Y Combinator’s S18 Demo Day 2
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
Anima does seem really great. As a front-end dev seeing this stuff makes me happy and slightly anxious for the future. On one hand, styling basic marketing sites manually is boring and I would happily use this if it fits easily into my work flow. On the other, I hope it doesn't start making complex React apps soon or I'm in trouble :)
Not sure if you're just starting your career or not, but every time i meet a freshly graduated junior that tell me he's a "x developer" where X is a technology, i make a point telling him "no you're not, you're a developper, period. Don't think of yourself as being stuck to a given tech or you'll be in trouble pretty soon".
That's good advice. I've worked up and down the stack but recently have had great success in marketing myself as a front-end dev. You're right though, I shouldn't get stuck in that mindset. Thanks for the reminder :)