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We wrote a solid application, made a silly video, and got into YC (hack-free?)
- pg 14y ago"We’ll never know if we got in because of our silly accent video." You did not get in because of your silly accent video. (As a rule it's a mistake to try to do amusing things in your video. Gags usually make you harder to understand rather than easier, and since we are usually at or past the limit of understanding when reading applications, any loss there is dangerous.)
- stevewillows 14y agoI really appreciate that you comment on these application posts. It's interesting to hear their theory contrasted by your comments.
- pg 14y agoIf there's a trend, it's that we like people for simpler reasons than they think.
- kami8845 14y agoSo why did you like them, if not for their accents?
- jconley 14y agoI'm no YC dude, but if I were a betting man, I'd give them money due to: 1. History of shipping stuff 2. Huge ass market 3. Solving a real pain point for indie game devs out there 4. Simple, easily understood, business model 5. Domain experience
- callmevlad 14y agoDo you have any advice on the length of the video? The application asks for a "one minute long" video, but most of the accepted videos I've seen are usually longer. Some are as long as 4 minutes. Does the length factor in to your decision?
- state 14y agoIt's really nice to hear a really genuine story about this process. The long list of "hacks" strike me as orthogonal to the simplicity of the application. This is the story I had hoped to hear about the YC process: simple, humane and honest.
- jvrossb 14y agoYou summarized it exactly as we experienced it.
- TheMakeA 14y agoI haven't heard much about the Skype pre-interview. Does anyone know more about that? Are they common?
- CaveTech 14y agoNever had a pre interview before my interview. I think it may be if YC wants to understand something about your application that isn't totally clear, before making a judgement on giving an interview.
- TheMakeA 14y agoThanks, that makes sense.
- fbuilesv 14y agoI'm not sure if everyone receives the same email but last year we got one from Harj Taggar to setup a video call. They wanted to: 1. "Give you a heads up on the kinds of things likely to come up for you specifically at interview". 2. "Let you ask us any questions you might have about YC". It was a 5-10 minutes thing.
- dbecker 14y agoIt's refreshing to hear someone suggest they got in due to their ability to build something, rather than a shortcut or gimmick. Good luck with your business.
- jvrossb 14y agoThanks! It occurred to us that had we been reading HN before applying we'd have gotten a little demoralized once we found out that all YC companies had apparently "hacked" their way in with some generally non-reproducible gimmick. We figured we should point out that this probably isn't the case.
- dbecker 14y agoIf you have time, it'd be nice to read a "what we got out of YC, and how it's shaped our path going forward." This would be interesting independent of whether you are still working on the startup you did with YC.
- jvrossb 14y agoYC changed a lot for us and we're still going strong on the startup we did with YC. Perhaps that'll be next week's blog post :) EDIT: And it'll be full of more silly things we did that probably didn't matter and that you should also not do.
- aptwebapps 14y agoOT, but if someone publishes though you, and you provide art and music, who owns what? What happens if they want to go cross-platform? Do you sign over the rights (if any) to the art to them? Or will you take royalties off the game if ported to, say, Android? Or will it not be permitted at all?
- jvrossb 14y agoSimplified, we own the art and music, the developer owns all the code. We get a license to the code and can publish it across multiple platforms, we owe the developer their share no matter what platform their game ends up on. The developer gets a license for our art only valid if published through us. So if the game is ported by us to Android, we still take royalties. The developer can strip out all of our assets and republish on any platform without giving us a rev share if they want.
- pdog 14y agoCan you share a link to the actual application?
- DesaiAshu 14y agoPDF here: https://s3.amazonaws.com/mgwu/YC+GM.pdf https://s3.amazonaws.com/mgwu/YC+GM.pdf What is interesting to us (discovered as we just re-read it), our slight pivot mid YC was to another idea we listed on our application.
- TheMakeA 14y agoThe proximity sensor hack is delightfully ingenious.
- tomasien 14y agoI feel like a "How to hack the front page of HN" that is about how you shouldn't hack HN: you should just post/write/produce great content is also needed. I'll write it now, post it tomorrow. I feel like the title of this post hints at a similar sentiment.
- tomasien 14y agohttp://tommy.authpad.com/how-to-get-on-the-front-page-of-hacker-news http://tommy.authpad.com/how-to-get-on-the-front-page-of-hac...
- jmharvey 14y agoGlad you wrote this. Looking at my YC batchmates, I don't see a lot of people with "how I got into YC" stories. YC tends to select founders who are both talented and confident, so the overwhelming attitude among founders is, "of course I got in," not, "oh wow, I can't believe that happened!" Of the 80-ish companies in the S12 batch, I can think of 3 with interesting "How I got in to YC" stories, and two of those boil down to, "we had amazing traction." Only Instacart's beer delivery was really a hack, and even that was a demo that their service really worked. The hack stories are interesting because they're rare. It's important to show off your scrappiness and tenacity, but most founders do that by describing something they've done that produced a worthwhile outcome, not by performing a stunt during the application process. The only reliable way I can think of to "hack" the YC application process is to apply with a business that you're going to pursue regardless of whether or not YC accepts you. The YC application is full of questions young companies should ask themselves, anyway, and the added confidence can't hurt during interviews.
- TheMakeA 14y agoI do wonder what percentage of people drop or pivot due to a YC rejection. It seems weird to me that not continuing would be the norm.
- huhtenberg 14y agoYou should've just started video in your native tongues, then slowly transition to the accented English and then phase out the accent as well :)
- TomGullen 14y agoLooks interesting, good luck with it! Good to see more game-dev related startups coming through.
- lloydarmbrust 14y agoHahaha. Glad my misuse of "hack" inspired you to write this great post :)