YC W15 emails are out Don't give up! |
YC W15 emails are out Don't give up! |
We were creating a mobile payment system to be used in Myanmar.
The only thing that really matters is your users. Other people, such as the judges who assess your app, the influential people whom you'd like to get their support - these are not necessarily your users, and they won't necessarily understand the problems you're solving.
Stay true to your users, and if they love what you are doing everything else will follow.
Can't see your email anywhere. Email me?
I don't know what "Your network is your net worth" means, but it sounds like a worldview in which the people you know matter more than what you can do. That's sometimes true, but none of the major startups started off by networking. It didn't matter who the Google founders knew. It didn't matter who Zuck knew. What mattered was what they were doing.
The only reason investors might be interested in you is if you're starting the next Google or Facebook, because their entire business model depends on it. But there's an optimistic way to phrase that: If you're starting the next Google or Facebook, then who you know doesn't really matter.
Keep on truckin!
I rather have a business that has that type of growth than get into YC.
Coverage: http://pando.com/2014/06/19/touch-of-modern-raises-14m-to-pr...
Launched a medical tourism startup-- prepre-alpha. Just nothing to show on url really (OTOH I also wonder if radical honesty would be the path to take?)
If huge or uncertain costs, or the fear & uncertainty of fighting your insurance/Dr/hospital over surprise billings post-hospitalisation is holding you back from any, and I mean ANY, elective treatments - let's talk.
In most cases, for a fraction of cost of copay+deductibles, apples-to-apples less than 10% what it would cost you in USA, you can get yourself treated & pampered at top-class facilities in India. Including return airfares. We have docs/hospitals/nurses with solid repute.
Here to help you navigate and arrive at right choices.
Happy to answer any queries or concerns that a potential patient has. My email is in my profile. Can chat/Skype/Hangout whatever. No time-limit, no-obligation, no fake-guilt selling. Will keep answering queries as much as I can. At the end of it if you decide against it that's perfectly ok.
So yeah, email me?
It's at least the 4th time I've applied, 2nd time with this company, and the 1st time I've been invited for an interview.
Good luck to everyone, and as I always tell myself: YC is not the goal, making something people want is not the goal, making something good that people want is the goal.
I wouldn't burn too many candles hoping to get in or trying to figure out a reason why you did not. There is a benefit to applying in that it makes your commitment to your startup even stronger.
Focus on what is important and that is your business. I truly believe building something sustainable is better for YOU, than trying to make the next Dropbox, Facebook etc. But if you already gaining Facebook like traction I am sure YC will already have heard of you.
Worry about your startup and just focus on making it sustainable. Becoming popular with customers and maintaining that relationship. has more benefits for more people than getting into YC. Focus on what is important.
PG says they now have 3 silos, like 3 mini YC's reviewing. But if you have 1400 alums reviewing apps, by definition you are going to have scoring that is biased against finding black swans, regardless of how many silos you create.
As you say, the problem is too many apps and not enough time for a smaller amount of alums to review the apps.
One answer might be going to a rolling application process to avoid the washout that happens with a wave 40% bigger than you anticipated. And/or opening other offices, which is most likely in the works.
Can you point me to where PG said this?
"But if you have 1400 alums reviewing apps, by definition you are going to have scoring that is biased against finding black swans, regardless of how many silos you create."
Why do you think the scoring is biased against black swans?
What is your use-case? We can talk alternative pricing models if you find it valuable -- email me at marc@routific.com
It also makes finding a programming cofounder easier because fewer programmers probably want to work on the cheap with a piece of a company that may never work out, but they will be willing to work with a fellow programmer as a cofounder on ideas that interest them both.
Launched a turbo tax, but for PCI Compliance.
Managing PCI Compliance is an unsolved real (big) problem, even bigger than HIPAA. There's been headline breaches in the news (e.g. Target, Kmart, Staples) and companies fear PCI because of its vague language and cost. With my relevant domain expertise in the security field, I'm bringing new tech to an old-school market.
http://www.ComplianceChimp.com
Instead of completing a PCI Requirement that looks like this: http://i.imgur.com/ZW0PzBd.png
You can complete one that looks like this: http://i.imgur.com/XdkrG4o.png
Our Startup is Cronus Audio Technology.
The main purpose of Cronus is to enable the musicians to extract the most from their performance, simple, elegant and versatile way, offering innovative tools that cover expressive artistic interactions, excellence in audio effects and social connectivity.
Our first product will be the Cronus-Z, an innovative proposal for equipment that mixes the functionality of a multi-effect pedal with the power and versatility of an audio workstation, in a compact and portable format. The Cronus-Z will have numerous resources, to effectively meet the demands of various user profiles.
More information can be found at: http://www.cronus-audio.com
a) We are planning to build a hardware product and are at the mock-ups/renderings stage so we do not have a prototype, and b) One of the team members hasn't physically met the other two (although we've worked on projects before and have a ~4 year friendship).
I had some correspondence with some of the partners about the second point-- PG told me it would be a problem, but Garry Tan said its not really a deal breaker. So I'll put it off to the lack of prototype which is what killed us.
Determination matters most.
Now my startup is gonna succeed...just a little more slowly.
Real entrepreneurs might WANT to get into YC, but do not NEED to get into YC.
If you really "need" YC then I think you're doing it wrong. Usually the types of people who are devastated by their YC rejection (like me my first time) are the kind that have everything riding on YC. As if it's the only way to get anything built or started. It's a terrible mindset to have. Once I opened up my options and had a plan B, C, D, etc... my business improved, my startup ideas changed and got better, I built more things and got more experience.
My team (www.stempaks.com) was really fortunate enough to get an interview. But like rgbrgb said, our goal isn't to get into YC; it's to create a good product that people will want.
Good luck for those who got an interview!
Might make some of us feel like all these years grinding on startups isn't for nothing and is just a simple matter of volume.
Good luck to everyone, and keep at it; we are.
getpartake.com - Expense Sharing for Couples
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=ca.cumulonimbu...
https://github.com/christiansmith/anvil-connect
Anyone interested in trying this out or collaborating, please get in touch using the email in my profile!
we want users to be able to
-Create an online music library, independent of the source providing the content. -Build it further by collecting any track discovered anywhere on the web. -Access and interact with other users' libraries, no matter which service they use or subscribe to.
A couple things I found confusing:
- I don't have flash installed in Safari (comes packaged in Chrome) and there was no explanation as to why music didn't play back when I was in Safari
- initially Rdio playback was limited to 30s samples even though I had my Rdio account linked. I think I fixed this by logging into Rdio in the same browser session, but not certain
Drop me an email (in my profile) if you're keen to chat.
I applied solo, so I wasn't holding my breath.
Congratulations to the teams that got in. I'm excited to see what you build.
Anyways we will apply again in the next round, YC is very important for us to get the right advice and move in the right direction.
Good luck everyone and keep moving forward! :)
note: We are http://monkey.io
Our company is also focused on STEM ... and I'd really love to chat with you guys. daniel@stempaks.com
Decided to run an indiegogo
We've just opened registrations to the public, and have a bunch of big OEMs embedding this in their next printers.
Let me know what you think!
By the way if you ever get some quality material on your site for all the universities/colleges/boards/exams in India, you can make a fortune.
Didn't they know how important this idea is?
As far as the black swans, I could be wrong on this, but my understanding is that YC has maybe 10 partners all giving a grade on the apps coming in (apparently started this after they missed SendGrid). Im not sure if the 1400 alums initially flag or what, but even with the 10 partners grading, their odds of finding black swans get worse because black swans don't look like winners to most people - they are essentially counter intuitive, crazy ideas that don't appeal to the majority in the beginning (or maybe the founders are not Stanford drop outs or ex Googlers, which further sways the majority to give higher grade to what is more obvious. Thus pushing down more potential black swans below the interview cut off line.
So the more partners you have grading a particular startup, the more partners you have trying to cover their asses and not fuck up. So the safer choices will get more interviews - and safe choices don't usually result in black swans.
Not sure if I'm making sense here, but maybe the proof is in the pudding in that some of their biggest wins are Dropbox, Reddit, and Airbnb...all relatively early in YC batches when there were fewer partners making choices.
Thanks!
The majority of companies in the music industry are aware of the problems driven by the fragmented setup. Some react by offering additional features for user retention. Others continue to drive the fragmentation further. New companies emerge, focusing on eliminating this setup. (bop.fm is one of them. check : tomahawk, wyhd and kollekt.fm)
This fragmentation though, is more the user’s problem than the industry’s. We start by accepting that music consumption, discovery and sharing has to be fragmented. Our competitors misperceive this problem and conclude that ‘sharing’ is broken in music. Taking a step backward, we know that the core problem is that ‘music consumption’ is broken.
On-demand services, download services, discovery services, terrestrial radio.. They are all complementary products from and end user perspective. This is why we accept that a user needs access to all these services and fulfil different consumption habits. This should not prevent a user to create a music library; accessible from anywhere and anyone. The users need an online Winamp!
Email is in your inbox! Thanks!
