
Tell HN: Peter Roberts, immigration lawyer for YC, will do an AMA this Friday - dang
Peter Roberts (<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;threads?id=proberts" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;threads?id=proberts</a>) is an immigration lawyer who has done stellar work for YC and YC startups. He has a long record of success in difficult cases and is good at explaining things.<p>Since HN users and&#x2F;or their companies have many concerns about U.S. immigration, we asked Peter if he&#x27;d do an AMA for HN. He kindly agreed and will do it this Friday (Dec. 11th) at 11 AM Pacific.<p>Peter says there are a lot of misconceptions about U.S. immigration floating around on the internet. Hopefully he can clear some of them up for the community here. This is your chance to get high quality information from a true expert, so please bring your questions on Friday!
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guillegette
I would love to hear at least the basics for a non-US/Canadian citizen: 1\.
you get an interview with YC, which visa should I get? B1/B2? purpose of
travel? 2\. you get into YC for 3 months, again, what kind of visa? purpose of
travel? 3\. you get +$1M in seed round, how do you stay? 4\. you get $5M in
series A, how do I live there?

Thanks!

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patcon
I hope someone asks about cruise ships situated in international waters. I
love it when serious people entertain crazy ideas, and I feel like Peter must
have thoughts on that

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johncolanduoni
Silicon Flotilla? I like the sound of that. We should get a tax lawyer to
weigh in too.

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supervillain
I don't have a bachelor's degree, Asian and already 13 years out of college,
now a family man and going back to college to get my degree is not an option
(since I'm working to provide for my family), is there a possibility for me to
work or start a company in the US?

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meta_pseudo
I have read about this in the past, to qualify for H1B you can add number of
years in college(max. 3 in case of drop out) + years of experience in the
related work(job you are applying for).

3 years of work experience constitutes to 1 year of college degree. Hope this
helps

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ukd1
This is pretty sensitive, any chance of you taking anonymous questions and
posting them, or should ppl just make a throw-away?

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dang
Sure, it's fine to make a throwaway account for such cases. If anyone has
concerns beyond that, email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll figure something out.

I expect that Peter will mostly answer questions in general terms, rather than
advising about specific cases. But everyone should feel free to ask what
they're wondering about, and if there's any worry about personal exposure, by
all means err on the side of discretion.

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cjbarber
Peter Roberts is fantastically helpful, for what it's worth. I expect that
this will be great.

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dhawalhs
Seconded! I worked with him on getting my H1B transferred to my startup.

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mrmch
Thirded! Peter is awesome, have referred him to many people with great
success.

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papercruncher
One more upvote for Peter, a great guy and a fantastic attorney

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kemitchell
> He has a long record of success in difficult cases and is good at explaining
> things.

Make sure he gets to read that. Warms a lawyer's heart.

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elvinyung
Is it literally impossible for a Canadian without a bachelor's degree to work
at or start a company in the US?

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adomanico
Working at a company in the US as a Canadian without a degree is possible. I
moved from Ontario to SV before I had completed my degree.

I was able to obtain TN status under the "Scientific Technician/Technologist"
category. It's not as straightforward as usual, but it's definitely possible.

Now that I have completed my degree I use the usual "Computer Systems Analyst"
category.

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hpagey
I hope someone asks about ppl starting and working for their own companies on
B1/B2 visas.

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rdc12
Is getting a visa to work at a U.S at startup something unique to the YC
program? I am/was under the impression that the company had to be accredited
to be able to employ foreign nationals.

Is there any advise you can give for a current undergrad (for me personally
citizen of NZ and UK if that matters) to improve the odds of being able to
accept a job or PHD study in the US (on the visa side of things).

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canadiancreed
This is basically me only Canadian instead of New Zealand.

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pavornyoh
Awesome.. Looking forward to it.

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dpaluy
Several startups I talked to, don't have enough knowledge dealing with H1-B
applications. As an applicant, how can I help them to make this process clear?

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yranadive
Has the AMA started? Where are we to post questions?

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yranadive
Here's the link
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10719080](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10719080)

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sudhirj
So where will the AMA happen? Is there already a link up or will it be posted
on HN when it starts?

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dang
The latter, this Friday at 11 AM Pacific time.

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canadiancreed
Sweet it starts as soon as I get off work to boot.

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haydenlee
Much appreciated!

