Sincere Apologies to Paul Graham and the Y Combinator Team (from the Seattle Founder's Co-op)

http://crashdev.blogspot.com/2008/04/sincere-apologies-to-paul-graham-and-y.html

by brfox • 18 years ago

70 49 18 years ago

crashdev.blogspot.com

brfox• 18 years ago

Well, I'm very glad that he responded so quickly. I was so excited to see something sort of like YC in Seattle but I was worried about the whole very-similar-application thing. I am glad to hear that he just really admires the YC program and is going to fix up the application.

huherto• 18 years ago

Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery.

lux2• 18 years ago

Very true. I doubt PG and co were losing sleep over a copied application form ;) They're probably watching their competition with much interest. It's not like there's room for only one after all.

lisper• 18 years ago

http://rondam.blogspot.com/2006/10/top-ten-geek-business-myt...

See myth #10

pg6• 18 years ago

The only thing I really worry about is that competitors will use artificial deadlines to panic founders into taking offers from them before they've interviewed with us. 100% of the clones make decisions before we even do interviews, probably not by coincidence. Last year when they made offers to groups that had also been invited to interviews with us, they tried to pressure them into accepting before they'd heard from us. I assume they'll do that again. That makes me mad, I admit. It seems such a nasty thing to do to a group of young founders.

brentr• 18 years ago

At first I wanted to write a response to your comment claiming that the Seattle group is not a competitor. After thinking about what to write for a moment, I realized that debating whether or not they are a competitor is not as important as debating whether or not another program like YC is beneficial to the people on this site and this community as a whole.

I believe another program like YC is valuable. Paul has stated several times that there are good ideas and good teams that he simply could not invite to YC because there were more stellar groups he invited. It does not mean that those not invited by YC should not have the opportunity to be funded. The Seattle program is simply another route to the ultimate goal: a nice payday.

gruseom2• 18 years ago

I've written many times [...] so I was caught by surprise

Reading that, it occurred to me that one of the gotchas here is the statelessness of the web. "Statelessness" isn't quite what I mean. "Contextlessness" might be better. URLs are pointers that jump directly to content that mostly gets consumed atomically, without reference to anything else the author has said/done. Of course if readers want context they have ample opportunity to explore: look at what else is on the site, google the sources and so on. But most won't. (I often do, but I didn't this time.) I wonder if one way to mitigate this is to make content more self-describing.

ecommercematt• 18 years ago

Do you have ideas on how to do that?

gruseom2• 18 years ago

Nothing well-formed; I've hardly thought about it. By the way, I didn't mean "self-describing" in any technical sense (like the way Alan Kay might use the phrase - though that is super cool). What I mean is, if there's context that's essential to understanding what you're saying on page X, maybe you should include it in X, or at least a noticeable link to it. Even at the cost of some duplication.

For example, would it have changed your perception of the Founders Co-op application if it had, at the bottom, a link to a FAQ like "Isn't this just like YC" or even "How is this different from other early-stage funds"?

bouncingsoul3• 18 years ago

What really bothers me about YC-clones copying the application form is how little it shows the group has thought about the program they're starting.

How is it possible that PG nailed down exactly what every seed investor would ever want to know about startup founders seeking funding? Don't these investors have any other questions? Do they actually call people hackers in real life? Is a couple sentences about each founder the maximum all investors are capable of reading?

So I'm left wondering if the lack of thought that went into the application carries over into the rest of the program.

davidw3• 18 years ago

You think an application form indicates thought about the program? They're just going to copy a few forms and start throwing thousands of dollars at people... Right...

If this were a statically typed conversation, it would have been impossible to make a mountain from this molehill.

bouncingsoul3• 18 years ago

I don't understand your comment. Could you clarify?

pg6• 18 years ago

This was nice of them. It didn't bother us too much. We were indignant the first time someone copied our application form, but at least these guys admitted it.

brlewis• 18 years ago

Additionally, the obsolete question(s) on their application (no longer present on YC applications) were not their fault. A bug has been filed with y2combinator: http://y2combinator.com/

keating• 18 years ago

It kind of reminds me of a salary history where a company wants to pay you according to how other companies value you, instead of making their own determination.

It's like they don't know what to ask, so they went with what you came up with. Well, if they can't figure out what information they need on their own, how are they going to figure out who to invest in on their own?

kirubakaran2• 18 years ago

These guys have suddenly gained a lot of respect in my eyes.

axod• 18 years ago

The old bait'n'switch at work ;)

Do something a bit bad, get some publicity, then apologize profusely!

llimllib• 18 years ago

Somebody's taken their Apple™ Marketing Training Course.

kirubakaran2• 18 years ago

I hope it is not that... That would kinda ruin my faith in humanity.

edw519• 18 years ago

Me too. I have already retracted the not so nice things I said about them here

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=165368

okeumeni2• 18 years ago

We have built a search of their sites and blogs, whatever you want to know about Founder's co-op, just search for it here: http://www.intelliverb.com/Search/?ul=en-us&six=src63343...

johnrob• 18 years ago

I'd just like to mention that, if YC clones use the same application forms, it does make life easier for the applicants...

attack_forgotpw3• 18 years ago

That's what I assumed what they were going for. Actually, I fully support this approach.

colellm• 18 years ago

A lot of the applications for the yc like programs are similar (ex. launchboxdigital), which, I agree, does make it easier to apply to multiple programs.

daniel-cussen• 18 years ago

Makes me think of Techstars...I don't think they're an all-out ripoff. Maybe they just came up with a similar idea before YC started. When they saw YC, they didn't feel they were copycats, but had to adapt to YC's presence. Just a guess.

Sincere Apologies to Paul Graham and the Y Combinator Team (from the Seattle Founder's Co-op)

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