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I’m not sure why YC is an example of something that has scaled well. There’s so many companies now in each batch with 95%+ never amounting to much success. It’s not clear how the scale is helping anyone.

I will say that large % of the batches turn out to still be good companies later, sometimes much later. The journey of being a founder sets people up to do a lot more: YC alums are often great C-level executives at other fast growing startups, and/or just because their first startup doesn't work doesn't mean they don't go on to create great companies later.

The key thing about networks is Metcalfe's law: the power of a network is the square of its nodes. This is also what makes the Internet more and more valuable over time.

Those things together mean scale increases value for founders, and what we've learned is those effects are most potent early.

Did YC used to have a better record when they were smaller?

There have been plenty of scaling problems (my batch, S12, has been publicly referred to a few times as "the batch that broke YC" for example).

Scaling is an iterative process :)

Or perhaps writing pro rata checks doesn't require that many people?