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Does YC see a problem with founders being the technical developers? When I saw their bio when this was announced a few months back, I did scratch my head a lit

by talbina 16y ago

Does YC see a problem with founders being the technical developers? When I saw their bio when this was announced a few months back, I did scratch my head a little. One was a PhD in computer science, the other was a researcher at ARM. None had a media background. I just wish people stop thinking that journalism is a technology problem.It doesn't matter how good your platform is. This hacker culture of thinking everything can be solved with guru developer skills needs to stop. Here are some qoutes from that letter: "If I could rewind and start again then I believe the pitch for NewsLabs should have been simpler and much more realistic: we will build you a technology platform and strive to work hard for you as programmers... but we cannot magically generate you an online brand or guarantee traffic." "It seemed like we had the right parts (your writing and our technology)..." This is why Mark MacLeod, in a recent post on his blog startupcfo.ca, said that one of the traits for a successful founder is domain knowledge: "Lets look at domain knowledge first. This is not about having studied or otherwise artificially gotten to “know” the industry. This is about coming from that industry, having lived it, knowing the players and knowing the pain firsthand. There is no substitute for this. You can’t fake it. You either come from the space or you don’t."

brandnewlow 16y ago
World Cup-related allusion: Which is why I'm not surprised at all that Argentina's team is playing its heart out for Maradona. The man may be a lunatic and borderline incompetent as an organizer, but he has the domain knowledge and knows the pain points of winning a World Cup as an Argentinian side better than anyone.
hboon 16y ago
This advice that a successful founder has domain knowledge runs contrary to what's said of PayPal though. From a recent thread in HN: http://primitus.com/blog/why-did-so-many-successful-entrepreneurs-and-startups-come-out-of-paypal-answered-by-insiders/ http://primitus.com/blog/why-did-so-many-successful-entrepre... PayPal had a strong bias toward hiring (and promoting / encouraging, as Keith mentions) smart, driven problem solvers, rather than subject matter experts I doubt there's a hard and fast rule.
ErrantX 16y ago
> None had a media background. With utter honesty; this was my biggest concern with the whole thing. I believe that the guys actually had a different idea when pitching to YC and they were "redirected" onto this idea.
- qeorge 16y ago
  I believe that the guys actually had a different idea when pitching to YC and they were "redirected" onto this idea. Interesting you say that, given how well the idea matched the first RFS. [1] For better or for worse, I got the same impression about NowMov. [1] http://ycombinator.com/rfs1.html http://ycombinator.com/rfs1.html
- zaidf 16y ago
  It's a high risk, high reward game(duh). If these guys would have come out with some super crazy thing that took off, we'd be using it as an example of how it helps to be ignorant. Most successful entrepreneurs in their 20s don't have domain knowledge. Ones that succeed usually do a kickass job of turning the industry upside down.
randomtask 16y ago
"This hacker culture of thinking everything can be solved with guru developer skills needs to stop." Why? I don't see a downside to self-assuredness, even downright arrogance, when it comes to tackling problems. Sure, maybe every problem can't be solved by every person who tries, but why should you or anyone else care if they are willing to give it a shot?
- csallen 16y ago
  He isn't saying that hackers shouldn't try to solve problems. He's just saying that they should go about solving them with more understanding and in a more intelligent manner.
  - randomtask 16y ago
    No, but (s)he does seem to be of the opinion that they shouldn't be trying to solve this one: "I just wish people stop thinking that journalism is a technology problem.It doesn't matter how good your platform is." Maybe that's true. Maybe the Newslab guys were doomed to fail from the beginning. However, who's to say they shouldn't have tried? There's nothing wrong with trying out an idea no matter how slim its chance of success might seem to be.
    - talbina 16y ago
      I didn't mean to imply that they shouldn't have tried. I'm just concerned about some VCs think that one of the main criteria is having technical founders. Historically, this hasn't worked in journalism. TechCrunch, HuffPo, Drudge, Business Insider...none of these were started by technical founders.
      - randomtask 16y ago
        I don't feel like you're comparing like with like here. TC, HuffPo, Drudge, etc are all content providers/aggregators. Newstilt on the other hand were going to provide services and software to journalists of which it seems aggregation was only a part. From this outsider's perspective at least they seemed to be in a good position starting out. They had seemingly recruited established journalists and other people from the industry who were able to tell them what they needed. I don't think it's far fetched to think that a startup like this that marries software and journalism could form the basis of a successful startup. I do think this could be done with mostly if not entirely technical founders. I think others are betting on that too: http://www.medill.northwestern.edu/admissions/page.aspx?id=58645 http://www.medill.northwestern.edu/admissions/page.aspx?id=5...
donw 16y ago
This. I see many, many developers going to battle about the technical merits of X versus Y. Platform A can't scale, but platform B takes too long to produce code. You've got to understand the problem that you solve for your customers if you're going to write something that they need. You need to understand your customers if you're going to write something that they want. I guarantee that your customers don't give a shit whether or not your product is written in Ruby, or Python, or PHP, or Java, or Clojure, or Scala, or even Brainfuck. Write it in Malebodge if that's what you're happiest working in. But whatever you do, write something that solves a problem.
zaidf 16y ago
"Lets look at domain knowledge first. This is not about having studied or otherwise artificially gotten to “know” the industry. This is about coming from that industry, having lived it, knowing the players and knowing the pain firsthand. There is no substitute for this. You can’t fake it. You either come from the space or you don’t." And yet there are plenty of successful stories of founders who excelled because they had no prior experience in the industry and saw things differently than all the other experienced industry joes.

by talbina 16y ago

brandnewlow 16y ago

World Cup-related allusion: Which is why I'm not surprised at all that Argentina's team is playing its heart out for Maradona. The man may be a lunatic and borderline incompetent as an organizer, but he has the domain knowledge and knows the pain points of winning a World Cup as an Argentinian side better than anyone.

hboon 16y ago

This advice that a successful founder has domain knowledge runs contrary to what's said of PayPal though. From a recent thread in HN: http://primitus.com/blog/why-did-so-many-successful-entrepreneurs-and-startups-come-out-of-paypal-answered-by-insiders/ http://primitus.com/blog/why-did-so-many-successful-entrepre... PayPal had a strong bias toward hiring (and promoting / encouraging, as Keith mentions) smart, driven problem solvers, rather than subject matter experts I doubt there's a hard and fast rule.

ErrantX 16y ago

> None had a media background. With utter honesty; this was my biggest concern with the whole thing. I believe that the guys actually had a different idea when pitching to YC and they were "redirected" onto this idea.

qeorge 16y ago
I believe that the guys actually had a different idea when pitching to YC and they were "redirected" onto this idea. Interesting you say that, given how well the idea matched the first RFS. [1] For better or for worse, I got the same impression about NowMov. [1] http://ycombinator.com/rfs1.html http://ycombinator.com/rfs1.html
zaidf 16y ago
It's a high risk, high reward game(duh). If these guys would have come out with some super crazy thing that took off, we'd be using it as an example of how it helps to be ignorant. Most successful entrepreneurs in their 20s don't have domain knowledge. Ones that succeed usually do a kickass job of turning the industry upside down.

randomtask 16y ago

"This hacker culture of thinking everything can be solved with guru developer skills needs to stop." Why? I don't see a downside to self-assuredness, even downright arrogance, when it comes to tackling problems. Sure, maybe every problem can't be solved by every person who tries, but why should you or anyone else care if they are willing to give it a shot?

csallen 16y ago
He isn't saying that hackers shouldn't try to solve problems. He's just saying that they should go about solving them with more understanding and in a more intelligent manner.
- randomtask 16y ago
  No, but (s)he does seem to be of the opinion that they shouldn't be trying to solve this one: "I just wish people stop thinking that journalism is a technology problem.It doesn't matter how good your platform is." Maybe that's true. Maybe the Newslab guys were doomed to fail from the beginning. However, who's to say they shouldn't have tried? There's nothing wrong with trying out an idea no matter how slim its chance of success might seem to be.
  - talbina 16y ago
    I didn't mean to imply that they shouldn't have tried. I'm just concerned about some VCs think that one of the main criteria is having technical founders. Historically, this hasn't worked in journalism. TechCrunch, HuffPo, Drudge, Business Insider...none of these were started by technical founders.
    - randomtask 16y ago
      I don't feel like you're comparing like with like here. TC, HuffPo, Drudge, etc are all content providers/aggregators. Newstilt on the other hand were going to provide services and software to journalists of which it seems aggregation was only a part. From this outsider's perspective at least they seemed to be in a good position starting out. They had seemingly recruited established journalists and other people from the industry who were able to tell them what they needed. I don't think it's far fetched to think that a startup like this that marries software and journalism could form the basis of a successful startup. I do think this could be done with mostly if not entirely technical founders. I think others are betting on that too: http://www.medill.northwestern.edu/admissions/page.aspx?id=58645 http://www.medill.northwestern.edu/admissions/page.aspx?id=5...

donw 16y ago

This. I see many, many developers going to battle about the technical merits of X versus Y. Platform A can't scale, but platform B takes too long to produce code. You've got to understand the problem that you solve for your customers if you're going to write something that they need. You need to understand your customers if you're going to write something that they want. I guarantee that your customers don't give a shit whether or not your product is written in Ruby, or Python, or PHP, or Java, or Clojure, or Scala, or even Brainfuck. Write it in Malebodge if that's what you're happiest working in. But whatever you do, write something that solves a problem.

zaidf 16y ago

"Lets look at domain knowledge first. This is not about having studied or otherwise artificially gotten to “know” the industry. This is about coming from that industry, having lived it, knowing the players and knowing the pain firsthand. There is no substitute for this. You can’t fake it. You either come from the space or you don’t." And yet there are plenty of successful stories of founders who excelled because they had no prior experience in the industry and saw things differently than all the other experienced industry joes.