We definitely fund people who have no connection to folks we already know, or Silicon Valley for that matter. And we also fund startups who are at the idea stage and have no traction (though traction does help).

I'm very sorry we rejected you, but we are honestly often wrong.

I'm just wondering if there's a way for people to understand what their chances are. For example, if 0.01% of people that have lower than a 650 GMAT get into Stanford, then that would be useful information to know (for hopeful applicants).

Similarly, if the "has revenue" cohort has a 15% interview rate, and the "pre-revenue" cohort has a 0.5% interview rate, that would also be really great to know. (same thing for solo vs. multiple founders, recommended vs. non-recommended, etc).

I understand that YC has no obligation to provide this information, and perhaps there are very good reasons why it wouldn't provide it even if it was available. It would just be useful to know if possible.

There are going to be a few companies which are obvious superstars (great team, market, execution, traction, etc.) which will be obvious yeses. You're either in this group or your not.

There are many many companies which are obviously bad: weak team, bad market, poorly thought through idea, pre-product, etc. These companies would get rejected regardless of how many companies applied.

Then you have the companies in the middle. That's where the competition is. It doesn't really matter how many companies are in the previous groups, what matters is how you rank compared to the "maybes".

- You get a lot more 'no's than 'yes'es

- They don't give you a lot of feedback when they pass

- Having a previous relationship with them is helpful

- The more successful you are, the more they want to give you money

Unless you are starting a non-profit, this is just how it works. These people are investing, not donating to charity or your team's self-development. Get some traction and/or revenue and the game will flip around very quickly.

I think we both agree that: YC is becoming more like everyone else in the investing game. they want to make a lot of money.

Just to clarify, it felt like YC used to be more different from others in the investing game, like they cared more, or they were willing to invest in earlier-stage startups, or they had a higher purpose, or followed the hacker ethos. but now it just feels like they're more like every other investor out there -- please note the use of the word "more". they still do great things (watsi case in point), and all of their blog posts are very respectful towards applicants. to reiterate, it just feels like they're becoming "more" like traditional VC and less like what I thought YC was or used to stand for.

1. Anybody can apply, from anywhere, and you apply online. Good luck finding an online application for a normal VC, and cold-emailing partners isn't going to get you anywhere. Oh, and if you don't live in the bay area your chances just went way down of getting a meeting or investment.

2. They give you a nice chunk of money in exchange for a really tiny amount of common stock (I think it's common stock), have really nice terms, and don't take a board seat. I'm sure for many of the companies that apply, YC could take much more equity but they don't (and it would still be worth it for the companies anyway). They are paranoid about and lose a ton of money by restricting partners investing or taking their pro-rata rights to protect the companies they don't follow on with (this is my understanding of their policies).

3. They keep increasing their class sizes in attempts to get more people going through it. They created an online class that they offered for free to everybody to encourage more people to do startups and spread the knowledge.

4. They have a means of preventing and responding to investor misbehavior by threatening to blacklist them from YC companies. This is hugely valuable for your average entrepreneur as its helps to shift the culture in a way that is better for entrepreneurs (which has happened a lot in the past few years).

They aren't perfect. They don't claim to be perfect (case in point: the title of this blog post). But believe me, they are miles away from a traditional VC.

For example if they think you need to prove out certain assumptions then they'll tell you those assumptions, because it's in their interest. If they think you personally as a founder are uninvestable then they're unlikely to tell you that because there's no advantage in that for anyone.

Assuming this is true, this must be one of the easiest things in the world to hack. I would be very worried about any aspiring tech entrepreneur who couldn't manage to connect with a group of people who are as open and as generous with their time as many of the YC alums are.

> tendency to fund those who need it the least

First, I wonder if this is really true. It may look that way, but I imagine that many of the companies are in the product/market fit stage. Some may find themselves actually in the problem/solution fit stage. I imagine few are in the straight-up scaling stage.

Second, from YC's perspective, I think that they should definitely have some companies in each class for which they will simply act as a multiplier -- that is, get the company to where it is going, just faster and (maybe) better.

Lastly, if traction and/or revenue really are the key to acceptance, aspiring YC companies could simply use this as a parameter to consider when developing their company. IMHO, this is a case of the tail wagging the dog, but it's something to consider.