I love the concept of YC to death. I don't think there is a better way to get a web start-up going than to have it incubated in the amazing circumstances that YC provides. Though I've not yet applied to YC, mainly because I saved up my own money for seeding, but also for other reasons, I'd imagine the key benefits being exactly what Sachin has listed in this post.

The least of the benefits is definitely (and should be) the money. Even without money, somebody could foreseeable devote a small amount of time to hack together something. Granted, without funding it won't be as fully fleshed out, or built in as short amount of time, but it's likely that actually doing it isn't going to be the key point of failure.

What YC gets right is they put you in an environment where you're more likely to not just do it, but do it right. Not just the product, which absolutely benefits from the groupthink of lots of smart, devoted people in so small a space, but the company as a whole, for reasons that Sachin has listed.

I'd imagine the hugest benefit of all being the social proof, and investor day. If you're back by YC, you've already got a foot in the door: smart, experienced people have invested at least some money and resources into your idea. These people have delivered great companies before. I guess it's kind of like recruitment day at a top university. The best meet up with the presumed best.

Anyway, I need to ask, are there any such "investor days" open to the public? I'm getting nearer and nearer to launch (now considering filing a provisional patent which could delay things), but I'll have something substantial to show that really deserves attention.

I like my knowledge to be well-balanced. Are there any founders who have gone through YC and not liked it?

My current sample seems to indicate they all liked the experience.

(edited last sentence for clarity).

I worry there are people who didn't like us. We've now funded around 300 people, and out of that many there are probably some. But no group has actually told me so far that they thought YC wasn't worth it.

I think it depends on their exits. My thinking is if the startups have good exits, then they probably should be pretty happy with the experience. Can pg share a little stats on YC startups exits?

I'd be curious to know if pg and gang do exit surveys to find out what founders thought was valuable and what they thought could be done different/better.

We don't do formal ones (we don't do anything formal), but we often ask alumni individually.

At my Japanese employer salary assignments are done by grade and there is essentially no deviation for individuals. The company does not have managers ask engineers whether they are getting paid enough, because engineers rush to say "I am thankful for the opportunity to work here and am glad to be paid the same as every other engineer in my grade." I have said it myself.

Then once a year when they recalculate grades, they tell the I-can't-believe-its-not-a-union "Do an anonymous survey and tell us what people actually think." They even follow the recommendations a portion of the time.

I love your stance on not doing anything formal. But if you took an anonymous survey of all the American engineers at my company, you'd probably hear "Do anonymous surveys or people will give you the answer they think you want to hear" from 100% of them. (Population size: 1)

Also, convenience samples have some well-known issues: if somebody was totally soured by their experience and cursed your name, would you still be talking to them on a regular basis? (My company has the same issue with its salary survey, incidentally: the people who are most dissatisfied with the amount of money offered no longer work here. Funny how that happens.)

Yeah, you're probably right. We should do some kind of anonymous survey using Wufoo.

Even if you had a bad YC experience, it wouldn't be to your advantage to go public with it. You'd burn bridges for little gain.

The only people who seem to bad-mouth investors are ones who've already made more money than they know what to do with (Sabeer Bhatia style: http://www.foundersatwork.com/1/post/2009/02/a-note-about-sa...). YC hasn't had any giant, mega-hits yet that would warrant a founder poisoning their relationship with the investment community.

The classic has to be the ArsDigita story. It seems that Philip Greenspun has removed the story from his site, but I found it elsewhere.

http://waxy.org/random/arsdigita/

lol yes this is a biased site.

Nonetheless, I so wish I could experience how it feels to be selected by yc.

Then get an idea going!

Better yet, get a team going. Seems like that's more what they're looking for...