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I took more notes the first time Craig spoke at YC than I've done with any other speaker. Most of the time I only write down one or two sentences. The first t
by pg 16y ago
I took more notes the first time Craig spoke at YC than I've done with any other speaker. Most of the time I only write down one or two sentences. The first time Craig spoke I took 4 pages of notes.
- dirtyaura 16y agoI think stories by early employees of successful companies are often the only way to see the messy truth of early stages. Founders are so involved in many aspects that constant self-observation is not possible. At least books by founders highlight the big lows and the big highs, but there are many insights to be gained from smaller daily decisions or way of making them, and I think employees can remember better how was the daily life in the early stages.
- pg 16y agoI've found this too. We also had Shel Kaphan speak, the first employee at Amazon (and really de facto cofounder), and he was very good as well.
- swah 16y agoReminded me of http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/06/done-and-gets-things-smart.html http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/06/done-and-gets-things...: "It's modeled on the early successes I've witnessed at Geoworks, Amazon, and Google, all of whom had one thing in common: they hired brilliant seed engineers."
- seiji 16y agoAfter re-reading the post, this sticks out prominently: "I've been debating whether to say this, since it'll smack vaguely of obsequiousness, but I've realized that one of the Google seed engineers (exactly one) is almost singlehandedly responsible for the amazing quality of Google's engineering culture." Is it Craig?
- swah 16y agoDunno, some folks in the comments also mention Jeff Dean.
- quizbiz 16y agoWhat made his remarks so notable?
- pg 16y agoHe was the only one besides Larry and Sergey who had first hand knowledge of some of the stuff he talked about, because for quite a long time the company was just those three.
- revorad 16y agoCan you please share the notes?
- pg 16y agoUnfortunately I don't think I could. If speakers knew that even notes from what they said were going to get published, they wouldn't be so candid. I talked about that here: http://ycombinator.com/atyc.html http://ycombinator.com/atyc.html What I do do though is incorporate their insights into the general advice I give in essays. That's not just based on my experience with YC-funded startups, but also on things I've heard in talks at YC.