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We're auctioning off a chance for your kid to come to a YC dinner
- gault8121 13y agoThis looks like a life changing experience for a teen. Is this auction going to Bing Nursery School?
- pg 13y agoYes, it's for the scholarship fund.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- iamkoby 13y agoI think you should consider adding it to the auction page. It would probably make it clearer and help raise bids.
- bennyg 13y agoYou should do a TOMS model for this - as in, one person pays for the meal and chance to meet/greet with founders, developers, and SV leaders (unfortunately biased towards wealthier people). Then, you give away a "meal" to a person who applies with an essay or something and who's parents can't pick up the check on this opportunity.
- pg 13y agoSince the money's going to scholarships, the situation actually is something like that, except the latter parents get something better.
- norswap 13y agoWould it really be? I guess it depends on the teen.
- TheMakeA 13y agoAs a 22 year old, I'd happily give $1000 to go to a YC dinner.
- larrys 13y agoWhat would be interesting is if you could elaborate on a) where you would get the $1000 and how significant $1000 is to you personally (vs. whatever your assets are) b) what you would hope to gain by paying $1000 and doing this that you could get by being creative and not spending the money.
- hartator 13y agoI guess his $1000 is worth the same than everyone else.
- mildtrepidation 13y agoOnly from a literal third party perspective. Someone whose family lives in a poor area and lives on food stamps will place a whole lot more value on $1,000 than a rich kid who gets the latest tech, his private high school tuition, and his car paid for by his parents. Most aren't this black and white, of course, but the point is that a fixed amount of any asset can mean vastly different things to people in different circumstances.
- TheMakeA 13y agoA.) I have a job. $1000 is about 58% of what I pay for a month of rent, and about 1/3rd of my monthly income. B.) Meet people, have fun, absorb information from smart people in a memorable moment. I don't see it as much different from e.g. a WWDC ticket, which would be nearly double the cost. I will add: I grew up relatively poor in Michigan. My parents income was less than $60k, so I couldn't really afford college. I moved into my own apartment when I was 18, and supported myself except for around $130/mo in cell phone and car insurance bills. The only remaining financial support from my parents is a $19/mo cell phone bill. This year I moved to Silicon Valley with less than $3000 in pocket, and I now work at a startup.
- 13y ago
- asdad 13y agoHow does this come to the main page of hacker news? 16+ points for a dinner auction does not sound believable. Whats the secret?
- iamkoby 13y agoit's pg who posted it...
- rohanpai 13y agoI'm tempted to bid on this for myself
- truthlaidbear 13y agoOh, cool, you found a way to stack the startup game towards the wealthy.
- maddddddddddddd 13y agowithout the wealthy, what is left of the startup game? who would pg fleece with recipe websites then?
- orik 13y agoEven though this is for charity I feel the same way. :/
- joshdance 13y agoHow is the startup game not stacked towards the wealthy already?
- michaelochurch 13y agoThis idea that parents can buy YC connections for their kids is the final nail in the coffin of the idea of Silicon Valley meritocracy.
- maddddddddddddd 13y agoand with it any sense of unbiased journalism from this site. YNepotator
- Segmentation 13y agoPeople with money have an advantage over people without money. News at 11.
- conanbatt 13y agoNo need to make that disadvantage deeper by contributing to it. I also find selling connection-potential to be as anti-meritocratic as you can be.
- Cookingboy 13y agoIn silicon valley merits play a huge part, but just like any other places, people are the build blocks of social interaction. Your connections and people you know and any other form of resources (rich parents, friend of VCs, etc) would fundamentally play a huge role in your success. I still think Silicon Valley is meritocracy since it's actually very difficult to succeed without any kind of value/merit, but meritocracy does not imply it's always going to be a fair playground for everyone.
- selmnoo 13y agoOh, for goodness' sake. You could have made a legitimate point if you hadn't been so abruptly cut-throat. The fact of the matter is that connections, luck, etc. rule pretty much everywhere. It's useless and unproductive to cast this blame to specific, ultimately small entities. If I had been born about 5 miles north of where I was born -- in the ghettos, vs. to a household that valued education, I would have been living a very different life. And I'm grateful that didn't happen, I'm grateful for all the opportunities I got, that my dad had friends in high places and were willing to hire me as an intern. I'm grateful that I had the social support to seek therapy when I had depression, a place to live when I was unemployed and penniless, friends that respected me, etc. I would not have had a lot of this if I was living in the third world, where opportunity is scarce. That is the way it is. You could chide YC and all the VC world, and I'm not sure if you'd get anywhere. As far as VC firms and incubators go, it's clear to see YC is something else: they're funding nonprofits like Watsi, their partners seem to have some sense of social good, so I think snark here is misplaced.
- pg 13y agoSince there will no doubt be a lot of the predictable complaint that this gives an advantage to the kids of people rich enough to buy it, I want to make it clear that this auction is to fund scholarships to the Bing nursery school. Since going to Bing helps kids a lot more than going to a YC dinner would, it's a net win for parents with less money. We knew when we decided to offer this item for auction that people would give us grief about it. But we're happy to take the heat to give more kids the opportunity to attend Bing.
- TrainedMonkey 13y ago"No good deed goes unpunished". I feel really sorry that current state of affairs requires you to make this disclosure for donating something.
- larrys 13y agoNo more than when someone needs to say "with all due respect" before offering criticism. It's a prophylactic way of acknowledging the reality of what some people will think (which would be valid as they might jump to conclusions) and warding or dulling the harshness.
- Samuel_Michon 13y ago“Bing was constructed as a laboratory school with a grant from the National Science Foundation and a gift from Dr. Peter S. Bing and his mother, Mrs. Anna Bing Arnold.” I’m glad I went on DDG before assuming Microsoft paid to name a nursery school after its advertising business.
- swalkergibson 13y agoDo you feel that the concerns expressed are not legitimate? If attending Bing is more beneficial than a YC dinner, why not make an unconditional donation to Bing and then open up these dinners to teenagers willing to apply/write an essay for them, regardless of ability to pay? It would have the added benefit of self-selecting out those people whose parents think it is a good idea for them to go to such a dinner and reserve it for only those who are interested. Obviously, any donation to Bing is better than no donation to Bing, and the reality is that it probably is a net win for the parents with less money, but it seems like it could be even better refined and ensure that there are fewer cheap-shots like in the thread below.
- JoeyJelinek 13y agoI guess we can get market data on the value of a YC dinner...
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- s_m 13y agoAs if a Bay Area kid whose parent has a couple extra grand to bid on such dinners is going to be short on advantages in startuplandia. How about a chance for disadvantaged kids to attend a YC dinner?
- michaelochurch 13y agoHow about a chance for disadvantaged kids to attend a YC dinner? The Poors are dangerous.
- avargas 13y agoI don't think you should be auctioning this for money. I think you should have some sort of way for kids in that age range to submit a video to you, like a 30 second video someone on YCombinator could watch, and to see their potential. Some rich kid that might think he's got what it takes will ask his rich daddy to pay for it.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- fireworks10 13y agoHave invitations for the interviews for YC Winter 2014 been sent out yet?
- granttimmerman 13y agoAs a 20 year old I'm seriously thinking about putting my internship money into this right now. I'll check back at 9:50pm and see what's the price.
- dutchbrit 13y agoTotally not worth 20k, I'll tell you that! There are better ways to get your foot in between the door, for free (unless you have no social skills what so ever).
- marklittlewood 13y agoWell intentioned probably. Full of suck though. Let's face it, if Y Combinator can't fund a few scholarships for whatever school it wants to, it isn't the most successful incubator in the world, or whatever it is. It can and it should it it wants to. Drawing attention to it like this seems remarkably gauche. This seems to implicitly support the 'poor' in a rather patronising way. Rich person pays for kid to come to dinner. Poor person gets gift of education. Wonder who would bid if it was rich person gets to pay for poor person's kid to go to dinner and rich kid gets 0?
- mikeryan52 13y agoAs a 20 year old student, this would be fantastic. I don't have the parents who could bid on this, so I suppose I'll shoot for it myself.
- jhspaybar 13y agoI read "come" as "become" and was like...what horrible joke awaits me?! Glad to see you won't be eating any children...
- mildtrepidation 13y agoAm I reading this wrong, or is this an auction for a single slot that's currently at twenty thousand dollars? If this is a standard auction model and that's what's actually going on... wow.
- lpolovets 13y agoThis is a cause that YC likes, and they're donating one of their assets to support the cause. Why is there so much negativity around this? First, this is basically the most valuable thing YC can give away (without selling slots into its batches). What else would be a reasonable thing to offer? Second, this is access to a YC dinner, but it doesn't ruin the meritocracy aspect -- just because you met a partner at a dinner doesn't mean you can get into YC with a crappy idea or without a lot of work. Third, it makes sense to target wealthy people and offer them a valuable reward for their contributions. They have the most to contribute, and a reward makes them more likely to contribute, and to contribute more. The negative responses really bum me out.
- swalkergibson 13y agoI think that it is more the fact that the prize is specifically for the children of the people who have, at this point, $20k+ to contribute to a perfectly valid cause. It would be another matter entirely if it were some adult buying access to a YC dinner. It is not. The gut reaction is that some rich kid gets to build his/her Rolodex because he/she hit the sperm lottery. In my opinion, it just seems like the antithesis of what YC is all about, which is (as far as I can tell), "who are you, what have you built, and why are you so good at what you do."
- michaelochurch 13y agoThe gut reaction is that some rich kid gets to build his/her Rolodex because he/she hit the sperm lottery. In my opinion, it just seems like the antithesis of what YC is all about, which is (as far as I can tell), "who are you, what have you built, and why are you so good at what you do." Bingo. Now, it's a huge topological stretch to argue that attending the YC dinner is really going to set a kid for life. More likely, he'll make a jackass of himself and that will be the end of that. However, it's the statement, the impression, and the direction that's getting everyone riled up. The reason people dislike VCs is that they give resources to people who need them the least. They'd be more respected if they were pouring their efforts (at least in terms of time and mentorship; as they are businesses, they shouldn't be funding nonviable candidates) into projects and people who could actually use the help. No one likes a fairweather friend.
- mathattack 13y ago20k? Wow! I suspect that a resourceful kid could get a meeting with PG for free if they thought hard enough. So I see this as 100% Donation. In some traditions, the value value of a donation is from the heart of the donor. In others it's from the benefit to the recipient. I am in the latter camp. I hope there is a bidding war and some rich self righteous jerk pays 500k to it. I think the charity would do a lot of good with that money.
- code_duck 13y agoCool, I how the funds help YC in some way. Oh, they're being donated. Well that's cool too... But what was the purpose of this?
- gojomo 13y agoPerhaps the winner will be a sullen, rebellious child of overbearing rich parents... who rather than showing up that night decides to crash daddy's car.
- cmac2992 13y agoIf I had a kid/wasn't a kid myself I'd bid. I'd imagine this is one of the most inspiring events a young person could witness
- garrettdreyfus 13y agoI believe the real issue we are discussing is do the ends justify the means. Is setting the precedent that you can buy a seat at a YC dinner worth a 20,000$ charitable donation. All in all I think it is. Also as a fifteen year old programmer whose parents definitely couldn't afford the 20k, I don't see this seat at the table as a great advantage and am thankful that the less fortunate will be helped.
- robg 13y agoIt's a no-brainer. One seat at one dinner for one seat for one year of education. That's an obvious win for everyone. I'm sad something so trivial turned into something so meaningful can become so controversial.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]