What We Do, More Than Money, Format & Philosophy | Hacker News Reader

What We Do, More Than Money, Format & Philosophy

ycombinator.com

13 pointsbootload5 comments

"... Why are we so flexible? Not (just) because we're nice people. We realize that, as it gets cheaper to start a company, the balance of power is shifting from investors to hackers. ..."

"... All venture investors supply some combination of money and help. In our case the money is by far the smaller component. ..."

"... One of the least publicized things we do, for obvious reasons, is mediate disputes between founders. No startup thinks they're going to need that, but most do at some point. ..."

".... We realize that independence is one of the reasons people want to start startups in the first place. And frankly, it's also one of the reasons startups succeed. Investors who try to control the companies they fund often end up destroying them. ..."

A nice read & certainly offering some insights I have not previously read.

I rewrote this a couple months ago to explain what we actually did, so I suppose it is news of a sort.

I leaf through most sites beyond the main pages & I was sure this was updated.

- working with ideas

- dealing with investors ('we supply not just advice but protection')

- why ability to give advice is scarce

- why bootcamp description is inaccurate & undesirable

- people want to create startups for independence

- explaining why the wrong type of external control (of business) is fatal

- power shift from funders to founders (that would make a good article)

- explanation of yc "do no evil" equation for founders & investors

The "news worthy" bits for me are some of the statements made within the page, that may be implicit in a lot of articles, talks or comments made concrete and explicit in this article.

I generally believe that most people with money are generally not stupid. Why, if that is the case, I hear so often that VCs more likely to destroy companies they fund by imposing their control (via puppet CEO for example)?

Just asking...

"... I generally believe that most people with money are generally not stupid. Why, if that is the case, I hear so often that VCs more likely to destroy companies they fund ..."

Human frailty.

After you make a certain amount of money the real aphrodisiac or prime motivator becomes power and control. So (mindless) control is the problem. It has less to do with stupidity, how smart you are as to how well your pre-frontal cortex has been trained to deal with absolute power. There is a lot to be learn't from the ego-less leader. Jim Collins has written about this character trait that propels (or hinders) companies ~ http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/51/goodtogreat.html

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