The thing that stands out to me the most is the sentiment. This reads like a big rant as in saying "I did all the things textbooks say, why didn't it work out?"

The thing that stands out to me the most is the sentiment. This reads like a big rant as in saying "I did all the things textbooks say, why didn't it work out?" That is as if to say "I've gone to the music school, why am I not a k-pop mega star yet?" A lot of people will not look at the 200k this person didn't make as "lost"; rather the cost of learning expensive lessons. The first lesson should have been that we're not in 2007 anymore. Sprinkling tech on random things has a small chance of working out. They did not have any domain knowledge or connections to schools nor restaurants. They were just users of them, like everybody else. Building a startup is a beautiful thing but it requires relentless optimism and actually feeling the problem. Enough to say that's how YC finds its cohort.