4 ms·

I am not discounting the application of "poetic" solutions, certainly there are cases where this is a justified approach. E.g. I think this is particularly rel

by jayruy 16y ago

I am not discounting the application of "poetic" solutions, certainly there are cases where this is a justified approach. E.g. I think this is particularly relevent in regards to parallelization. There's a time for poetry and a time for prose: I'm merely saying that neither side should be throwing epithets. pg extracts shareholder value by managing the artistic/economic gap. I am not being critical: this is a perfectly valid thing to do with one's time, I'd take his job in a heartbeat =o) However, I'd wager that if you added up salaries forgone by ycombinator participants and compared them against aggregate payout it would paint a fairly bleak economic picture.

apu 16y ago
I'd wager that if you added up salaries forgone by ycombinator participants and compared them against aggregate payout it would paint a fairly bleak economic picture. I'd take that wager at a 100:1 payout in a heartbeat! My guess is that it takes 5-7 years for payouts to start happening from startups, so allowing for that much time, I have no doubt that the total payout will be much greater than would be from regular salaries. All you need are a few to hit it out of the park, and you've covered everyone. Of course, we're talking about aggregates here; I could certainly imagine that for some fraction of the participants, it might be a net lose monetarily.
- jayruy 16y ago
  http://sam.bluwiki.com/blog/2007/04/y-combinators-portfolio.html http://sam.bluwiki.com/blog/2007/04/y-combinators-portfolio.... Their most successful sale is still Reddit, yes? Assuming moderate dilution, I imagine payout per founder in the $1mm-$2mm range. Assuming the average ycombinator is capable of securing a 6-figure job, their greatest success only accounts for 2 years living wages of 10 failures. Forget the multi-million dollar company valuations: almost everyone on this board would have a multi-million dollar valuation if they were willing (or legally able) to sell ownership over all their future cash flows.
- jayruy 16y ago
  In the interest of being sporting amidst all the downvotes - happy to make this wager up to $1k to anyone who P.M.'s me - we can draw up reasonable terms. Please note I have the greatest respect for entrepreneurs and what they do, I'm just making the point that what they do is not economically motivated in general. I'm also not making a comment on whether ycombinator itself does well - their investments are much smaller than forgone wages.

by jayruy 16y ago

apu 16y ago

I'd wager that if you added up salaries forgone by ycombinator participants and compared them against aggregate payout it would paint a fairly bleak economic picture. I'd take that wager at a 100:1 payout in a heartbeat! My guess is that it takes 5-7 years for payouts to start happening from startups, so allowing for that much time, I have no doubt that the total payout will be much greater than would be from regular salaries. All you need are a few to hit it out of the park, and you've covered everyone. Of course, we're talking about aggregates here; I could certainly imagine that for some fraction of the participants, it might be a net lose monetarily.

jayruy 16y ago
http://sam.bluwiki.com/blog/2007/04/y-combinators-portfolio.html http://sam.bluwiki.com/blog/2007/04/y-combinators-portfolio.... Their most successful sale is still Reddit, yes? Assuming moderate dilution, I imagine payout per founder in the $1mm-$2mm range. Assuming the average ycombinator is capable of securing a 6-figure job, their greatest success only accounts for 2 years living wages of 10 failures. Forget the multi-million dollar company valuations: almost everyone on this board would have a multi-million dollar valuation if they were willing (or legally able) to sell ownership over all their future cash flows.
jayruy 16y ago
In the interest of being sporting amidst all the downvotes - happy to make this wager up to $1k to anyone who P.M.'s me - we can draw up reasonable terms. Please note I have the greatest respect for entrepreneurs and what they do, I'm just making the point that what they do is not economically motivated in general. I'm also not making a comment on whether ycombinator itself does well - their investments are much smaller than forgone wages.