>YC famously claims it is not a VC fund because it invests their own money, Th label "VC fund" can be imprecise because YC itself has changed its structure ove

>YC famously claims it is not a VC fund because it invests their own money, Th label "VC fund" can be imprecise because YC itself has changed its structure over the years. The original 2005 YCombinator where Paul Graham & Friends used some of their personal Yahoo wealth from selling ViaWeb ... instead of raising outside money from "limited partners" ... was the period when they were more like "angel investors". Today, YC is more institutionalized and has different funds that raise money from outside investors as limited partners -- very much like traditional VC funds. (https://www.google.com/search?q=YC+new+funds+raise+billions https://www.google.com/search?q=YC+new+funds+raise+billions) But YC still doesn't do all the typical "vc fund" procedures such as take a board seat or negotiate a different % with each startup founder on a case-by-case basis. The VC funds like Sequoia/a16z/etc will require a board seat and negotiate different ownership percentages. So today's YC is a "semi" VC fund depending which aspects are salient to you.