Ask HN: Do any alumni think YC was not worth it?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7482786

by nsted • 12 years ago

16 2 12 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Robby2012• 12 years ago

Why wouldn't it be worth it? I mean, it only lasts 3 months, you get $17,000 and you get access to an incredible network of contacts plus very good feedback. How can't it be worth it?

rdl• 12 years ago

There are absolutely people for whom doing a startup wasn't worth it, both in retrospect, and based on the best information available to them at the time; some in YC.

I don't think YC itself was a bad choice for any of the startups I can think of; there were some cofounder disputes where one of the cofounders added negative value.

There were zombie companies, especially from after the START Fund was $150k (W11, S11, W12, S12) where teams which should have died stayed around due to YC; it might have been better in retrospect if they hadn't done YC and thus had the money to stay in hateful zombie mode.

I could potentially imagine a situation where a company would benefit from YC but would benefit more from it 6mo later, so e.g. doing YC W11 was a mistake and they should have done YC S11 instead; now I think some people are allowed to defer to the next demo day, which solves a lot of that.

Ask HN: Do any alumni think YC was not worth it?

Related Stories