I agree with you entirely. To add to your point, we readers aren’t an an average of a simulation. We are a single path. So, this advice works for the those that reap benefits of the average but it may not be the advice suited for individuals.

“Jump off a cliff because statistically, one of you may fly”.

"We've had no complaints from cliff jumping participants."

a literal example of survivor bias

Money has logarithmic utility. If you build a successful company, your gain is proportional to logarithm of its profit. But your investor's gain is directly proportional to the profit.

So the investor will try to convince you to aim for 300% profit with 50% probability (compared to your original plan), because for the investor this simply means +50%. For you, it mostly means -50% probability, because the difference between having e.g. $10M or $30M is negligible compared to the difference between having $10M or nothing.

But what is the problem for those for who it doesn't work? How much do they get to lose? If they don't get accepted to the YC, they lose very little and it's just a short detour in their lives, certainly not the most boring or frustrating one, something to remember. If they get accepted to the YC, they clearly win vs the average folk because they get to know so many influential people and see how the world-class stuff gets done.

For example, i've been doing custom development for more than 20 years, made several million in the process, built over 130 project and i still don't have a slightest idea of how it's done - because every single of my client's projects failed - and i would be more than delighted to see how projects succeed first-hand even if the project wasn't mine.

I feel your example is a good portrayal of a life pretty much well-lived: you made money doing something you enjoy, met tons of people and fed your curiosity.

But according to this essay, you followed a BAD path not innovative enough, and the hidden reason why it's bad is because it will never generate any sort of profit for YC.

Now if you had tried 3 or 4 startups in that same timespan, burned through all your life savings, did not make several millions in the process, and failed all you endeavours, you will be applauded by YC.

Why ? because the more people exist like you, the better it is for them.

> you followed a BAD path [ according to the essay]

I think not -- instead this seems quite un-conventional to me:

>> doing custom development for more than 20 years, made several million in the process

> detour in their lives, certainly not the most boring or frustrating one, something to remember

Yes, and something one could regret for a lifetime if one never tried, a dream that one never gave the chance

But of course it depends

> trying to trick/persuade/convince (choose freely) thousands (literaly) of people to go this path, benefits tremendously ycombinator - not the persuaded founders.

Why so negative

It can be fun for the founders also if the startup fails, and not always anything to regret

And good for society in general with more innovation, eg YC's request for startups page: https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs/

Many things there are really good for this planet

At this point, honestly the only YC startup they seem to be romanticizing is Airbnb. I've only heard of a few casual mentions (from Michael Siebel I think) of Brex or Segment or any of the other startups.

It does appear that YC is no longer relevant the way they were 10 years ago.

Is there a "new" YC?