5 ms·

This is a comment from an assessment of the previous generation of Thiel fellows found here: http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/24/examining-the-thiel-fellowship-whe

This is a comment from an assessment of the previous generation of Thiel fellows found here: http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/24/examining-the-thiel-fellowship-where-are-they-now/ http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/24/examining-the-thiel-fellows... > But what do these companies do? Can we get some specifics? Other than "Upstart", no mention is given of any of the companies. If you go to the Thiel Fellowship website, there is no list of startups founded by these fellows. They do have a list of present and past fellows, but the profile pages mostly link to either the fellows' personal websites (not company websites), or dead links. Without any concrete evidence of these companies even existing, or doing anything useful (instead of just talking about what they're "going to do", or name-dropping all the investors they've attracted), this all sounds like a bunch of hot air. Not to be cynical, and I wish all these people success, but so far they haven't demonstrated that they've actually done anything. The entire Thiel fellow program is an exercise in finding out which baby can stand up the fastest and projecting that being the first to stand up somehow makes one a genius. It's little different from child beauty pageants and dog shows.

brackin 13y ago
Your assumptions are based on a PandoDaily post where they cover just a few of the fellows that have decided to publicise their companies. There's a wider (but far from full) list here. https://www.quora.com/Thiel-Fellows/What-were-the-results-of-the-first-Thiel-Fellowship-Class https://www.quora.com/Thiel-Fellows/What-were-the-results-of... I'd say most of the projects aren't known about (in beta, not startups, not publicised or not launched) at this point, some will fail but I can see quite a few big tech companies springing up from that batch. I believe they said today that fellows have raised $34M+ in funding and I know quite a few YC founders in the fellowship and I've only just scratched the surface of speaking to people.
zerotoone 13y ago
confluence, you've been awfully negative about the fellowship and Peter Thiel thus far. However, you should be careful to not conflate the lack of readily available data on the fellows with lack of progress on their end. The fact that there isn't much press is a (very) rough indicator that the fellows are spending time working with their heads-down rather than attention-whoring. Anyways, I'll do some homework for you and dig up some concrete cases of what the fellows have done: - Andrew Hsu raised $1.5M as a solo founder for Airy Labs from Google Ventures and Foundation Capital (http://www.forbes.com/sites/briancaulfield/2011/08/04/names-you-need-to-know-andrew-hsu-19-raises-1-5m-for-educational-gaming-startup/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/briancaulfield/2011/08/04/names-...) - Ben Yu has built a transdermal caffeine company (http://sprayableenergy.com/ http://sprayableenergy.com/), which he holds provisional patents for (http://benyu.org/thiel-fellowship-closing-ceremony-speech http://benyu.org/thiel-fellowship-closing-ceremony-speech) - Clay Allsopp is building Propeller (http://usepropeller.com/ http://usepropeller.com/), a drag-and-drop native iOS app builder. He has also authored a RubyMotion book (http://pragprog.com/book/carubym/rubymotion http://pragprog.com/book/carubym/rubymotion). - Connor Zwick is building YC-backed Coco Controller (http://techcrunch.com/2012/08/14/the-yc-backed-coco-controller-will-turn-your-iphone-into-a-gaming-powerhouse/ http://techcrunch.com/2012/08/14/the-yc-backed-coco-controll...) to augment iOS and Android gaming. He also has a Flashcards app with 1M+ downloads (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/flashcards+/id408490162?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/flashcards+/id408490162?mt=8). - Darren Zhu is working on a synthetic biology company and has gotten a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/06/thiel-fellows-are-making-the-grade/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/06/thiel-fellows-are-making-th...). - Dale J Stephens has published a book, Hacking Your Education (http://www.amazon.com/Hacking-Your-Education-Lectures-Thousands/dp/0399159967 http://www.amazon.com/Hacking-Your-Education-Lectures-Thousa...) through Perigee Books, and has launched the UnCollege movement (http://www.uncollege.org/ http://www.uncollege.org/) - Daniel Friedman is building personalized online education startup Thinkful, which has raised $1M (http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/peter-thiel-backs-thinkful-for-personalized-online-education/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/peter-thie...). - Eden Full is building the SunSaluter (http://www.sunsaluter.com/ http://www.sunsaluter.com/) through her social venture Roseicollis Technologies, which has won the Westly Prize, the Mashable-UN Foundation Startups for Social Good Challenge, second prize at the Postcode Lottery Green Challenge, and the grand prize at the Staples-Ashoka Youth Social Entrepreneurship Challenge (http://www.linkedin.com/in/edenfull http://www.linkedin.com/in/edenfull). - James Proud sold his company GigLocator for undisclosed 6-figure sum (http://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2012/06/20/skip-school-sell-company-meet-the-thiel-fellow-who-just-turned-a-profit/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2012/06/20/skip-school-s...) - Laura Deming has her own fund (http://www.forbes.com/pictures/mkg45jfej/laura-deming-18-2/ http://www.forbes.com/pictures/mkg45jfej/laura-deming-18-2/) and has been working working closely with biotech legend Corey Goodman to fund anti-aging therapies. She also spoke at TEDMED 2013 (http://www.tedmed.com/speakers/show?id=46921 http://www.tedmed.com/speakers/show?id=46921) - Nick Cammarata "started a company that was recently acquired" (http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/24/examining-the-thiel-fellowship-where-are-they-now/ http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/24/examining-the-thiel-fellows...). - Paul Gu is working with Upstart, which raised $5.9M as a kickstarter for people (http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/22/upstart-grabs-5-9-million-to-let-investors-back-people-yep-a-kickstarter-for-people/ http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/22/upstart-grabs-5-9-million-t...) - Ritik Malhotra is working on YC-backed Streem, a Dropbox for Video (https://angel.co/streem https://angel.co/streem) - Sujay Tyle is working at Developer Auction (http://techcrunch.com/2013/01/21/developerauction-sujay-tyle/ http://techcrunch.com/2013/01/21/developerauction-sujay-tyle...), which has raised $2.7M (http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/03/14/developerauction-raises-2-7m-seed-for-tech-hiring-service/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/03/14/developera...) - Taylor Wilson is building small nuclear fission reactors (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HL1BEC024g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HL1BEC024g) - Tom Currier built out a robotic solar panel tracking company (http://www.qbotix.com/ http://www.qbotix.com/) that has raised $7.5M total (http://www.qbotix.com/pressseptember4/ http://www.qbotix.com/pressseptember4/) and got a couple patents for it (http://www.google.com/patents/WO2011150373A1 http://www.google.com/patents/WO2011150373A1, http://www.google.com/patents/WO2012009470A1 http://www.google.com/patents/WO2012009470A1) - Yoonseo Kang has been working on Open Source Ecology and Open Tech Forever (http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/User:Yoonseo_Kang http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/User:Yoonseo_Kang). You can check out some of the stuff he's built here: http://vimeo.com/user9565582 http://vimeo.com/user9565582 The fellows who haven't been explicitly mentioned here aren't necessarily dormant; they simply have not bothered to garner any press. Please tread a little more carefully next time you label something as being "little different from child beauty pageants and dog shows" -- or at the very least, do your homework so a "college dropout" doesn't have to do it for you.
- argonaut 13y ago
  While I feel like confluence is being overly snarky and cynical about the Thiel program, upon hitting the fact that you listed Andrew Hsu and Airy Labs among the list of accomplished Thiel Fellows it becomes immediately apparent that you really haven't actually done your homework. At the risk of sounding like I'm attacking Andrew, he was just about the worst possible example for you to pick. His startup is and was notorious for imploding after being run into the ground with highly public mismanagement that involved interference from his family members. If I were someone who wanted to make a spurious argument attacking the Thiel Fellowship, he would be exhibit #1. The rest of your post is merely a long list of people all in the process of "starting" something - but not actually having accomplished anything of particular note. It is easy to "start" a company, or a fund, or an organization. It is much harder to actually achieve anything with that. And despite what TechCrunch/other mdia may wish for you to believe, raising funding, giving talks, and winning random competitions are hardly accomplishments. Now, I don't think the Thiel Fellowship is a bad thing. If I was younger than 20 I would very much be interested in applying for the program. The fact that most Thiel Fellows have not accomplished anything of great external significance has so much less to do with the program and the fellows themselves, and so much more to do with how damn hard it is to start a successful company / solve a big hairy problem. It's not something you do in two years. It's a process and I think the Thiel Fellowship was only ever meant as an experience in independent learning/self-starting for the fellows. I have no doubt that every Thiel Fellow has learned a lot in his/her experience, but I think it is unwise to tout many of the people in your list as having made concrete achievements.
spartango 13y ago
I'm a Thiel fellow without much public info listed about my project. I'm not even listed in the grand list comment here. My work isn't widely publicized because I simply don't feel the need at this stage. The community I'm working with doesn't read the tech press and I don't feel comfortable broadcasting my not-ready-for-primetime work. I don't particularly care to be famous; to be honest, the whole CNBC documentary irritated me. Actually that's only part of the story. Another part of the story is that the project I'm working on is in a space that is a bit slow moving and requires quite a bit of learning on my part. I'm spending more than a little time exploring its nuances. It takes time to get a product to market in biomedical spaces because I have to validate it scientifically. At this stage, when I make progress, I make a note of it in my journal and smile. And yet another part of the story is that the fellowship helps put me in a position to work somewhat quietly. You won't hear stories of my project raising a round yet, because there isn't a need right now, given $50K a year. I have sufficient connections in the life science and medical communities that I don't find myself angling for more attention. That said, I don't operate in super-stealth mode. I'm happy to tell curious folks what I'm working on (just email me, see my profile). So, there's your open invitation, ask away.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]

brackin 13y ago

Your assumptions are based on a PandoDaily post where they cover just a few of the fellows that have decided to publicise their companies. There's a wider (but far from full) list here. https://www.quora.com/Thiel-Fellows/What-were-the-results-of-the-first-Thiel-Fellowship-Class https://www.quora.com/Thiel-Fellows/What-were-the-results-of... I'd say most of the projects aren't known about (in beta, not startups, not publicised or not launched) at this point, some will fail but I can see quite a few big tech companies springing up from that batch. I believe they said today that fellows have raised $34M+ in funding and I know quite a few YC founders in the fellowship and I've only just scratched the surface of speaking to people.

zerotoone 13y ago

confluence, you've been awfully negative about the fellowship and Peter Thiel thus far. However, you should be careful to not conflate the lack of readily available data on the fellows with lack of progress on their end. The fact that there isn't much press is a (very) rough indicator that the fellows are spending time working with their heads-down rather than attention-whoring. Anyways, I'll do some homework for you and dig up some concrete cases of what the fellows have done: - Andrew Hsu raised $1.5M as a solo founder for Airy Labs from Google Ventures and Foundation Capital (http://www.forbes.com/sites/briancaulfield/2011/08/04/names-you-need-to-know-andrew-hsu-19-raises-1-5m-for-educational-gaming-startup/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/briancaulfield/2011/08/04/names-...) - Ben Yu has built a transdermal caffeine company (http://sprayableenergy.com/ http://sprayableenergy.com/), which he holds provisional patents for (http://benyu.org/thiel-fellowship-closing-ceremony-speech http://benyu.org/thiel-fellowship-closing-ceremony-speech) - Clay Allsopp is building Propeller (http://usepropeller.com/ http://usepropeller.com/), a drag-and-drop native iOS app builder. He has also authored a RubyMotion book (http://pragprog.com/book/carubym/rubymotion http://pragprog.com/book/carubym/rubymotion). - Connor Zwick is building YC-backed Coco Controller (http://techcrunch.com/2012/08/14/the-yc-backed-coco-controller-will-turn-your-iphone-into-a-gaming-powerhouse/ http://techcrunch.com/2012/08/14/the-yc-backed-coco-controll...) to augment iOS and Android gaming. He also has a Flashcards app with 1M+ downloads (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/flashcards+/id408490162?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/flashcards+/id408490162?mt=8). - Darren Zhu is working on a synthetic biology company and has gotten a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/06/thiel-fellows-are-making-the-grade/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/12/06/thiel-fellows-are-making-th...). - Dale J Stephens has published a book, Hacking Your Education (http://www.amazon.com/Hacking-Your-Education-Lectures-Thousands/dp/0399159967 http://www.amazon.com/Hacking-Your-Education-Lectures-Thousa...) through Perigee Books, and has launched the UnCollege movement (http://www.uncollege.org/ http://www.uncollege.org/) - Daniel Friedman is building personalized online education startup Thinkful, which has raised $1M (http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/peter-thiel-backs-thinkful-for-personalized-online-education/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/02/26/peter-thie...). - Eden Full is building the SunSaluter (http://www.sunsaluter.com/ http://www.sunsaluter.com/) through her social venture Roseicollis Technologies, which has won the Westly Prize, the Mashable-UN Foundation Startups for Social Good Challenge, second prize at the Postcode Lottery Green Challenge, and the grand prize at the Staples-Ashoka Youth Social Entrepreneurship Challenge (http://www.linkedin.com/in/edenfull http://www.linkedin.com/in/edenfull). - James Proud sold his company GigLocator for undisclosed 6-figure sum (http://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2012/06/20/skip-school-sell-company-meet-the-thiel-fellow-who-just-turned-a-profit/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2012/06/20/skip-school-s...) - Laura Deming has her own fund (http://www.forbes.com/pictures/mkg45jfej/laura-deming-18-2/ http://www.forbes.com/pictures/mkg45jfej/laura-deming-18-2/) and has been working working closely with biotech legend Corey Goodman to fund anti-aging therapies. She also spoke at TEDMED 2013 (http://www.tedmed.com/speakers/show?id=46921 http://www.tedmed.com/speakers/show?id=46921) - Nick Cammarata "started a company that was recently acquired" (http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/24/examining-the-thiel-fellowship-where-are-they-now/ http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/24/examining-the-thiel-fellows...). - Paul Gu is working with Upstart, which raised $5.9M as a kickstarter for people (http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/22/upstart-grabs-5-9-million-to-let-investors-back-people-yep-a-kickstarter-for-people/ http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/22/upstart-grabs-5-9-million-t...) - Ritik Malhotra is working on YC-backed Streem, a Dropbox for Video (https://angel.co/streem https://angel.co/streem) - Sujay Tyle is working at Developer Auction (http://techcrunch.com/2013/01/21/developerauction-sujay-tyle/ http://techcrunch.com/2013/01/21/developerauction-sujay-tyle...), which has raised $2.7M (http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/03/14/developerauction-raises-2-7m-seed-for-tech-hiring-service/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2013/03/14/developera...) - Taylor Wilson is building small nuclear fission reactors (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HL1BEC024g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HL1BEC024g) - Tom Currier built out a robotic solar panel tracking company (http://www.qbotix.com/ http://www.qbotix.com/) that has raised $7.5M total (http://www.qbotix.com/pressseptember4/ http://www.qbotix.com/pressseptember4/) and got a couple patents for it (http://www.google.com/patents/WO2011150373A1 http://www.google.com/patents/WO2011150373A1, http://www.google.com/patents/WO2012009470A1 http://www.google.com/patents/WO2012009470A1) - Yoonseo Kang has been working on Open Source Ecology and Open Tech Forever (http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/User:Yoonseo_Kang http://opensourceecology.org/wiki/User:Yoonseo_Kang). You can check out some of the stuff he's built here: http://vimeo.com/user9565582 http://vimeo.com/user9565582 The fellows who haven't been explicitly mentioned here aren't necessarily dormant; they simply have not bothered to garner any press. Please tread a little more carefully next time you label something as being "little different from child beauty pageants and dog shows" -- or at the very least, do your homework so a "college dropout" doesn't have to do it for you.

argonaut 13y ago
While I feel like confluence is being overly snarky and cynical about the Thiel program, upon hitting the fact that you listed Andrew Hsu and Airy Labs among the list of accomplished Thiel Fellows it becomes immediately apparent that you really haven't actually done your homework. At the risk of sounding like I'm attacking Andrew, he was just about the worst possible example for you to pick. His startup is and was notorious for imploding after being run into the ground with highly public mismanagement that involved interference from his family members. If I were someone who wanted to make a spurious argument attacking the Thiel Fellowship, he would be exhibit #1. The rest of your post is merely a long list of people all in the process of "starting" something - but not actually having accomplished anything of particular note. It is easy to "start" a company, or a fund, or an organization. It is much harder to actually achieve anything with that. And despite what TechCrunch/other mdia may wish for you to believe, raising funding, giving talks, and winning random competitions are hardly accomplishments. Now, I don't think the Thiel Fellowship is a bad thing. If I was younger than 20 I would very much be interested in applying for the program. The fact that most Thiel Fellows have not accomplished anything of great external significance has so much less to do with the program and the fellows themselves, and so much more to do with how damn hard it is to start a successful company / solve a big hairy problem. It's not something you do in two years. It's a process and I think the Thiel Fellowship was only ever meant as an experience in independent learning/self-starting for the fellows. I have no doubt that every Thiel Fellow has learned a lot in his/her experience, but I think it is unwise to tout many of the people in your list as having made concrete achievements.

spartango 13y ago

I'm a Thiel fellow without much public info listed about my project. I'm not even listed in the grand list comment here. My work isn't widely publicized because I simply don't feel the need at this stage. The community I'm working with doesn't read the tech press and I don't feel comfortable broadcasting my not-ready-for-primetime work. I don't particularly care to be famous; to be honest, the whole CNBC documentary irritated me. Actually that's only part of the story. Another part of the story is that the project I'm working on is in a space that is a bit slow moving and requires quite a bit of learning on my part. I'm spending more than a little time exploring its nuances. It takes time to get a product to market in biomedical spaces because I have to validate it scientifically. At this stage, when I make progress, I make a note of it in my journal and smile. And yet another part of the story is that the fellowship helps put me in a position to work somewhat quietly. You won't hear stories of my project raising a round yet, because there isn't a need right now, given $50K a year. I have sufficient connections in the life science and medical communities that I don't find myself angling for more attention. That said, I don't operate in super-stealth mode. I'm happy to tell curious folks what I'm working on (just email me, see my profile). So, there's your open invitation, ask away.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]