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Comment by pg | Hacker News Reader

It is probably not an accident that this is phrased in such an odd way, with the subjects of the sentences missing. It should read "we got in the second time, but I dropped out a week later." What happened is that Siqi and a cofounder started YC, then a week in Siqi bailed and left his cofounder in the lurch because a side project of his had unexpectedly taken off. We suggested making the side project be the focus of the startup they were doing, but Siqi didn't want to share it with his cofounder. His poor cofounder kept going and managed to recruit someone new, but the startup limped along without Siqi and didn't live much past demo day. It was probably the most treacherous thing one cofounder has done to another in YC so far.

I would never have said anything publicly about the matter, but I can't stand to hear it described in this misleading way.

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Wow, this really stings coming from someone I respect so much. This is what happens when you leave without an explanation from YC I suppose.

Paul, I agree I should have said "we got in the second time, but I dropped out a week later". I apologize for not being clear but I don't accept that there was anything wrong with what I said.

To be clear, the side project of mine which took off was co-owned 50% by my another founder who was not involved in YC and didn't want to join, so it wasn't mine to simply share with my YC team.

There were 3 cofounders who went to the YC interview - there were 2 cofounders remaining after I left. I was transparent with both of my cofounders and we remain friends to this day - they had zero involvement in the side project from beginning to end. I specifically asked each of them if they felt I was behaving unethically - they responded that they don't believe so and would have done the same in my shoes.

I think whats going on is pg is pissed someone ditched YC and made out better - "HOW DARE you leave YC and go on and make millions- while the rest of my flock struggles on ramen noodles and my outworn cliches!!!"

I created another account just so I could get around my noprocrast settings.

Out of the 2 cofounders in YC, one I later hired to run network operations at my company and the other I am very close friends with and regularly have beers. We left on good terms. Why don't you ask the two of them what they think of me?

You're the reason why I'm an entrepreneur today and I respect you immensely. To hear you describe what I did as treachery is hurtful but worse it's just factually wrong. It was an incredibly difficult ethical decision for me at the time, but I truly believe that I behaved in a transparent and above the board way.

I take responsibility for not talking to you before or after I left - I didn't realize you felt this way about it and I'm happy to have the chance to bring this out into the open.

Seems like everything was fair and transparent among them.

Reputation saved.

I'm glad they don't blame you. But what bothered me so much about what you did was that you were the leader of that group. You'd recruited them as cofounders to apply to YC with. IIRC you were the CEO. So it was like an officer deserting his men, not just one of three guys dropping out of a three person startup.

It was far from an easy decision and I never felt great about it. This is fair criticism and I accept it.

However, I don't feel the same way about your original response. The side project wasn't mine to share, and calling it "treacherous" takes it way too far.

I was Siqi's cofounder both times we applied.

Siqi is correct; we didn't believe he was being unethical. The 3 of us agonized over the situation for quite a while, and understood his decision to leave, especially given that the side project wasn't completely his to share. It was a really tough spot for all of us, and I know he didnt make the decision lightly.

Hmmm, both points of view have merit.

IIRC PG/YC fund the team and not a specific idea. If you are on shaky idea, they would want you to persist and figure out a better idea as a team. This is clear to anyone who follows HN. So it does make sense that PG/YC don't like it if the founder(s) quits when something else interesting (like great job offer or another idea) comes along.

And your POV, that it is something you did outside of YC and don't want to share, makes sense too.

I don't know what I would have done if I was in the same situation.

Umm, hold on a second. So I have a cofounder and a startup, but I also do little side projects here and there on my own, mostly for fun / learning. Am I to understand that if one of them blows up and I elect to leave and pursue that instead of my current startup, I've committed "treachery" against my cofounder? If my cofounder had something like that happen to him, I'd be incredibly happy for him (and a little jealous), but I wouldn't consider it treachery unless he tried to take his equity or it was competing with our startup or something.

I know that it's popular to compare picking a cofounder to picking a spouse, but they're not the same thing, and if you start a company with someone who later decides to move on, that's just how it goes. Am I way off?

As in everything: It depends.

I don't know this story beyond what two people have just said. But, I know that if I commit to something, I expect my co-founder to also be committed to it (within the bounds of what we've agreed upon). Working on other projects now and then is fine and normal...it's what hackers do. But, if you've committed to build a business with someone, it's not really the idea that makes the business. It's the combined effort and execution of the team. So, splitting your time between building your "private business" and your "co-founded business", and then taking off when the private business has some bit of success, is probably not what an honest business person would do. If you don't believe in the co-founded business idea, anymore, you talk it over with your co-founder, and you try to fix the problem.

But, shit happens. If you give up your equity in the co-founded startup, apologize for flaking, etc. then I guess you've done the best you can. I wouldn't expect the co-founder to ever be willing to do business with you again, but it's probably not what I would call "treacherous", either. I think the story of Evan Williams and Blogger (and Odeo/Twitter, for that matter, maybe even moreso) would sound kind of similar when told by different involved parties, and we don't consider Evan treacherous.

Then again, we are talking about one week later. He had to know that he had other irons in the fire and probably wouldn't be involved in the company much longer. So, yeah, this actually does sound kinda nasty.

Good point.

Maybe what happened was that he didn't know whether they'd get in YC or not so was OK with being part of the application.

Then they found out they got in and he realized he had to make a decision between the two projects and it took him one week to make that decision.

That doesn't really make it better, and I can understand pg's disappointment, when a team falls apart almost instantly upon getting accepted. Ethically speaking, you don't ask someone to invest time, money, and effort into helping you build a business if you aren't actually going to build that business.

"Then again, we are talking about one week later. He had to know that he had other irons in the fire and probably wouldn't be involved in the company much longer. So, yeah, this actually does sound kinda nasty."

The side project was a Facebook application. It grew from about 10,000 users to more than a million from interview time to the week the season started (about a month). By the time the season started I had my doubts (along with my cofounders), but I thought I could tough it out and do both. I was wrong and made the hard choice to leave.

Trying to do both would have been a more unfair choice, and the much safer and easier road to take.

As I mentioned, I don't know the whole story, only the tiny bits and pieces presented by biased parties. And, as I also mentioned, shit happens. Congratulations on your acquired startup, and I'm glad to hear your cofounders in the failed YC startup hold no grudges.

You're wrong because;

A) pg was simply pointing out what the guy had failed to mention in his post.

B) The manner in which you leave a partner to pursue your own thing can vary. It wasn't that he left, from pg's comment I get a feeling the issue is HOW the founder ended his affairs with YC and co-founder.

So relax, keep your side projects. all though I highly recommend that you focus one at a time. put all you can in one idea before you leave and potentially put your team mates in jeopardy to pursue another.

Yeah I mean I face this issue too and it can go both ways.

I've talked to other potential founders who like my idea and would want to participate as a side project. But I've been loathe to do that. Initially I thought more help would be better but as I started working on it, it just seemed like it would be a logistical nightmare. Also, PG has some words with people working part time which mostly were not good and I totally agreed with his points.

It's a double-edged sword though. It's infinitely easier to find someone who will work part time on your idea than be committed to it.

It would depend how transparent you were to begin with. If you were honest with your co-founder in fully advising that you'd take off to pursue your own project if it started going well, then he could make an informed decision about whether to co-found with you to begin with.

Given the stakes involved, most co-founders would expect more of a solid commitment than that.

> I would never have said anything publicly about the matter.

And you shouldn't have, it's unprofessional from someone holding your position.

> I can't stand to hear it described in this misleading way

How is it misleading? He didn't say we in reference to his YC history. He omitted any concept of more than one person, thus the assumption should be that he was speaking about himself. Which is fine.

Why is it unprofessional?

For the same reason he claimed he would normally never make this statement public to begin with.

Siqi hadn't agreed to share his entire life with his YC cofounders and pretending otherwise is very childish. The fact that PG is being upvoted for this simply because he is PG is damaging to reasonable debate.

That sucks.

Oddly enough I actually know (well, actually met) Siqi back in the day when he was at Powerset. It's interesting to hear this kind of story.

Go figure. :\

It wouldn't be wise, or kind, to judge based on hearsay, even pg's hearsay.

Yeah. Well I take it with a grain of salt I guess.

Anyway, I saw Siqi's response and it seems pretty legit.

That's pretty low.

Has YC changed its contractual agreements with new YC companies to avoid such treachery in the future ?

No; the biggest danger of people doing bad things to you is that it will make you paranoid, so we've made a conscious effort not to accumulate a lot of defensive cruft. E.g. to this day we don't ask startups to sign any kind of LOI at the the point when we agree to fund them.

If only the security organisations of the world could share your attitude.

All the dude gave was a brief description of his experience in response to what the original poster asked for. Calm down pg, you are not a god.

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