

Show HN: I wrote a guidebook on everything I know about applying to Y Combinator - jasonshen
http://guidetoyc.com

======
pg
I noticed a few mistakes. I only skimmed this, so there may be more, but these
were the obvious ones:

1\. "Y Combinator invests 5k + 5k per founder in exchange for 6-10% equity."

Should be 11k + 3k per founder in exchange for 2-10% (but almost always 7%).

2\. "According to PG, every partner reads every app over a period of about 10
days."

The partners no longer read every application. Alumni reviewers do a first
pass. Better to start from the fact that a partner reading applications will
read 70-100 per day, and do the math based on that.

3\. "Oh god yes, we think of ourselves as just utterly terrible at picking
these terms."

The "terms" must be some kind of transcription error. Teams?

4\. "They truly would love to have every single company they fund be a
"winner" even if there weren’t as many mega companies."

This is the exact opposite of what we think. We're looking for outliers.
That's why we like to fund crazy ideas. There's nothing we like better than
funding an idea that has a small chance of succeeding, but will be huge if it
does.

Of course, once we accept a startup, we want it to succeed. But that is a
separate question.

5\. "The unofficial YC slogan is "Make something people want.""

That's the official slogan. (The unofficial one is "Never a dull moment,"
referring to the fact that with so many startups there is always something
extreme happening on any given day.)

6\. "My thoughts on the demo are actually that it doesn’t play a major role in
YC’s decision."

The demo can matter a lot. It depends on the type of startup. If you're in a
situation where you ought to have something to show for your work so far, it's
bad not to. And no matter what your situation, it helps greatly if you have a
great demo.

7\. "Make sure you try your hardest to get some recommendations."

Actually it would be better to expend that effort on your company or the
application. Don't spend a lot of time spamming YC alumni trying to collect
recommendations. They don't carry any weight with us unless they are very
strong. We can tell the difference between a recommendation that's being made
for our sake (because the alum thinks it would damaging for us to overlook the
application), and one that's being made for the sake of the applicant (e.g.
because the alum is benevolent and they begged him to recommend them).

8\. "PG has started to re-imagine YC as an institution."

It would be more accurate to say that I've started to talk openly about such
things. The imagining started surprisingly early.

~~~
chrisacky
One point which I really was hoping to see covered in the OP article was
timing.

Timing as to when to apply based on your startup's current roadmap.

We've been working on our startup for several months, will be ready to "pre-
launch" beta right around the time we submit our application.

This leaves us in somewhat of a schism. A lot of discussions that I have
briefly had with other entrepreneurs mention that they have either:

A) Just come up with an idea and are in the beginning development stage; or

B) Are already launched and are starting to pick up solid traction.

We are going to be in the middle of this, and will be starting to "pre-launch"
at the beginning of next month with a solid MVP. So we would actually have
quite a lot to show you in this application.

And then secondly, when it comes to the application, what do you prefer,
direct links with logins to a live demo, or a 2-3 minute demo video of our
startup discussing how we will plan to penetrate the market with our
application.

~~~
yaliceme
I have a related question, though at a more micro scale: how early should we
_submit_ our application for the summer 2012 class?

The application page says that "Groups that submit early have a significant
advantage because we have more time to read their applications." It also says
we can edit and resubmit as often as we like. Based on this, we'd be inclined
to submit as soon as we've completed all parts of the application to our own
minimum standard of satisfaction, then update as needed.

However, I've seen pg say in another HN thread that YC does not reread
applications when they are resubmitted, "so submit when you're ready for us to
read it the only time we'll read it."

I perceive the trade-off to be that the earlier we submit, the more time YC
partners have to read our application and engage with us, but the less time we
have to improve the application itself before submitting (better demo, more
up-to-date answers, etc). Do pg and the alumni have any advice on this
question?

I realize the answer may end up being "you will need to evaluate that tradeoff
and decide for yourself."

~~~
pg
You will need to evaluate that tradeoff and decide for yourself.

------
e1ven
I've loaded the page a few times via Coral Cache, so you may be able to read
it here, if wordpress is still misbehaving.

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/0-readme/>

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/1-introduction/>

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/2-why-apply/>

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/3-basic-advice/>

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/4-team/>

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/5-idea/>

[http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/6-users-
distribu...](http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/6-users-
distribution/)

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/7-writing-tips/>

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/8-video-demo/>

[http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-
guide/9-recommendation...](http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-
guide/9-recommendations/)

<http://www.guidetoyc.com.nyud.net/the-guide/10-final-advice/>

~~~
jasonshen
Thanks so much! This is really helpful. I have WP Super Cache installed but
realized it wasn't turned on. Just did that so hopefully this helps!

~~~
dmix
Cloudflare is good for these moments as well.

------
cryptoz
"Your idea is not original"

And if it is? I think I'm the only one building a weather network with cell
phone sensors :).

~~~
ig1
There's at least three companies doing that in London alone (one's a weather
agency the other two are startups)

~~~
cryptoz
Would you care to provide more information? I'd love to know more, but I don't
see anyone else doing this. Maybe I'm searching poorly? I'm collecting
barometer readings, and I'm been search for others doing the same thing for
about 12-15 months now without luck. Any help would be appreciated.

~~~
ig1
I'll see if I can track them down, one of the startups I just met at some
random event, but the other I saw pitching at a pitching event (flagon's den)
so I can probably find them again.

------
capkutay
I'm starting to wonder if being a VC-backed company in the post YCombinator
era puts you at a serious disadvantage by not being in the yc network...

~~~
samstave
Isn't that the Evil Plan! Muahahaha.

Seriously, PG and crew have done an amazing job at positioning themselves to
effectively own 6%+ of every tech win that will come along.

Although, I had posed the question previously about YC cloning itself to
provide a focus on a vertical (i.e. Health) but PG replied that they were
going to stay broadly focused.

Then Rockhealth created a healthcare focused YC clone. I think that is one
opportunity YC missed...

------
switz
[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:7axBGiA...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:7axBGiApdlYJ:www.guidetoyc.com/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

~~~
jasonshen
Oh man, is it crashing already?

~~~
e1ven
It looks like you are using wordpress, and doing DB hits on every pageload.
The easiest thing you might do to get things working again would be to install
a caching engine, which will serve static files.

[http://www.tutorial9.net/tutorials/web-
tutorials/wordpress-c...](http://www.tutorial9.net/tutorials/web-
tutorials/wordpress-caching-whats-the-best-caching-plugin/)

------
rcfox
The "next" links from <http://www.guidetoyc.com/the-guide/5-idea/> points to
<http://www.guidetoyc.com/the-guide/6-customersdistribution/>, which doesn't
exist. It should be <http://www.guidetoyc.com/the-guide/6-users-distribution/>

------
davidcann
Am I reading this wrong or is the math on page 3 off by an order of magnitude?

If this is true: "every partner reads every app over a period of about 10
days" and there are "2000+ applications", then each parter would be reading
200 applications per day, not 20. That means you have 2 minutes to catch their
attention, not 20 minutes. This only further supports the message of that page
- impress fast.

~~~
jasonshen
Great catch! When the traffic dies down a little, I will be updating the text
accordingly:

According to PG, every partner reads every app over a period of about 10 days.
Assuming an 8 hour day with 5 minute breaks each hour means each app gets
about 2 minutes of each partners time on average. (440mins per day / 200 apps
per day = 2.2 mins per app)

------
jasonshen
Deadline is in less than two weeks - if you are thinking about applying, I
hope you find this valuable. YC was a phenomenal experience and I wrote this
guide as a way to give back to the community.

~~~
yaliceme
The deadline is Mar 28, which by my calculation is a little over 3 weeks. Am I
missing something?

------
gwillis13
Your guide was good. Number 4 "Team" caught my attention the most. A solid
team is vital to any endeavor. So it can't be stressed enough who you choose
to work with, needs to be self-motivated.

------
flipside
Great guide! Was a good refresher for me and I could probably add to it (which
probably means I've done too much research).

Now back to hacking on our alpha.

------
nodesocket
Get W3TotalCache installed, and serve a cached static page.

~~~
jasonshen
Thanks. I have WP Super Cache installed but realized it wasn't turned on. Just
did that so hopefully this helps!

------
Tossrock
11 separate pages, with a landing page to get to the 11 separate pages? That
seems a little excessive, especially considering the low content of each page.

~~~
jasonshen
Sorry to make you click so much - I set it up in a chapter model partly to
help me keep track of everything. I think next time, I would make a single
page with quick links to various sections. Lesson learned!

------
mforsberg
I got to read some, but not all. Looking forward to read up on the rest when
you get your hosting in check.

------
loceng
"I’m nontechnical" - your cofounder was technical then?

~~~
jasonshen
I have two cofounders: Kalvin Wang and Randy Pang, both CS majors with startup
engineering experience.

~~~
loceng
Ah gotcha. "I’m nontechnical but happened to have two technical friends and
roommates who both worked at startups." doesn't say that they joined you at
the incubator. :)

And yes, lucky indeed. I'm going to be traveling this summer some in hopes of
finding one or multiple technical cofounders. Already have the idea well-
planned out. They'll work, just need to get the tech cofounders so investors
will even take a look.

~~~
nzmsv
I looked at your blog and saw that you are in Kingston. There are techies here
too, so you might not even have to travel much :)

~~~
loceng
Hmm.. lies! :P I've actually not really had any luck finding any. I must be
looking in the wrong places. Want to grab a tea/coffee? :)

~~~
nzmsv
Sure, send me an email. Address in profile.

~~~
loceng
Cool. Sent. :) Let me know if you find it..

------
inmygarage
I think this guidebook would be a great test case for gumroad (new payment
platform for content). In case you are looking for an easy way for people to
pay for the PDF...

------
crowdjewel
Thanks for the guide Jason. Helpful!

------
quanfucius
Did I just get trolled? "Error establishing a database connection"

