5 ms·

It's not surprising NewMe didn't get coverage. Taking part in a race-selected accelerator, instead of a quality-selected accelerator, reflects badly. "If their

It's not surprising NewMe didn't get coverage. Taking part in a race-selected accelerator, instead of a quality-selected accelerator, reflects badly. "If their product is so good, why couldn't they get into YC or TechStars?".

aprjoy 15y ago
Hmm...two curious assumptions here: 1) that a "race-selected" accelerator is not a "quality-selected" one and 2) that the NewME companies are all YC and TechStars rejects Curious what led you to them.
- colinplamondon 15y ago
  A race-selected accelerator is filtering based on race first, then on quality. It's not business investment, it's social entrepreneurship. Step 1) Throw out 87% of applications randomly. Step 2) Select based on quality. Step 3) Profit? Compare that to a quality-selected accelerator: Step 1) Select based on quality. Step 2) Profit! A race-based accelerator will only outperform a quality-selected accelerator if there's a race that inherently, innately outperforms all other races. Science has pretty well debunked that one. As to #2, you'd have to be really, really, really stupid to go with a niche accelerator that no one's ever heard of IF given the option of going with YC or TS. NewMe could barely get a mention in TechCrunch, and, when they did, the social entrepreneurship side story beat out the "here are our awesome companies!" story.
  - hackinthebochs 15y ago
    Not necessarily. You're working under the assumption that Black entrepreneurs don't have a harder time getting exposure or VC funding than other groups, thus focusing solely on Black startups will likely yield a suboptimal group. This is likely to be false. If it is the case that Black startups have it harder, it is likely that strong startups exist that are being overlooked in this group. Thus intentionally taking an extra look at black entrepreneurs could in fact be a smart business decision. Furthermore, there's also the uniqueness factor that could bring extra "free" exposure which is the lifeblood of a startup. "Merit" has different meanings in different contexts. In the startup world, merit means whoever will likely bring in the most return on investment. He's betting that the overlooked black startups fit the bill. That's a 100% business calculation.
JabavuAdams 15y ago
> Taking part in a race-selected accelerator, instead of a quality-selected accelerator This is very true. I'm half-black and I've avoided such programs and clubs to avoid being labeled. This is part of a larger issue: "black" is not a culture. What we call "black culture" is more like US-poor-uneducated-black-ghetto-post-slavery-culture. So, if you happen to be black and aren't poor and aren't living in a ghetto, you don't really identify strongly with what most people call "black culture". This means that successful, main-stream blacks (speaking of Canada, here) are dis-inclined to live with or be particularly helpful to struggling blacks. Compound this with other cultural divides like high religiosity of uneducated blacks vs. lower religiosity of educated people in general, and there really is a sense of "those losers are embarrassing us." Contrast this to other minority groups that have strong cultural ties. If Jews are shunned in a country, they tend to set up their own parallel social structures. Chinese help Chinese, etc. Kenyans help Kenyans, and Somalis help Somalis, but blacks (in general) don't really help blacks, because "black" is not a well-defined cultural group. It's only a well-defined cultural stereotype.
- create_account 15y ago
  there really is a sense of "those losers are embarrassing us." Chris Rock has a famous rant about this: "There are black people and there are n!!!ers, and the n!!!ers have got to go"
  - JabavuAdams 15y ago
    Hilarious rant, but there's still the problem of the word "nigger". There's a recent tendency to equate "nigger" with "white trash". White people don't call white trash niggers. Innocent whites weren't hung from trees in living memory with crowds of blacks shouting "white trash!". The word "nigger" is more offensive (for now) because of the history of its use. It's an ugly word. By analogy, ask an Irish Catholic which is more offensive: "white trash" or "dogan". Actually, don't ask, unless you know the person really well.
    - create_account 15y ago
david927 15y ago
Are you kidding? Which one is the quality-selected accelerator? You mentioned YC and TechStars, but both of these have a large number of examples of a selection bias that seems to skew to young, male Ivy League grads. Trying to skew that another way seems like a good idea to me.

aprjoy 15y ago

Hmm...two curious assumptions here: 1) that a "race-selected" accelerator is not a "quality-selected" one and 2) that the NewME companies are all YC and TechStars rejects Curious what led you to them.

colinplamondon 15y ago
A race-selected accelerator is filtering based on race first, then on quality. It's not business investment, it's social entrepreneurship. Step 1) Throw out 87% of applications randomly. Step 2) Select based on quality. Step 3) Profit? Compare that to a quality-selected accelerator: Step 1) Select based on quality. Step 2) Profit! A race-based accelerator will only outperform a quality-selected accelerator if there's a race that inherently, innately outperforms all other races. Science has pretty well debunked that one. As to #2, you'd have to be really, really, really stupid to go with a niche accelerator that no one's ever heard of IF given the option of going with YC or TS. NewMe could barely get a mention in TechCrunch, and, when they did, the social entrepreneurship side story beat out the "here are our awesome companies!" story.
- hackinthebochs 15y ago
  Not necessarily. You're working under the assumption that Black entrepreneurs don't have a harder time getting exposure or VC funding than other groups, thus focusing solely on Black startups will likely yield a suboptimal group. This is likely to be false. If it is the case that Black startups have it harder, it is likely that strong startups exist that are being overlooked in this group. Thus intentionally taking an extra look at black entrepreneurs could in fact be a smart business decision. Furthermore, there's also the uniqueness factor that could bring extra "free" exposure which is the lifeblood of a startup. "Merit" has different meanings in different contexts. In the startup world, merit means whoever will likely bring in the most return on investment. He's betting that the overlooked black startups fit the bill. That's a 100% business calculation.

JabavuAdams 15y ago

> Taking part in a race-selected accelerator, instead of a quality-selected accelerator This is very true. I'm half-black and I've avoided such programs and clubs to avoid being labeled. This is part of a larger issue: "black" is not a culture. What we call "black culture" is more like US-poor-uneducated-black-ghetto-post-slavery-culture. So, if you happen to be black and aren't poor and aren't living in a ghetto, you don't really identify strongly with what most people call "black culture". This means that successful, main-stream blacks (speaking of Canada, here) are dis-inclined to live with or be particularly helpful to struggling blacks. Compound this with other cultural divides like high religiosity of uneducated blacks vs. lower religiosity of educated people in general, and there really is a sense of "those losers are embarrassing us." Contrast this to other minority groups that have strong cultural ties. If Jews are shunned in a country, they tend to set up their own parallel social structures. Chinese help Chinese, etc. Kenyans help Kenyans, and Somalis help Somalis, but blacks (in general) don't really help blacks, because "black" is not a well-defined cultural group. It's only a well-defined cultural stereotype.

create_account 15y ago
there really is a sense of "those losers are embarrassing us." Chris Rock has a famous rant about this: "There are black people and there are n!!!ers, and the n!!!ers have got to go"
- JabavuAdams 15y ago
  Hilarious rant, but there's still the problem of the word "nigger". There's a recent tendency to equate "nigger" with "white trash". White people don't call white trash niggers. Innocent whites weren't hung from trees in living memory with crowds of blacks shouting "white trash!". The word "nigger" is more offensive (for now) because of the history of its use. It's an ugly word. By analogy, ask an Irish Catholic which is more offensive: "white trash" or "dogan". Actually, don't ask, unless you know the person really well.
  - create_account 15y ago

david927 15y ago

Are you kidding? Which one is the quality-selected accelerator? You mentioned YC and TechStars, but both of these have a large number of examples of a selection bias that seems to skew to young, male Ivy League grads. Trying to skew that another way seems like a good idea to me.