
Why Y Combinator is a waste of time - markovich
http://www.scribd.com/doc/25132/Why-YCombinator-is-a-waste-of-time
======
mauricecheeks
I think I understand from personal experience what he might be trying to
describe in terms of not letting YC be your alpha / omega.

We applied to the Fall 06 YC round. I was in school and my co-founder had a
job at a small software company. Really we just had a cool idea and wanted to
do it. When we found out about YC we thought it was "perfect for us". We spent
a week or two struggling over answering question just right. We had no
product, and had not yet considered some of the questions the application was
asking. As you may guess we got an email from YC in late October saying:

\--- " We're sorry to say that we can't accept your proposal for funding.
Please don't take it personally, because most of the proposals we rejected, we
rejected for reasons having nothing to do with the quality of the applicants.
For example, we were very reluctant to accept proposals with only one founder,
because we think starting a startup is too much work for one person. We also
rejected a lot of proposals simply because we couldn't understand them, or
didn't understand the problem domain well enough to judge them, or because the
project seemed too big to start on only three months of funding.

We realize this process is fraught with error. It's practically certain that
groups we rejected will go on to create successful startups. If you do, we'd
appreciate it if you'd send us an email making fun of us; we want to learn
from our mistakes.

Thanks Y Combinator Staff" \---

We told ourselves that wasn't going to stop us.... but it sorta did for a
while. I wasn't done with school, but was getting dream job offers, and my co-
founder was enjoying his software development job. So we didn't do much for a
few months. We just kept talking about our idea for Revvu.

In doing some soul searching though, I decided I had to turn down these job
offers and stop wasting time in school. This is not the life I wanted. After
talking to my co-founder we came to grips with the fact that... working
regular jobs was the default. That was the easy way to go about life, but we
wanted more than that. We are too creative and determined to be held back or
stifled by the nuances of a "job".

In January I moved across the country to live with my co-founder and work full
time on our project. Shortly after that we had a full business plan, and were
testing our site in closed beta. As of this week we've launched publicly and
are getting encouraging user feedback.

We are beginning to tap our network to find potential investors, so that we
can grow the business significantly in the next 12 moths.

About a week ago my co-founder brought up YCombinator for the first time in
months, and we decided to apply at the last minute. Not because we NEED the
living expenses, we both have savings. Also, not because we need it to feel
like we're doing something. We're already confident that we're doing
something, and we'll peruse other sourced of funding if we don't get YC. We
applied because we know we could benefit from the mentoring, the guidance, the
connections, and i guess partially because not draining our bank accounts just
to eat would be kinda nice.

If the author had good intentions, IMHO, we might be a model for what he was
trying to communicate. We weren't ready before. We were sitting around waiting
to hear back from YC in October, and nearly let our passion fade after not
being accepted.

This time filling out the application didn't take long at all, because we
actually knew our answers. This time we have a real plan for our business and
legitimately strive towards success.

If we get YC... awesome, if not... thats fine too.

I hope many of you are in the same boat. I hope you're building something you
believe is great, and nothing will stop you. Don't get discouraged. Don't let
anything slow you down. The world is big enough for all of us to succeed.

-if you build it, they will come

~~~
Goladus
\---"If the author had good intentions"---

Yeah that rant was a bit hard to follow. In particular his definition of
"backup plan" seems rather fuzzy.

------
nostrademons
Premise is right, headline is wrong. If you look at the businesses that made
people billionaires, the other point they have in common is that the owners
aggressively pursued opportunities. So yes, Bill Gates slaved away for 6
years, with a variety of other products, before IBM came knocking. However, if
he had turned them away, or been out of the office flying his plane like Gary
Kildall, we'd be talking about the "Digital Research Monopoly" instead.

My startup initially wasn't going to apply to yCombinator. We have a solid
team, a product that I really want to see exist, and we're making steady
progress implementing it. But I figured that if we have a decent chance of
success without yCombinator, we'll have an even better chance of success
_with_ yCombinator. So why not spend 4 days or so putting together an
application and see if they accept us?

If they turn us down, fine, we go back to our original plan and keep working
on the product. But if they don't, _great_! It's advice, connections, a set
timetable for when I leave my day job and work full-time on the startup (for
me, this is a question of when, not if: yCombinator would just make the
decision for me), and a cool hacker environment where you get to bounce ideas
off other equally-smart people.

~~~
aberrantfunk
I posted over at scribd, but I see the intelligent conversation is here, so
I'm going to repost. I hope no one minds:

You're making the right points but drawing the wrong conclusions from them.
Yes, users need to be your highest priority, yes you need to have the drive to
succeed that is reflected here by not relying on Y Combinator to be your
ticket to wealth, Yes you need to get out there and actually DO; actually
BUILD. But these are precisely the kinds of people and ideas that y combinator
IS GOING TO PICK.

The fact is that Paul Graham says these same points time and time again in his
own essays, and so anyone that is applying to y combinator without these
things in mind is obviously not very bright. But your conclusion is not very
bright either. Someone who really had all the qualities you describe would
recognize that while y combinator doesn't mean success or failure, it provides
a number of extremely valuable resources (of which money is only one of, and
not #1 of, the list). I certainly wouldn't want my competitors to be in a y
combinator group that I was rejected from -- that is a bad sign.

To reiterate, good points; bad conclusion.

My first time at news.ycombinator, but i've been reading paul graham's essays
for a while now and am increasingly impressed. I'll be back

------
pg
If YC is for losers, then Robert and Trevor and I are losers ourselves,
because we modelled it on how we started Viaweb. We took $10k in seed funding
from our friend Julian, who (since he was a lawyer) also set us up as a
company.

For us, Julian's help was both a necessary and sufficient condition of getting
launched. Nothing has changed since then about life in the seed stage. Sure,
maybe you can get to the next stage on $200k instead of a $2m series A round
like in the Bubble, but initially you still need at least a few months' living
expenses.

I only skimmed that [what should I call it? article?], but I did notice one
other thing that's mistaken. We don't judge people by their karma on news.yc,
but by the quality of their comments and submissions. Surely that is a
reasonable test.

~~~
BitGeek
You missed his point. Yes, what you are doing is replicating the situation
that worked for you. And this program is probably a good one for students who
are still in college and want to build a company over the summer.

But anyone who has left college and is working for a living should be able to
save up one months living expenses every month. (EG: make 25 an hour, gross
$4k, $3.6k after taxes, live on $1,500 a month or so.) Thus if you work for 6
months as a contract programmer (or better yet as an employee for a startup)
you will then have 6 months of expenses to build your business. Thus there's
no reason that not getting YC funding should be an impediment to strting a
business.

The strong impression I get from people who post here, and the people who
attented startupschool is that they are focused on getting funding. They want
to go to YC, or move to the bay area for connections to funding. Landing a VC
deal is seen as the end goal.

This is not an entreprenurial focus. Were you focused on VC funding for
viaweb, or were you trying to build a business?

The original poster is right-- build a business-- that should be the focus.
Not getting funding. Not worrying about what you're going to do if you don't
get into YC. YC should be seen as a possible opportunity, but not critical to
success.

And since YC only happens twice a year and is limited in the number
accepted... waiting for the next round of YC indicates that building the
business or product is not the number one priority.

As an investor, I'd rate highly someone who was living off of their own
savings to build their product-- they have shown the gumption and have even
more skin in the game.

~~~
pg
I was 30 when we started Viaweb, and I needed the money.

Viaweb raised a total of $2.5 million during its life. Some of the time I was
focused on funding. Investors like you to be, when you're asking for that
much.

It's ridiculous to suggest that one has a choice of focusing on funding or
building a business. Pretty nearly 100% of successful startups take outside
funding, from Google on down.

~~~
abossy
I believe Microsoft never took funding. There might be a few others. Anybody
know? Apple? That wouldn't make sense. I can't recall the numbers off the top
of my head.

~~~
pg
Microsoft took funding before their IPO. I've never understood why; it has the
smell of a bribe; but they did. Apple took a lot of funding.

~~~
nostrademons
From what I read, Microsoft took a mezzanine round before IPO because VCs have
connections to investment bankers, and Microsoft needed investment bankers to
make the IPO process run smoothly. So yeah, it basically was a bribe.

------
Harj
The very point of this article is an argument in favor of applying to YC and
not against it.

Like it or not, all successful web companies have at some point taken on
funding. It is an inevitable part of building a company.

Raising funding is a resource and time drain. The author argues that we should
all be spending time building our products. I completely agree and that's why
I applied to YC. It's the equivalent of outsourcing your "distractions". Being
a YC company dramatically reduces the amount of time you have to spend finding
PR and investment (things you will have to do at some point). These things
will find you.

The real power of YC is not the money. It's their ability to take away most of
the distractions that cause startups to fail and let you concentrate on what
really matters - building your product.

The author shouldn't be so short sighted and should take a longer term view of
building a business.

------
richcollins
I was rejected by YC for the 2006 WFP. I created an app with no funding that
didn't make any money, but gave me credibility. As a result, my current (new)
project is funded. If it had kept looking for funding instead of just building
something, I probably would have given up long ago.

The true ethos of a hacker lies in building stuff. If you get rejected, just
keep building stuff!

~~~
dpapathanasiou
Rich, that's a great point, and one that I hope doesn't get lost in this
discussion.

YC, like other angels/VC firms, has a profile they prefer, even if they may
not state it explicitly: i.e. teams of at least two people, under 35, writing
web-based software, etc.

So just because you don't fit that profile (or you do, but YC rejected you),
doesn't mean you will fail.

------
jkush
I think the author is missing part of the point. YCombinator is simply a way
to make something that's very very hard to do just that much easier. Nobody
should bank everything on getting accepted (I know I'm not). Just because you
shouldn't bank on something doesn't mean it's not a valuable thing.

The author is right in that you should plan on doing it without YC help. My
point is that you should still try to get YC's help. It'll be worth it.

~~~
voiceofreason
I think the author is missing a lot of things.

------
danielha
There are so many failed assumptions made that this doesn't even stand as a
valid opinion piece.

A valid point to make would have been: Accepted into the program or not, a
good startup will learn from the experience and continue on.

Then stop there; everything else was either superfluous or unfounded.

------
thingsilearned
Though it could be said in a much less offensive way, I agreed with this in
the article

"I read YCombinator Startup News. I read that thing that Paul wrote saying
that anybody who contributes regularly is going to fare better. Thats shit
from a bull! Anybody who is spending time posting on a site that is a
collection of links to dream money instead of working on his project is never
going to make money. Anybody who cares about karma on that site instead of
spending time reaching users for his product is an idiot."

I've been checking out these threads for a few days and have started leaving
comments because that apparently gives you a better chance. Paul has a lot of
tough choices to make and I understand his reasons for using comments as one
of the many tools in filtering prospective startups, but I really hope its a
small small factor. Sure it proves I read blogged advice and other mumbo jumbo
on the subject of startups and am interested in the funding, but it also might
indicate that a person has way too much free time or has a serious net
addiction (a major development killer). I've been getting ready to kick start
my startup this summer for over a month now. During that time I've read a lot
of these startup articles, all of Paul's entries, Founders at Work, bought a
few other books and searched the net for VC firms and how to get in touch with
them. One article at the beginning of the process affected me greatly. When I
was making the tough decision to do the startup or take a very appealing job
offer I read Paul's article (not to brown nose) "A student's guide to
startups" which said the best time to start one is when you're 24, fresh out
of grad school, and hopefully have a solid internship behind you. That was
something I didn't know and hit me hard because this summer that will be my
exact situation. If I hadn't have read it I might have missed my perfect
window! I made my decision right then. Every article, book, or resource since
however has been repetitive and more draining on my energy to get started than
helpful.

My point, and the article's author's point in the quoted paragraph is, use
these articles to get yourself inspired and confident about doing this thing
and then stop reading and commenting! You're inspired now don't kill it and
waste your time with reading more and more of the same crap, go make your own
stories. This is most likely my last post here. I hope that doesn't effect my
rating :).

------
andreyf
There's a grain of truth here, in that YC won't guarantee a successful
startup, and that rejection from YC doesn't mean your idea will fail, but did
anyone really think otherwise?

To call YC "a waste of time", however, seems to me nothing but attention
grabbing... if anything, YC is the opposite of a waste of time - for a student
like me, YC funding means _not_ wasting my time at a summer job for food/rent
while working on an idea, and _not_ wasting my time on searching for business
advice/legalese if the idea makes it off the ground.

How the heck did this make it to the #1 story? Is it because people anxious
about being rejected by YC, or is it just the rebellious headline?

~~~
BrandonM
I voted it up because I thought there were some truths in the article that the
people whose only plan is to get YC funding could benefit from reading. I
agree that the headline is poor, but I still think that there is plenty of
truth there.

------
yaacovtp
I don't think anyone is applying for the money. After all most people are in
their 20's with little to no responsibility. Just living in the Cambridge area
for the summer will eat up a chunk of money. If you have a great idea and must
have 3 months to concentrate on it or you'll never get it done, just move in
with the folks for 3 months.

I think most people are applying for the mentoring and collaborative
environment.I found a great partner in the process. That has to be worth
taking the time to apply.

------
budu3
Well, if he can point to his success then I might be inclined to take his
advise, otherwise ...

------
oltsm
Actually, there is a subtle point in the way YC is approaching this whole
thing and the person missed the point. Assume there exists a world without YC,
how many people will spend time doing something they believe on and make
effort to take it to a point so that you can show it to someone? Probably a
vast majority would anyway do it. say 90%, what YC is trying to do is - try to
squeeze a percent or two of the remaining 10% by making them work by promising
them that they'd fund if you come up with something interesting and that adds
a certain value to the society as a whole.

So it is certainly a waste of time if - you think of an idea, write an
application and decide to work on only if YC is funding it..

But not - when you are working on something or planning to work on something,
YC offers you that last bit of motivation to actually go and do it because you
want to play the YC gamble.

And it might happen that otherwise, you end up building something, YC rejects
you, but you say to yourself, what the heck, I have already done something so
lets take it to a logical conclusion (may be 90% will chicken out. but who
knows one of those who persisted might be next big thing!!) YC has certainly
helped them, who would have been left in "I am planning to do" state otherwise
and I think thats what PG is essentially trying to do. Make more people try a
stint at 'startuping' and all of this comes at a reasonable cost to everyone!!

To conclude - would the authors' brother have not been happy if there was an
"Irish Pub" or something that promised, hey if you send us your recordings,
may be we can give you a saturday night and if you get a deal from a recording
company, we get cut out of it... (Ouch! I just spit out an idea for some
"irish pub" owner, if he's on the list!)

------
culix
It seems like this guy is a big fan of the [Ben and Jerry's]
(<http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000056.html)> organic company
model, and is deriding YC for being more of the "amazon" big burst type model
(or at least accusing YC of creating small startup companies that follow the
Amazon model). This analogy is slightly flawed, because, like ViaWeb, most of
the startups that YC funds don't really seem like Amazon model companies. I
would say that the author of this article is drawing the line between "organic
startup" and "explosive funded company" much closer to the side of startups
that start small, and including YC funded companies on the "explosive funded"
side. That may account for some of his anger.

FWIW, his piece does have a good point: that a viable startup should be able
to continue along a successful path even if they get rejected by YC. But as
other people have noted there are benefits to being funded by YC: firstly they
can [remove some of your
distractions](<http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=9439)> and give you
good advice; and secondly, applying to and being rejected by YC might just
[force you to step up and improve your
company](<http://news.ycombinator.com/comments?id=9486).> While there
certainly are (and should be) companies that don't need YC to become
successful, I think if you can get ahead by getting funded, then you should do
it, and that's why YC really matters.

------
zkinion
Some of the stuff he says isn't so bad. It's good to just go out and create
something. Too many people do seem to rely on YC.

However, the money YC gives is really insignificant. I doubt many people even
applied for the money at all. Its really more about the network and mesh of
people you get with it. Anybody can work and save up 6k, its not that hard.

I didn't apply because I want to be in the San Fran. network isntead of the
cambridge area. If this round was in the bay area, then I would have applied,
and been accepted :).

~~~
dfranke
YC's money isn't the most important thing they offer, but in my case (I'm
finishing undergrad this month) it probably does make the difference between
being able to go full-time right away versus needing to either spend a year
saving or moonlight it.

------
Alex3917
Anyone else find it ironic that this document is hosted by a YC startup?

~~~
abossy
Not necessarily -- it makes sense.

He realizes that a startup won't magically succeed by being a part of the
right group or having the right connections. It still takes extremely hard
work, undying dedication to users, timing, etc... YC is only one cog in the
wheel, and plenty of startups actually succeed without them -- which might
seem disillusioning to some, especially those that hang around these boards
too often.

I believe that's what he's getting at, anyhow.

------
Mistone
While the original post may have been a bit off target it certainly set off a
very interesting comment conversation. The post has been thoroughly critiqued
here, but I did want to add on thing that came to mind as I was reading
through the discussion.

YC is a model that was created based on expereince and success. The value of
YC funding is not the money, $5-20 k is not hard to save or raise.

It has been encouraging and interesting to hear from so many people, who
obviously find a lot of value in VC's approach, offering slight variances
based on their personal situation.

It is important to take what is valuable from a model and apply it to your own
startup situation. If you can implement the use the best concepts and models
from other and apply them to your unique startup, you will reduce the chance
of failure and save a ton of time and money.

If you fallow blindly and base your success on one groups acceptance your not
an entrepreneur.

------
dpapathanasiou
Not the greatest essay in the world, but the author may be right in that too
many people are applying to YC for the wrong reasons.

------
mukund
Sour grapes? I dont know why people think it as though YC will spoon feed and
get u stand up on your feet and will teach you walking and running. I see YC
as a way of catalyst which nurtures, get you connections and give valuable
advice. Again this is my perspective, i may be wrong but i really dont agree
with the write up on scribd.com.

------
nonrecursive
Did anyone find this article helpful? I thought it was... a waste of time.

------
ecuzzillo
The only reason I can imagine applying to YC and then not going through with
the startup if I didn't get in is if when I applied I wasn't totally sure that
I and my cofounder were totally on crack when we thought we could start a
startup. Acceptance by YC would, in that situation, give a big confidence
boost, and validate the idea. I don't think that's a terribly unreasonable
premise. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if there were some currently
successful startups who thought they might not do it if they didn't get into
YC.

------
inklesspen
As usual, people see only the money. Y Combinator is also about the
networking, and based on some things I've heard, that's the more important
part. "Never Eat Alone."

------
juwo
<http://juwo-works.blogspot.com/2007/04/our-plan-b.html>

------
domp
(took out the first paragraph I had here. I should have read the full
article!)

People that are applying for YC definitely are just seeing this as another
possibility and not an end all to their idea. I'm sure that a very small
amount of people are going to give up their business if rejected.

~~~
edgeztv
I think the music parallel was right on, actually. You need users to tell you
what they think of your product at least as much as VCs or execs. If users
don't like your product, trying to pitch it to VCs is a waste of time.

~~~
domp
I took it that he meant that the artist wasn't willing to work at his music
enough to gain traction and wanted a quick track to success by signing to a
big record label. With that being said, I think that the majority of YC
submissions aren't looking towards this as an only alternative but one of many
routes that could be taken.

------
mattculbreth
Don't feed the troll.

------
timg
There is some meaning within this rambling.

Here's a startup idea Mr PG: I will pay $50 for basic feedback on a very early
startup idea and give you 1% equity.

What are the alternatives? Is there any way to get feedback on startup plans
from half competent people without broadcasting your ideas all over forums?

~~~
nostrademons
I actually proposed that (1% of startup equity in exchange for being able to
ask questions and come to the YC dinners) when I got rejected from SFP2005.
They ignored me.

I suspect the problem is that time is their scarcest resource, not money. They
want to spend their time mentoring the startups with the greatest chance of
success. Until you reach the point where you have a reasonable chance of
success, you're stuck with YC News.

~~~
jamongkad
Very Darwinian...but if anything else getting rejected should be seen in a
positive light. As a time to get to know your users and build something that
they will find useful. Just like in PG's essays.

------
voiceofreason
(Back to where it was) The author unfairly compared Paul to a young musician's
experience, said Paul speaks Bull, and that the YC is a waste of time. He also
insults the reader. The author should apologize.

~~~
ClintonKarr
He does make one valid point - if you're spending all day contributing to this
news section you're probably not working hard enough on your project.

Also, I don't believe he was comparing Paul to a 15-year-old musician, but
rather screwed up and switched the name of his cousin from Steve to Paul. A
freudian comparison perhaps, but not intentional. He failed to communicate his
point effectively.

~~~
nostrademons
Some of us contribute to yCombinator because we have day jobs and can't work
on our startup while on company time. And yet we have bosses that tell us to
hold up because they aren't done with the requirements yet. Time is fungible;
might as well use our bored-time at work on something semi-productive and free
up the time at home for working on the startup.

Of course, you could argue that if one really wants their startup to succeed,
they shouldn't have a day job. I'd probably even agree with you. But "when to
quit" is a complicated question, particularly if you're gaining (or hopefully
soon will be getting - damn boss!) valuable experience in addition to cash.

~~~
palish
As to 'When to quit?', I was initially aiming for a savings of $15k, but my
savings rate is too slow. I'll be taking the plunge at $10k.

~~~
nostrademons
Man, I feel silly now. I have several times more than $15K saved up. At grad-
school living expenses, perhaps 3 years of runway.

I'm not really sticking with the day job for financial reasons though. I want
to see the product I've been working on ship. Get it into the hands of actual
paying customers. Because I figure then I'll get to see a whole bunch of other
problems that will likely impact the startup too. Much better to make the
initial mistakes on someone else's dime.

Problem is, my day job seems to move at a glacial pace. So despite having a 6
month handicap and about 1/5 the number of man-hours available, my startup may
launch first. If that happens, I'll probably quit the day job whether it's
done or not, because it's just a drag on the startup.

~~~
palish
That's still plenty respectable. Woz designed most of the Apple II in his
apartment while working at Hewlett Packard. However, (if my memory serves me
correctly) he left HP to put the finishing touches on the design before it
launched.

So perhaps it might be best to leave when your product is about 80% to the
point of launching, because then you can focus full time on actually getting
it out the door, and on the aftermath. If you have a day job, it might never
seem like it's ready to launch.

But that's just my hypothesis; I don't have any actual experience with that.
:)

------
zaidf
Funny. And stupid.

