Y Combinator Inspires Imitators
businessweek.com
Paul Graham's intensive workshop permits investors and startups to check each other out with a minimum of risk and a maximum of potential
businessweek.com
Compare that with YC's entry point - read discussions without any barriers, then enter username, password, click create account - and start posting comments which will help YC get to know you.
YC's Reddit-style forum is much more enticing than Seedcamp's old-school forum (although Seedcamp's graphics are pretter.)
Is understanding of design and programming a predictor of good angel-ness?
Yes, IMO.
My first mainstream media PR hit would've been a whole lot better if she would have said "Kevin Fischer, founder of www.hivgene.com." instead of Kevin Fischer, Y Combinator reject. Maybe next time.
(to anyone wondering, she saw some posts of mine on a thread comparing Y Combinator to Techstars on the Techcrunch forums and emailed me for an interview. 22 minutes on the phone.)
Bullshit. I live in South America. Show me the Y Combinator in Bogota.
There's a reason they ask you to move to the bay area or Cambridge. You can't just duplicate the atmosphere in a non-startup epicenter. This is probably the best reason not to have YC programs everywhere. And what good would a YC franchise be without the 4 partners? Unless the franchise owner can attract the same kind of speakers, the experience would be significantly less worthwhile.
But as long as the franchise owner is of better caliber than the Y Europe guy, it's a lot better than nothing. YC only funds 50 startups a year, there is a lot of unmet demand for similar services.
1) pg/yc's advice and connections
2) other smart hackers' advice and connections
3) a complex package I'll call moral support. This includes the validation of their plans, committment to working full-time, and some other less important factors.
4) being able to say "I am funded by yc"
5) publicity
6) money
1), 4), and 5) are hard to replicate well, but I don't think it'd be hard to do them better than an angel (depending on the angel). Angels are also useless at 2, and they take more equity. I think there's a lot of value in even mediocre yc knockoffs, and that we'll see a lot more of them in the coming years.