
Ask PG: Did the "apply to YC without an idea" experiment work? - maximz
It appears that it's not possible to apply without an idea for S13. Does this mean that the experiment didn't work? Can you share some details of what you found and what went wrong?
======
pg
To be honest, I wasn't sure whether or not the noidea application was live. I
had to go look at the source. So it looks like we de facto killed it by never
enabling it for s13. Frankly it's not a big deal either way. We only accepted
one noidea application last cycle, and IIRC there were only about 50
applications.

~~~
mkeblx
Perhaps the whole idea of the noidea app set the stage for the disaster that
was S12. Even though only one noidea app was accepted strictly speaking
perhaps both a signal sent that the 'idea bar' was lowered and and a lowering
of standards. This seems to me to hold a lot of explanatory power, much more
so than the idea that multiplying 66 by 1.27 would be the key thing in turning
something that works into something unmanageable.

I read the post S12 (post noidea) essay
(<http://www.paulgraham.com/startupideas.html>) as a (if unacknowledged)
reaction of someone trying to understand and elucidate why ideas are actually
very important (going against the common refrain that 'execution' is all that
matters) after having recently seen poor ideas get by a selective process.

~~~
pg
_much more so than the idea that multiplying 66 by 1.27 would be the key thing
in turning something that works into something unmanageable_

Ever run into an n^2 algorithm?

~~~
Locke1689
Out of curiosity, what makes you think that managing YC is n^2? Certainly
everyone would need to communicate with you -- that's n. The question is
whether or not each YC pair would need to communicate with each other. That is
n^2 and seems like an excessively high level of message passing.

~~~
pg
In its then form, every partner had to know what every startup was doing, and
the number of partners was a function of the number of startups.

~~~
tptacek
So n log n.

~~~
pg
The number of partners you need is not the log of the number of startups. It's
more like n/15.

------
argumentum
Being one of the no idea / barely an idea teams in s12, one of the teams that
acrimoniously blew apart and probably one of the teams that led to the changes
that YC made for w13, I am glad that "no idea" is no longer an option.

I still view YC's willingness to experiment in an extremely positive light.
It's why YC is the innovator, and everyone else (500, techstars etc) are just
imitators. That being said, I think "no idea" was a bad idea, for YC as
investors and advisors, for the following reasons:

1\. It created teams that had not actually _worked together_ for a significant
length of time on an idea that _all founders believed in_. In other words,
"teams" which were not actually "teams", but rather a set of individuals with
strong credentials.

2\. Some of the most important psychological benefits of going through YC,
particularly the artificial pressure of Demo Day, have a paradoxical effect on
"no idea" teams. The experience of watching good startups grow literally
before your eyes at weekly dinners is inspiring, but not particularly
conducive to coming up with your own idea. For me at least, it created an
almost existential angst.

3\. Without an idea, a shared revolutionary vision of the future, there is
nothing binding a team together. Each time an idea "failed" there was an
intense feeling of loss and personal failure, particularly (as mentioned
above) when you see the "idea" teams progressing week on week. That emotional
baggage can rip apart formerly great friends .. it did in our case.

Given that, s12 was _not a disaster_. For one, many s12 teams are doing
brilliantly, and I wouldn't be surprised if there are more than a few black
swans amongst my batchmates. But more importantly, it wasn't a failure in the
same sense that Edison's first 9,999 light bulbs (that didn't work) were not
failures.

For me personally, "no idea" was a great idea, as I learned more from my YC
experience than can be quantified. While I'd never take funding again without
an idea (or a working product or service) as it causes unnecessary and often
contradictory pressure, my understanding of how to succeed in startups is
orders of magnitude greater than it would have been without YC, and for that I
will be eternally grateful.

~~~
mkeblx
This kind of hits the nail on the head. An idea is in many ways the context by
which you judge a startup team in terms of a core commitment to a common goal,
as shown by working on it together for a period of time (more than a week,
etc.). It defines what 'team' means. Without that, what do you have?
Credentials.

Of course by disaster I meant just relative to other classes, with a much
higher amount of team splits/zombies in such a short period, which seemed
predictable. Most startups don't work out, that's expected, but the stage was
weighed for things not to work out in re: the startup itself and the
friendships involved. Who knows, perhaps you and your friends, with a shared,
good idea would have done great in w13, having the right context to build upon
where you were at. I know of other teams who were extremely frustrated that
something they've dreamed about, Demo Day, turn into something to dread and
the quite painfully choosing to give up on the whole endeavor whatever the
high personal costs (not necessarily wrongly).

One of the best things about pg's essay was the core message to entrepreneurs
that a good startup idea requires not a pressure cooker atmosphere to come up
with an 'idea' but the natural space in which you notice a problem that can be
solved. It's the starting point, not something that can be tacked on later
like the noidea concept would suggest.

~~~
argumentum
I don't know if it was predictable. It was a thesis that turned out to be
incorrect, but on what basis could it have been discounted until tried?

Wrt to my own team, we would not have done great in w13 .. it turned out that
we were not a "team", we didn't work well together and had vastly,
irreconcilably, different views. Some people just aren't meant to work
together, and I'm glad to have learned this sooner rather than later. I now
know what to look for in co-founders, and that's not a meager knowledge.

------
polshaw
It seems to me there would be no benefit to them in allowing it. If you want
to get into YC and are smart, determined and all the other qualities they
want-- you will come up with _something_. It may not be right, but PG et al
can still decide they want the applicant without liking the idea.

Like problem solving in job interviews, doing the exercise tells you a lot
more than just if the applicant can get the right answer or not. It can
demonstrate your effort, creativity, intelligence, even if it has flaws.

~~~
btipling
It helps to know something about the business in which you are starting your
startup.

------
sherm8n
If you really want to apply without an idea just do it. No one is forcing you
to fill out every single field of the application. Don't fall victim to being
constrained by the limits of the system!

------
goronbjorn
Voicegem was one of the no idea companies in the first YC class it was
offered. They've already joined Palantir, it seems: <http://www.voicegem.com>

------
niggler
"Application deadline: March 29"

Today's the last day to apply. How did no one notice or think about asking
this earlier?

~~~
jcr
I read the application for this round when it was announced, and the "no idea"
option had been removed.

EDIT: took me a while to find it but:

<https://news.ycombinator.com/apply-noidea>

> _Sorry, we're no longer considering applications for winter 2013._

> _Check back later to apply for summer._

The S13 application date closes today, so either the above needed editing, or
the "no idea" option really was removed.

------
gkoberger
Here's some previous times this has come up:

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4512022> (answer from pg)

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5262796>

~~~
shardling
His answer was "It's still too early to tell". It might be reasonable to ask
again 200 days later.

~~~
dgallagher
Also, there may be a need for a large sample size before patterns can be
recognized.

------
OnyeaboAduba
I'm a sole founder with a non techincal background who is currently
outsourcing the development of my site .I applied for the summer batch what do
you guys think my chances are ???

~~~
tempestn
But also, I find it pretty hard to imagine building a successful technical
startup in this manner. Not saying there's no value to non-technical founders,
but alone? How do you evaluate the quality of the outsourced work?

~~~
famousactress
_How do you evaluate the quality of the outsourced work?_

I find that silly. I'm not a chef but I can taste food.

Increasingly I have the tendency to believe that all this technical/non-
technical is a really unfortunate simplification. I think especially when it
comes to a startup tackling really big problems whether you've programmed
before might be a rounding error in the equation toward succeeding.

~~~
mion
_I'm not a chef but I can taste food._

That's an unfortunate simplification. Without a technical background, you
wouldn't know how long it takes to make a basic CRUD app. "3 weeks? Ok I
guess. Oh, 3 months actually? Ok I guess." And what about performance,
scalability, costs, etc? You'd have no clue.

~~~
001sky
_you wouldn't know how long it takes to make a basic CRUD app_

\-- Not to nitpick, but you are implying the technical team is untrustworthy
or incompetent, unless they are co-founders. While I (would like to) think all
founders are trustworthy and competent, being a non-founder should not be a
contra-indication.

~~~
pseut
You're implying that someone who can't program is as capable of hiring
trustworthy and skilled programmers as a programmer.

~~~
001sky
Two intersecting sets: (a) trustworthy people; and (b) skilled programmers.
Both difficult to observe. Having good information on at least one set is a
definite advantage, both for screening and for avoidance of sub-optimal
candidates. One would need to make assumptions about the relative
trustworthiness of the candidate pools to decide which is more beneficial. It
may be that in certain areas, at certain times, its rarer and more difficult
to assess character than competence (the latter even at high levels).

------
jamesmcbennett
I have always worked on the principle that entrepreneurs have 1000 ideas,
choosing which idea to work on is the challenge.

I presume YC attracts a certain target audience of generally 'people who build
things.' . Wonder did YC without an idea change the target audience?

~~~
argumentum
No, everyone "without an idea" had plenty of ideas, just hadn't yet settled on
one.

------
BSousa
While not related to the original question, how does YC work for non US
residents and Visa related issues? Does it accept/sponsor a few outside the US
startups? IS it interested in doing so?

~~~
rdl
YC has plenty of non-US residents. Visa situations get resolved on a case by
case basis, but there are general guidelines.

Essentially visa problems cease to be a showstopper once you have money.

