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Something about "startups fail because they simply don't listen to us, get confused, and stop working" feels wrong coming from the President of YC. It bothers m
by subdane 11y ago
Something about "startups fail because they simply don't listen to us, get confused, and stop working" feels wrong coming from the President of YC. It bothers me that there's no institutional or personal responsibility being taken. It also bothers me that the risk the founders took isn't being acknowledged - that all the failures are being placed back on the founders' shoulders. YC selected these founders from thousands in an incredibly selective process. Why is Sama crapping on alumni? Wouldn't you want your president going to bat for you and defending your efforts?
- coffeemug 11y ago> Why is Sama crapping on alumni? I don't think he's doing that at all. He merely observed a negative pattern that many startups tend to fall into by default, and warned people about that pattern. The tone of the post is clearly "it's easy to make this mistake, don't make it", not "if you make this mistake you're an idiot." The latter interpretation is perhaps the least charitable you could have picked. I do think there is a kernel of truth in your comment. YC tests a lot of assumptions and tries a lot of things. Many of the tests work out, some don't. This means that at some point they've necessarily given founders bad advice that people then went on to execute on. I think that's something worth acknowledging explicitly (e.g. "hey, we thought this was right but it turned out to be wrong; sorry"). But there is a huge gap between that, and what you referred to as "crapping on alumni".