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1. the point was stronger before you added the second paragraph. 2. So what? Yes, we need DARPA, NSF, &co to fund $10^9 research projects like space elevators

1. the point was stronger before you added the second paragraph. 2. So what? Yes, we need DARPA, NSF, &co to fund $10^9 research projects like space elevators or The Internet. YC has shown that the real problem with such projects isn't red tape per se. It's the decade-long release-response-revision cycle you're forced to deal with when the stakes get so high. You have to deal with a lot more accountability mechanisms when you beg or borrow that much money. I'd be willing to bet YC's success rate compares favorably to NSF's.

rjurney 17y ago
DARPA birthed the Internet. YC birthed reddit. I guess the jury is still out.
- eru 17y ago
  Look at the funds involved. Return on investment may be higher, even if reddit was the only thing that came out of YC.
  - rjurney 17y ago
    Its a silly comparison to make in the first place. The goal of SBIR is to give out a certain portion of the federal budget to small business. Its a great program. As to ROI: federal funding for R&D provided the entire basis for the early economy of silicon valley in which YC resides. No programs like these = no silicon valley = no YC. YC is the ROI on federal R&D dollars :)
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
    - pg 17y ago
      It was not merely a silly comparison, but a deliberately dishonest one. Reddit is one of 144 startups we've funded. It's also false that federal R&D funding was the "entire basis" for Silicon Valley. And false that YC is a product of Silicon Valley. In fact, it's hard to find much that you've said that isn't false.
      - aaronblohowiak 17y ago
        Deliberately dishonest? I'm not sure how you can discern cloudy thinking from malice. The DARPA:Internet YC:Reddit comparison is about as useful as stating the number of startups you've funded -- none of this data is sufficient to draw any meaningful conclusion. Techniques for comparison that may provide some utility: investment efficiency, total investment adjusted for duration of program, applicants per dollar invested, and so on. I am surprised that you are engaging in a debate about the relative influence of DARPA funding and YC. It seems like comparing Apples to Filesystems.
        pg 17y ago
        I'm not sure how you can discern cloudy thinking from malice. Here's how I do it: I look for someone who seems to be trying to score rhetorical points, and then I ask what the chances are that happened by accident. When people are earnestly but confusedly trying to work something out for themselves, they don't sound like this: DARPA birthed the Internet. YC birthed reddit. I guess the jury is still out.
        aaronblohowiak 17y ago
        If the person errantly assumes that the best metric to evaluate the programs is by an unadjusted comparison of their most recognizable achievement (which is simple, obvious, and wrong) then I can see how they would make a point similar to the one above. I do not believe that malice is required for shallow exploration of the problem set in this way. The sarcasm is petty, but it may follow from the earlier error. So the issue in this case is wether the sarcasm follows from the errant logical conclusion or wether a malicious intent inspired the faulty logic and bad attitude. As the righteous are often petty, I cannot discern if the error is deliberately dishonest or negligently shallow and intentionally righteous. Either way, I agree that it is a terrible argument and a worse comment.
        rjurney 17y ago
        Frankly, I'm having trouble taking either of you seriously. The comment was a silly one, but clearly the ego of Paul Graham cannot handle jest that compares YC unfavorably with the invention of the wheel.
- mnemonicsloth 17y ago
  I'm not saying DARPA/NSF are bad. They deserve the respect they get. But their job is to tackle problems that only might have solutions, way out at the edge of what's possible at a given level of technology. But it takes a long time for the benefits of that kind of work trickle down to the average person, and there's no feedback to indicate what the private sector will want and what it won't. So for every Internet, there are a lot of ITERs: http://www.iter.org http://www.iter.org Total cost of ITER has been in the tens of billions, and the project is projected to start producing energy about 40 years from now. In contrast, General Fusion, a startup with under $25M in funding, could be ready a lot sooner: http://www.technologyreview.com/business/23102/ http://www.technologyreview.com/business/23102/
  - rjurney 17y ago
    While its true that they only accept proposals that have technical risk, its also true that in SBIR at least, they don't do pie in the sky stuff either. Iterative improvements only. Federal research investment stimulates private research investment. Its a symbiotic relationship.
    - eru 17y ago
      Though one wonders what the dollars would have done in the private hand, if they had not been taxed away in the first place.
  - Retric 17y ago
    General Fusion: "It's a long shot, they say, but well worth a try." Read that as It's got less than a 1% chance it might work, but compared to the potential gain it's still worth looking at. ITER on the other hand has an 85+% chance of working (net energy gain) and only costs the US ~1billion. So while ITER might cost 50x as much it's more than 50x more likely to actually work. Also should ITER work as well as expected a working fusion reactor that could produce 1GW of base load power could be built in 10 years. ITER's initial design was for a 500MW power plant, but ITER was scaled back to a demonstration device to lower cost and reduce risks. PS: All fusion devices produce a lot a radiation and need extensive containment and decommissioning costs. The only way you can build a 20 million$ fusion reactor is by avoiding actually producing significant amounts of fusion. So all projects that say we can demonstrate fusion for < 50 million are not going to produce significant amounts of electricity.

rjurney 17y ago

DARPA birthed the Internet. YC birthed reddit. I guess the jury is still out.

eru 17y ago
Look at the funds involved. Return on investment may be higher, even if reddit was the only thing that came out of YC.
- rjurney 17y ago
  Its a silly comparison to make in the first place. The goal of SBIR is to give out a certain portion of the federal budget to small business. Its a great program. As to ROI: federal funding for R&D provided the entire basis for the early economy of silicon valley in which YC resides. No programs like these = no silicon valley = no YC. YC is the ROI on federal R&D dollars :)
  - deleted 17y ago
    [deleted]
  - pg 17y ago
    It was not merely a silly comparison, but a deliberately dishonest one. Reddit is one of 144 startups we've funded. It's also false that federal R&D funding was the "entire basis" for Silicon Valley. And false that YC is a product of Silicon Valley. In fact, it's hard to find much that you've said that isn't false.
    - aaronblohowiak 17y ago
      Deliberately dishonest? I'm not sure how you can discern cloudy thinking from malice. The DARPA:Internet YC:Reddit comparison is about as useful as stating the number of startups you've funded -- none of this data is sufficient to draw any meaningful conclusion. Techniques for comparison that may provide some utility: investment efficiency, total investment adjusted for duration of program, applicants per dollar invested, and so on. I am surprised that you are engaging in a debate about the relative influence of DARPA funding and YC. It seems like comparing Apples to Filesystems.
      - pg 17y ago
        I'm not sure how you can discern cloudy thinking from malice. Here's how I do it: I look for someone who seems to be trying to score rhetorical points, and then I ask what the chances are that happened by accident. When people are earnestly but confusedly trying to work something out for themselves, they don't sound like this: DARPA birthed the Internet. YC birthed reddit. I guess the jury is still out.
        aaronblohowiak 17y ago
        If the person errantly assumes that the best metric to evaluate the programs is by an unadjusted comparison of their most recognizable achievement (which is simple, obvious, and wrong) then I can see how they would make a point similar to the one above. I do not believe that malice is required for shallow exploration of the problem set in this way. The sarcasm is petty, but it may follow from the earlier error. So the issue in this case is wether the sarcasm follows from the errant logical conclusion or wether a malicious intent inspired the faulty logic and bad attitude. As the righteous are often petty, I cannot discern if the error is deliberately dishonest or negligently shallow and intentionally righteous. Either way, I agree that it is a terrible argument and a worse comment.
        rjurney 17y ago
        Frankly, I'm having trouble taking either of you seriously. The comment was a silly one, but clearly the ego of Paul Graham cannot handle jest that compares YC unfavorably with the invention of the wheel.
mnemonicsloth 17y ago
I'm not saying DARPA/NSF are bad. They deserve the respect they get. But their job is to tackle problems that only might have solutions, way out at the edge of what's possible at a given level of technology. But it takes a long time for the benefits of that kind of work trickle down to the average person, and there's no feedback to indicate what the private sector will want and what it won't. So for every Internet, there are a lot of ITERs: http://www.iter.org http://www.iter.org Total cost of ITER has been in the tens of billions, and the project is projected to start producing energy about 40 years from now. In contrast, General Fusion, a startup with under $25M in funding, could be ready a lot sooner: http://www.technologyreview.com/business/23102/ http://www.technologyreview.com/business/23102/
- rjurney 17y ago
  While its true that they only accept proposals that have technical risk, its also true that in SBIR at least, they don't do pie in the sky stuff either. Iterative improvements only. Federal research investment stimulates private research investment. Its a symbiotic relationship.
  - eru 17y ago
    Though one wonders what the dollars would have done in the private hand, if they had not been taxed away in the first place.
- Retric 17y ago
  General Fusion: "It's a long shot, they say, but well worth a try." Read that as It's got less than a 1% chance it might work, but compared to the potential gain it's still worth looking at. ITER on the other hand has an 85+% chance of working (net energy gain) and only costs the US ~1billion. So while ITER might cost 50x as much it's more than 50x more likely to actually work. Also should ITER work as well as expected a working fusion reactor that could produce 1GW of base load power could be built in 10 years. ITER's initial design was for a 500MW power plant, but ITER was scaled back to a demonstration device to lower cost and reduce risks. PS: All fusion devices produce a lot a radiation and need extensive containment and decommissioning costs. The only way you can build a 20 million$ fusion reactor is by avoiding actually producing significant amounts of fusion. So all projects that say we can demonstrate fusion for < 50 million are not going to produce significant amounts of electricity.