Y Combinator may go fully remote for its next cohort | Hacker News Reader

Y Combinator may go fully remote for its next cohort

techcrunch.com

141 pointssahin-boydas30 comments

It's probably not worth having a big thread about one use of the word "may", especially since there is a flood of this kind of story right now. On HN, there's no harm in waiting until a thing actually happens, and an announcement of the possibility of a future announcement is off topic.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

(I don't have any information about this, having just read about it here like everyone else.)

Application deadline tomorrow 8pm PT btw.

I'll apply with phone-based weather forecasting (as I always do, ha), and in the other ideas section I will add my ideas for remote work.

I wonder if there will be a surge of last-minute applications regarding new ideas adjacent to the current crisis.

It’s funny how ideas related to the current crisis have been dismissed in the past as “not very interesting.” Yet my little company that deals with online mental health has exploded in the past weeks and with the visibility and viability of “remote” getting more attention, the growth potential has become a lot more interesting. We’ve had former customers resubscribing, and a deluge of new customers. My weekend has been nonstop handling the rush. It’s almost like being Slashdotted — yet these folks are handing us money.

Any new companies being thought up right now are likely going to be left behind — the time to think of this stuff was years ago. But, unfortunately, VC money often lacks foresight.

It is interesting though how vitamins can suddenly become painkillers in the right environment.

As a current Startup School, Europe-based participant [1], this raises an interesting question: if the whole program can be run virtually in a remote-only fashion, then perhaps it can be open for startups from anywhere in the world?

[1] - https://www.startupschool.org/companies/scanrepeat

YC has always been open to startups from anywhere. They've funded hundreds of international startups, if not more than a thousand by now, and certainly well over a thousand international founders.

YC-funded startups have never been required to stay in the US after the batch, so it's easy to answer your question. (I've not got any inside information and just found out about this by reading HN like everybody else.)

That doesn't answer the parent's question. The requirement to come to the US even for a single hour, either before or during or after the batch, can be a huge hurdle for some founders. That's why the "fully remote" part is interesting. 99.9% remote is very different from 100% remote.

I'm scratching my head trying to see how that doesn't answer the question. By definition, a remote batch means people wouldn't need to come to SF for a batch. There's never been any location requirement otherwise. What's left?

Well, the announcement hasn't been as clear as "By definition." They only said that "some or all of the batch may take place remotely over video."

If the coronavirus pandemic is under control in the U.S. by June, and YC decides to run some of the later parts of the batch (such as Demo Day) offline in SF, that could be a problem for foreign founders who might still be stuck in their own countries or can't get a visa on time. The deadline is drawing near. Without a firm assurance that there will be no location requirement whatsoever at any time, a lot of foreign founders might decide not to take the risk. But YC is not making themselves clear. As I said, there's a huge difference between 99.9% remote and 100% remote.

Anyway, I just saw your more recent comment about over-interpreting the word "may" and I fully agree with what you said there.

Ah, I see now. That phrase is so obviously corporate boilerplate that there's no story here.

I was being a typical reader and reacting to the headline.

I wonder how this will affect the level of candor at the famous dinner discussions?

I imagine that the risk of being caught secretly recording them would be higher in person than sitting at home on a video call.

Either would likely run into wiretapping laws.

Laws establish consequences when discovered, but discovery is the challenge. How can you mitigate the risk of someone recording with their phone? how can you tell who recorded it unless e.g. YC watermarks multicasts? What if that recording is never published but is distributed privately to/for someone else's advantage?

Hackers putting together some of the more notable firetalks/skytalks this year had some adjacent conversations about creating possibly virtual-only firetalks, and these concerns were all raised given the traditionally ephemeral nature of in-person conversations at the events.

Most of the United States is single party consent with regards to recording calls. I am not aware about the rest of the world but I doubt the US is the only place where that is true.

I suppose you could make everyone sign a nondisclosure agreement that their candid, off the record conversation couldn’t be recorded, but it does seem to defeat the purpose of the candid, off the record conversation if contract law comes in to play and and would only impose civil (money) penalties.

I am currently participating in another accelerator that is being conducted remotely due the virus.

There are some benefits to the remote format. The most noticeable is that you can network a lot more than you could in real life. Scheduling Zoom calls with your peers is easy enough and you can quickly switch back to working afterwards.

The greatest downside is that I came to SF just for this accelerator and (as it became a remote event) I have been mostly just working from my bedroom.

It is definetely not as fun as meeting people in person though. Having video calls VS working together, brainstorming and going for meals just doesn't create the same relationships. Overall, the experience feels lonely and not much different than participating in entrepreneur Slack community.

yeah, and YC has already built some stuff out thru startup school to make this easier.

The statement below is interesting (linked in the article) - it was posted on March 10, presumably mainly as a COVID-19 reaction. Is that acceleration surprising? Or maybe the acceleration is just for a few of the companies who most directly are impacted (or impact) COVID-19, but YC needs to take a portfolio approach?

>Over the last few days, a large number of investors have accelerated their outreach to our current batch of founders. They are moving quickly to make investment decisions, and we’re going to match their pace and accelerate our schedule by one week. YC W20 online Demo Day will now be on March 16.

Considering the upcoming recession, is now even a good time to start a company?

Here's a relevant Paul Graham essay -

http://paulgraham.com/badeconomy.html

We did some research on this a while ago, and while it definitely won't be as easy as in a bull market, there's plenty of good companies that were started during market downturns. [0]

[0] https://medium.com/@645ventures/3-things-founders-vcs-should...

it might not have a choice...

pioneer.app has been super fun in the limited time we have used it. Check it out!

Will they still require you to move to SF?

If not, and if it works out well, I can imagine this being a nail in the coffin for the Bay Area bubble.

Every year we hear this could be the end of Bay Area dominance. Hasn't happened yet. No reason it will now.

The events we are currently experiencing represent a large quantity of activation energy that could destabilize many metastable equilibria in our lives. I've already arranged to work remotely through the end of 2020. I see no reason to believe others won't do the same. Our offices and commutes were already obviously bad for productivity and creativity, but we were all just collectively ignoring it.

> No reason it will now.

You can't think of anything different now?

YC doesn't require companies to be located in SF after a batch. It never has.

About time!

So no statements on the epidemic, no plans to support or donate for the cause, just Silicon Valley rat race as usual?

https://blog.samaltman.com/funding-for-covid-19-projects

"Funding [word of the day] startups". Adaptive rat race, sure.

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