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I find this comment surprising. I didn't say anything too controversial. Investors regularly refuse (and it's often the morally correct thing to do) investments

I find this comment surprising. I didn't say anything too controversial. Investors regularly refuse (and it's often the morally correct thing to do) investments in competitors. It's also often in their financial incentive too. To assume any investment organization in broad does differently because of their stated principles is absurd. Most investors would comfortably say this. > YC funds competitors all the time and would never turn down an innovator for anti-competitive reasons While I know your intentions weren't bad, it feels disingenuous to speak so confidently about the behavior of hundreds(?) of investors/employees, regardless of the take. Also getting a seed check from YC doesn't really disprove any of this. The forces of the business immune system he's describing probably wouldn't kick in until later anyway. To be clear I don't think any of this is abnormal behavior (or reprehensible). Regardless I stand by my bet: the successor to Airbnb & Stripe probably wont be YC backed.

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rattray 5y ago
YC is indeed different from VCs in this regard. VCs generally don't fund direct competitors to those in their portfolio, which I agree with you is a good thing -- conditional on there being a lot of VCs out there (which there are). (Btw, in case any reader is not aware, dang is employed by YC to manage HN - and YC acts differently from VCs in many respects).
nus07 5y ago
With all due respect there have been 2-3 HN posts in the last few months about YC and HN being biased towards Stripe. Surely it cannot be so much smoke without a fire.
- dang 5y ago
  That's bad logic in two ways. First, this is the internet. Smoke goes a lot further than that. Second, to the extent that the claims involve HN, (I'm being careful only to comment on facts I personally know about), they're definitely false [1]. So yes, for sure there can be that much fireless smoke. [1] I haven't had a chance to respond properly about those claims yet. Normally I'd have done it by now, but I'm on my phone with intermittent access at the moment, so am a lot slower and don't have my usual tools. Edit: I finally got it out - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30070287 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30070287.
  - dotcoma 5y ago
    dang, imho you’re trying too hard.
    - dang 5y ago
      Sorry, but if someone makes statements about HN or YC that I know to be false, I believe it's my job to correct them—especially since we can't treat this kind of post in the way we normally moderate HN (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20moderate%20less%20%22not%20more%22%20yc&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...). What do you think I should do instead?
      - Kye 5y ago
        I can see someone who isn't convinced you're a fair operator taking the volume and detail of response as defensiveness, and that can look suspicious in a context like this. They aren't right, but I can understand the perspective.
        CTmystery 5y ago
        > They aren't right, but I can understand the perspective. How? I'm curious. If someone makes accusations that you know to be false, wouldn't your best defense be a comprehensive refutation? What alternative do you see that would be more compelling? I, for one, really appreciate this level of detail, because the most common alternative is to attack back mercilessly without evidence. This tactic being commonly employed by politicians the world over.
        Kye 5y ago
        Most of the world's ills would be solved if facts and evidence were enough to convince people.
        dang 5y ago
        I get it too. But when things get to that stage, literally anything you do will be taken as proof of the same nefariousness, whether you sink or you float. I think it makes more sense to focus on the much larger audience that's sincerely making up their mind, and give them good information with which to do it. Could I do that less defensively though? Absolutely. Not there yet.
- deleted 5y ago
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dang 5y ago
My comment wasn't about hundreds of investors -- it was strictly about Y Combinator, which is just one company. I've worked for YC for years and therefore know things about it. Since I don't work on the investment side of the business, there are a lot of details I miss out on, but on the macro level, such as the core patterns by which YC operates, I know quite a bit. Also, part of my job is to be a liaison between HN and YC, and an important part of that is to correct inaccuracies and misperceptions where possible.
- choppaface 5y ago
  But this poster is also a HN "moderator" and has a very biased perspective in this conversation. Moderators are in place to ensure fairness, to act as a referee and prevent spam. It's PR that does the sort of "correct inaccuracies and misperceptions where possible" stuff of effectively using outsized leverage to control the narrative. It's PR that tries to deny that beliefs that are deemed "incorrect." I'm sure that line between PR and "forum mod" can get blurred over the years, but that's exactly the OP's point. The YC community, as it has scaled, is no unbiased marketplace, and it has not handling scaling responsibly. Look at the founders who were ousted from bookface, or even some of the non-public discussions there. The OP's Stripe commentary might be over the top, but YC has yet to produce a mature response to any of these friction points.
  - Permit 5y ago
    > The OP's Stripe commentary might be over the top, but YC has yet to produce a mature response to any of these friction points. How could they produce the mature response you’re looking for when the accusations are full of holes. Lyft isn’t a YC company and didn’t use Stripe initially as he claims. The only “Proof” (his words) posted is incorrect: Stripe posted their blog post before he posted his. He has produced no real evidence for his claims. The evidence he has tried to produce is trivial to check and works against his claims. How should YC respond to this?
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rattray 5y ago

YC is indeed different from VCs in this regard. VCs generally don't fund direct competitors to those in their portfolio, which I agree with you is a good thing -- conditional on there being a lot of VCs out there (which there are). (Btw, in case any reader is not aware, dang is employed by YC to manage HN - and YC acts differently from VCs in many respects).

nus07 5y ago

With all due respect there have been 2-3 HN posts in the last few months about YC and HN being biased towards Stripe. Surely it cannot be so much smoke without a fire.

dang 5y ago
That's bad logic in two ways. First, this is the internet. Smoke goes a lot further than that. Second, to the extent that the claims involve HN, (I'm being careful only to comment on facts I personally know about), they're definitely false [1]. So yes, for sure there can be that much fireless smoke. [1] I haven't had a chance to respond properly about those claims yet. Normally I'd have done it by now, but I'm on my phone with intermittent access at the moment, so am a lot slower and don't have my usual tools. Edit: I finally got it out - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30070287 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30070287.
- dotcoma 5y ago
  dang, imho you’re trying too hard.
  - dang 5y ago
    Sorry, but if someone makes statements about HN or YC that I know to be false, I believe it's my job to correct them—especially since we can't treat this kind of post in the way we normally moderate HN (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=by%3Adang%20moderate%20less%20%22not%20more%22%20yc&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...). What do you think I should do instead?
    - Kye 5y ago
      I can see someone who isn't convinced you're a fair operator taking the volume and detail of response as defensiveness, and that can look suspicious in a context like this. They aren't right, but I can understand the perspective.
      - CTmystery 5y ago
        > They aren't right, but I can understand the perspective. How? I'm curious. If someone makes accusations that you know to be false, wouldn't your best defense be a comprehensive refutation? What alternative do you see that would be more compelling? I, for one, really appreciate this level of detail, because the most common alternative is to attack back mercilessly without evidence. This tactic being commonly employed by politicians the world over.
        Kye 5y ago
        Most of the world's ills would be solved if facts and evidence were enough to convince people.
      - dang 5y ago
        I get it too. But when things get to that stage, literally anything you do will be taken as proof of the same nefariousness, whether you sink or you float. I think it makes more sense to focus on the much larger audience that's sincerely making up their mind, and give them good information with which to do it. Could I do that less defensively though? Absolutely. Not there yet.
deleted 5y ago
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dang 5y ago

My comment wasn't about hundreds of investors -- it was strictly about Y Combinator, which is just one company. I've worked for YC for years and therefore know things about it. Since I don't work on the investment side of the business, there are a lot of details I miss out on, but on the macro level, such as the core patterns by which YC operates, I know quite a bit. Also, part of my job is to be a liaison between HN and YC, and an important part of that is to correct inaccuracies and misperceptions where possible.

choppaface 5y ago
But this poster is also a HN "moderator" and has a very biased perspective in this conversation. Moderators are in place to ensure fairness, to act as a referee and prevent spam. It's PR that does the sort of "correct inaccuracies and misperceptions where possible" stuff of effectively using outsized leverage to control the narrative. It's PR that tries to deny that beliefs that are deemed "incorrect." I'm sure that line between PR and "forum mod" can get blurred over the years, but that's exactly the OP's point. The YC community, as it has scaled, is no unbiased marketplace, and it has not handling scaling responsibly. Look at the founders who were ousted from bookface, or even some of the non-public discussions there. The OP's Stripe commentary might be over the top, but YC has yet to produce a mature response to any of these friction points.
- Permit 5y ago
  > The OP's Stripe commentary might be over the top, but YC has yet to produce a mature response to any of these friction points. How could they produce the mature response you’re looking for when the accusations are full of holes. Lyft isn’t a YC company and didn’t use Stripe initially as he claims. The only “Proof” (his words) posted is incorrect: Stripe posted their blog post before he posted his. He has produced no real evidence for his claims. The evidence he has tried to produce is trivial to check and works against his claims. How should YC respond to this?
- deleted 5y ago
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