
How about YC-rejected Alumni network? - xmly
I filed 2016W at the very last minute, with no demo as &quot;solo-founder&quot;. Actually I have a cofounder, just I never met him:) So my chance got rejected is much higher than 97%.<p>Today I can not stop thinking why not people got rejected start a network and help each other.<p>At least we could get feedback from each other, which we could not get from rejection.<p>Any thoughts?
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smt88
You don't need more feedback from other, unfunded founders. You need feedback
from customers. Networking with other founders isn't a very useful activity
once you already have your co-founder. If you're not coding, spend all of
every day on customer discovery.

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xmly
then why yc alumni network exists? Why yc provides mentors? Whose feedback is
more valuable, mentors or customers?

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smt88
The entire assumption of YC (and all investors, really) is that they're able
to select companies that are likely to succeed. I'm not saying YC (or anyone)
is good at it, but let's pretend that they are.

You're proposing to create a group of people who YC has decided are _not_
likely to succeed. That doesn't make any sense.

YC alumni might want to be in a network so they can collaborate, make deals
with each other, or find new jobs when their own company fails.

Why would you want to do that with the rejected group? Why not try to do that
with other companies in general? There are lots of opportunities to meet other
founders in any city with a decent level of entrepreneurship.

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jjoe
You're stopping short of saying YC-rejected groups are failures (less likely
to succeed) ergo their advice will certainly fall short. But then we learn
better from failure in general and the failure of others. I think that
rejected YC companies are one step closer to success.

So why not...

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brudgers
I think the process of applying is useful for some people At least for me, it
took me outside my comfort zone. I've always just operated under my own name
and spokesmodelling "a company" instead for the video created a cognitive
shift that I didn't know existed.

This article is probably a reasonable way to look at not getting accepted:
[http://mathwithbaddrawings.com/2015/09/30/why-ive-stopped-
do...](http://mathwithbaddrawings.com/2015/09/30/why-ive-stopped-doing-
interviews-for-yale/)

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jaredsohn
From six years ago:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=550351](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=550351)

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GFischer
Pretty good post. And you get the bonus of Drew Houston saying he got rejected
the first time :)

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Mz
If I understand you correctly, you have not yet been rejected. You are just
having big feels, feeling sure you will be rejected, and are flailing around
looking for an emotional outlet, hoping to find people who will understand
you.

This is the kind of thing where the answer is you write emo poetry or watch
tear jerk movies or something until you have an actual answer in hand.

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xmly
Not really. What I feel bad is a lot of 97% rejected applications may have
pretty solid ideas. We could see the ideas of successful ones from demo day.

My actual purpose is I want to see rest of them.

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Mz
I hate the meme "Ideas don't matter, execution does" but there is a reason it
exists.

I have a sandbox website that I have long neglected where I want to talk about
the architecture of ideas. Execution reveals assumptions you did not know you
had. To have a successful start up, you need a density of value in your
concepts.

I think most failed start ups have serious errors in their ideas, kind of like
early pregnancies that miscarry because they aren't viable.

Unlike pregnancy, a startup has opportunities to become aware that it doesn't
work and to self correct -- to pivot, for example.

You might learn something from seeing all the demos, but a "rejection club" is
not a great way to reach out to people and ask for access to that information.
You aren't even yet rejected. This is just seriously not the way to approach
this.

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xmly
I agree with your comment with ideas. Some ideas are totally not workable.
That is why we could learn more from failures.

Many applicants may not like to show failed application to unknown people. But
to a group of peers who experienced same thing, we could possibly share and
learn from each other's application.

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Mz
Generally speaking, a good example of what actually works is the strongest way
to teach people how to do things that work.

Best of luck.

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pavornyoh
If you have a strong conviction that what you are building/making will
succeed, why do you need a "YC-Rejected Alumni Network? Why do you need the
reminder of the rejection? What will be the purpose of such a network?

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xmly
Maybe as someone said we do not need feedbacks, which I think we all need.

But since already prepared the application, why not show it to more people?

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smt88
> why not show it to more people?

Because most people will have strong opinions about it, and those opinions
will be wrong. The only people who have the right opinions are your
prospective customers. Go show it to them.

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staticautomatic
I'm in.

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sharemywin
I didn't apply can I be in too?

