HN user

2arrs2ells

2,153 karma

interested in:

   * education
   * edtech
   * data problems
Cofounder of Clever (YC S12) https://clever.com

@bytingtheapple

Email = hn username @ gmail.com

[ my public key: https://keybase.io/dcc; my proof: https://keybase.io/dcc/sigs/wfL5WJH6FdQ-6UfpzKeBmoAHoeIHxFkuXOkGHmzPTFg ]

YC Badge: 0x05b3b86ad8d43a45b0ff1b3d4612861679cd22fc

Posts50
Comments370
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cursor.com 2mo ago

Build programmatic agents with the Cursor SDK

2arrs2ells
3pts0
www.raf.xyz 9mo ago

YC, Take Two

2arrs2ells
3pts0
twitter.com 1y ago

We're moving YC to 4 batches/year

2arrs2ells
2pts0
blog.ycombinator.com 5y ago

2020 – Year in Review

2arrs2ells
1pts0
www.nytimes.com 5y ago

At Talkspace, Startup Culture Collides with Mental Health Concerns

2arrs2ells
2pts0
stackoverflow.com 6y ago

Why does `True == False is False` evaluate to False in Python? (2013)

2arrs2ells
268pts217
hechingerreport.org 6y ago

Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

2arrs2ells
324pts372
techcrunch.com 6y ago

Evervault raises $3.2M for an API to build apps with privacy baked in

2arrs2ells
1pts0
twitter.com 6y ago

Bloomberg Misreports on Whatsapp Story

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195pts58
www.atlassian.com 7y ago

Atlassian releases an open term sheet for M&A

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4pts0
waitbutwhy.com 7y ago

Did James Make the Right Final Jeopardy Bet?

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2pts0
www.theregister.co.uk 7y ago

Q: What do you call an IT admin for 20 children? A: A teacher

2arrs2ells
4pts2
motherboard.vice.com 7y ago

MIT PhD Wants to Replace America's Voting Machines with Open Source Software

2arrs2ells
4pts0
www.wired.com 8y ago

How the startup mentality failed kids in San Francisco

2arrs2ells
4pts0
medium.com 8y ago

Postmortem on Last Week’s Outages (Clever – S12)

2arrs2ells
2pts0
blogs.edweek.org 8y ago

A Confession and a Question on Personalized Learning

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2pts1
www.bloomberg.com 8y ago

Good Luck Spending Your Kodakcoins

2arrs2ells
2pts0
medium.com 8y ago

Standard Practice: Building an OpenAPI 2.0 Spec for the Slack Web API

2arrs2ells
4pts0
avnipatelthompson.com 8y ago

Is Y Combinator for me?

2arrs2ells
1pts0
www.wired.com 8y ago

Brash investor tries to blow up the ipo as his partners quit

2arrs2ells
1pts0
cockeyed.com 8y ago

Driving for Lyft in Sacramento

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3pts1
www.nytimes.com 9y ago

Apple’s Devices Lose Luster in American Classrooms

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423pts320
www.kickstarter.com 11y ago

Nikola Phone Case: Power your phone with wasted energy

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1pts0
techcrunch.com 11y ago

Clever (YC S12) Hires VP Engineering from Square

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3pts1
techcrunch.com 12y ago

Facebook Launches “Nearby Friends” With Opt-In Real-Time Location Sharing

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18pts5
venturebeat.com 12y ago

Clever, ‘one of the unsexiest ever’ education startups, solves real problems

2arrs2ells
7pts0
techcrunch.com 12y ago

Clever (YC S12) Confirms $10.3M Raise From Sequoia, Paul Graham

2arrs2ells
69pts14
pandodaily.com 12y ago

Two caterpillars become man-butterflies, form BodBot fitness

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2pts0
stackoverflow.com 13y ago

Why does `True == False is False` evaluate to False in Python? (2013)

2arrs2ells
2pts1
blog.getclever.com 13y ago

SXSWedu - What a week for Clever

2arrs2ells
6pts0

When AI can handle the content, teachers get to focus on motivation, values and emotions.

I started my career as a teacher and spent > 8 hrs a day lesson planning, delivering content & grading. If I could have handed that off to a great program like Bloomy, I could have built far better relationships & my students would have been so much better off.

This is a great example... except I think the right answer to "what exactly would you do in this case?" doesn't support your argument.

I'd document that mobile Opera with Javascript disabled is an unsupported config, and ask a team to make a help center doc asking mobile Opera users to enable JS.

You’re spot on. Bootstrapping a reputation is really hard (and expensive), and the very painful accreditation process makes it much harder (need students to get accredited, can’t offer degree to students without accreditation).

Two good colleges who’ve overcome the challenges recently are Olin (engineering school in Boston) and Minerva (globally distributed college).

New iMac with M4 2 years ago

I bought an M2 iMac for my parents. It’ll last at least five years for them - likely closer to 10. At that point, I’m happy to recycle or donate it and get them a new iMac - likely with some major updates (form factor? Display? Etc?) that wouldn’t get with a RAM / CPU upgrade.

Spending ~$150-$300/year for them to have an easy to use & fast computer feels very worth it for me.

All that said - I would love for the machine to be upgradeable as well! Just explaining why it’s not a dealbreaker.

Claude 2.1 3 years ago

Have heard similar things from friends, who were then able to get access via AWS

Procreate Dreams 3 years ago

If you back up the iPad locally, will it back up Procreate data? I would expect it to...

Product Market Fit 4 years ago

Making an app you spend significant time in every day more useful & powerful can be a path to PMF (see Slack vs Hipchat, for example)

I’d argue Superhuman does have PMF - just in a smaller market of email power users.

Product Market Fit 4 years ago

Your argument is a “unique insight” isn’t enough to provide an enduring competitive advantage (or “moat”). But that’s not what the OP is talking about.

A unique insight (and great timing / market) is often enough to get to early PMF (and - like you mention - to Series A).

Life is not short 4 years ago

<nit> The philosophy behind hospice is that you are *not* hooked up to all sorts of medical equipment. Rather, you only receive the minimal treatment needed to make yourself comfortable as you let your illness run its course. </nit>

It’s not that bad. It’s normal to have your car window broken overnight or to see people shoplifting openly at the pharmacy or grocery store. In certain parts of the city there’s fairly open drug dealing & use. And the homelessness is heartbreaking.

Violent crime / theft happens - but not at a noticeably different rate than other large cities.

Still the most beautiful city in the US (imo) and the natural beauty 30 min outside the city in any direction is insane.

At Clever we include this in our privacy policy. It caused no problems when we sold our company last year:

In the event of a change of control: If we sell, divest or transfer our business, we will not transfer personal information of our customers unless the new owner intends to maintain and provide the Service as a going concern, and provided that the new owner has agreed to data privacy standards no less stringent than our own. In such case we will provide you with notice and an opportunity to opt-out of the transfer of personally identifiable Student Data.

Congratulations, Zach! Codecademy was a huge inspiration for me and a whole generation of edtech founders. It’s been amazing watching the company transition from a wildly viral consumer company to an enterprise powerhouse.