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I'm the technical guy behind SumZero and I'd have to say that your comments are spot on. It can be very difficult to get a good rating on the site, those ideas

by conorh 16y ago

I'm the technical guy behind SumZero and I'd have to say that your comments are spot on. It can be very difficult to get a good rating on the site, those ideas that do tend to be exceptional and get a significant amount of attention.

dsplittgerber 16y ago
Do you know about any other of those types of clubs?
- jakarta 16y ago
  The biggest difference between VIC and SZ is that VIC requires members to stay anonymous whereas SZ posts your full name and where you work whenever you post an idea. You can often figure out the identity of a VIC member because you'll see them post the exact same idea on SumZero at the same time. So that's eroded a bit of the anonymity. Some people disagree with the lack of anonymity, they think that without it people will be influenced when it comes to rate ideas. It's been my experience so far that this is actually not the case. Well rated ideas mostly get there on their own merit.
  - dsplittgerber 16y ago
    Great insights, thanks! What I personally struggle with is learning all the necessary knowledge and lingo, coming from a different field - it's so much harder to even get to the point where you might come up with an investment idea of your own when you're not doing it professionally (yet).
    - jakarta 16y ago
      On sites like VIC, you can grab a guest account where you see ideas that are 45 days old. SumZero also has their weekly idea e-mail which Conor mentioned above. From there, I think you can get a really good understanding of how to lay out your investment thesis and what kinds of factors are relevant. I spent a good amount of time reverse engineering ideas on VIC before submitting my own. You'll pick up all kinds of relevant metrics/industry lingo by doing that.
conorh 16y ago
Also, and sorry for the plug, but I think it is relevant here. If you are interested in seeing the quality of ideas that come through SumZero you should sign up for our individual investor mailing list - http://sumzero.com/retail/users http://sumzero.com/retail/users. Each week we send out a top idea to the members on the list. edit: There are some sample ideas on that page.
- davidw 16y ago
  Do you have an example mail or two from that to see if it's at all something that is relevant to me?
  - SkyMarshal 16y ago
    http://sumzero.com/retail/users http://sumzero.com/retail/users Check the sidebar.
- adrianwaj 16y ago
  "There are actually two sites that exist where you can apply for entry. They are heavily populated by people who already work at hedge funds, so the process is pretty rigorous." Here's an idea: let HN users above a threshold post ideas into the site. I recall hedge funds investing in startups. http://www.hackernewsers.com http://www.hackernewsers.com has already devised a way to verify its accounts against underlying HN accounts. Users can also link to a Stack Overflow account, and in theory users should be able to link to freelancer sites for gathering metrics on a user. I'd have a way whereby hackers can take a YC application form and submit it to sumzero users: either all, a named list, or upon request. Have a way where feedback can be given as well. If not the YC application form, then they can pick from say 5 different submission forms, all varying in detail and types of information submitted.

by conorh 16y ago

dsplittgerber 16y ago

Do you know about any other of those types of clubs?

jakarta 16y ago
The biggest difference between VIC and SZ is that VIC requires members to stay anonymous whereas SZ posts your full name and where you work whenever you post an idea. You can often figure out the identity of a VIC member because you'll see them post the exact same idea on SumZero at the same time. So that's eroded a bit of the anonymity. Some people disagree with the lack of anonymity, they think that without it people will be influenced when it comes to rate ideas. It's been my experience so far that this is actually not the case. Well rated ideas mostly get there on their own merit.
- dsplittgerber 16y ago
  Great insights, thanks! What I personally struggle with is learning all the necessary knowledge and lingo, coming from a different field - it's so much harder to even get to the point where you might come up with an investment idea of your own when you're not doing it professionally (yet).
  - jakarta 16y ago
    On sites like VIC, you can grab a guest account where you see ideas that are 45 days old. SumZero also has their weekly idea e-mail which Conor mentioned above. From there, I think you can get a really good understanding of how to lay out your investment thesis and what kinds of factors are relevant. I spent a good amount of time reverse engineering ideas on VIC before submitting my own. You'll pick up all kinds of relevant metrics/industry lingo by doing that.

conorh 16y ago

Also, and sorry for the plug, but I think it is relevant here. If you are interested in seeing the quality of ideas that come through SumZero you should sign up for our individual investor mailing list - http://sumzero.com/retail/users http://sumzero.com/retail/users. Each week we send out a top idea to the members on the list. edit: There are some sample ideas on that page.

davidw 16y ago
Do you have an example mail or two from that to see if it's at all something that is relevant to me?
- SkyMarshal 16y ago
  http://sumzero.com/retail/users http://sumzero.com/retail/users Check the sidebar.
adrianwaj 16y ago
"There are actually two sites that exist where you can apply for entry. They are heavily populated by people who already work at hedge funds, so the process is pretty rigorous." Here's an idea: let HN users above a threshold post ideas into the site. I recall hedge funds investing in startups. http://www.hackernewsers.com http://www.hackernewsers.com has already devised a way to verify its accounts against underlying HN accounts. Users can also link to a Stack Overflow account, and in theory users should be able to link to freelancer sites for gathering metrics on a user. I'd have a way whereby hackers can take a YC application form and submit it to sumzero users: either all, a named list, or upon request. Have a way where feedback can be given as well. If not the YC application form, then they can pick from say 5 different submission forms, all varying in detail and types of information submitted.