I did four B-Plan competitions (had success in all four) in the spring of 2008 and the experience was useful. I would HIGHLY recommend and HN'ers in the Boston

I did four B-Plan competitions (had success in all four) in the spring of 2008 and the experience was useful. I would HIGHLY recommend and HN'ers in the Boston area sign up for this years event, which is going on now. The good things: 1. Great networking: The MIT 100K competition has a lot of support in the Boston area. It is a great way to open a door to almost any company that has any affiliation with MIT. 2. Business issues: I know the prevailing ethos here is build something people want and the rest will take care of itself, but these competitions do force you to think about how you will sell you product, the importance of barriers to entry etc. As PG said he is even rethinking the mentoring aspect of YC to more richly incorporate this kind of info. 3. Money - These competitions are serious cash cows. 35 team at MIT get $1k, 7 get $10K, and at least 2 get $100K. In addition there are special prizes for mobile and other areas. If you have a half decent idea it is a way to get YC caliber money with no dilution. All you need to do is find a student at MIT to participate, which is trivially easy. The downsides of these competitions (in addition to what the author said): 1. Wrong teams: Often the teams are comprised entirely of MBA's. Even though many were former hackers, they were at school to become managers not makers. I'm not anti-MBA, but the big problem is the fact that by the time you win a competition the MBA is a month from graduating and is on the hook for $200K in debt which dampens the entrepreneurial enthusiasm. In any case I think the process is well worth it.