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Got rejected to YC and now feel happy about it:)

14 points by DeanTheHacker ↗ HN
Well... It was really disappointing to get the rejection, especially when we've put so much work into that YC application. First idea when I saw the email: Damn! How could they do not invite us? We have such a great mobile email app! Disrupting! Fantastically awesome! Totally new approach that blows Google's Inbox and Mailbox out of the water hands down. Cool traction with early adopters and even a 200M users company as a partner that opens their audience to us. But then the second thought came. Thank you! Tanks for not inviting us to the interview for this W15 batch. We'll work our asses off to get into Summer batch. It is obvious that we didn't work hard enough to get invited into this one. Thanks for the motivational ass kick! Let's talk in April.

12 comments

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mindcrime
We'll work our asses off to get into Summer batch.

How about just "work your ass off to make a great product that satisfies your users, and grow your company", where getting into YC (or not) is just a side effect? Pointedly working to get into YC sounds, to me, like a micro-optimization, that may or may not make much difference in terms of your end goal(s).

jsonne
Piling on here. Marc Ecko's book Unlabel does a good job touching on this. There's gatekeepers and goalkeepers. YC is very valuable to be sure, but the real goalkeeper is getting your customers to pay for your product or service. That's really it.
michaelchisari
Or, work so hard to get into the summer batch that you don't end up caring about getting into the summer batch.
mindcrime
Or, work so hard to get into the summer batch that you don't end up caring about getting into the summer batch.

To the extent that you'd do the same things either way, I think that makes perfect sense. But I'd worry if someone optimized for getting into YC, at the expense of doing something to improve their product / develop better engagement with their customers / etc.

Of course this is a continuum, not a binary thing. Even just filling out a YC application is an investment of time, that, theoretically, could have been used for writing code or something. And I'm certainly not saying "no one should ever apply to YC". I would just get nervous if it seemed that someone was treating "getting into YC" as the goal, in and of itself - rather than just treating it as a stepping-stone.

retrogradeMT
Still, many people work better with short term milestones. I would wager that making a great product is always on the top of the list. The process of doing that is what matters. If this company finds intense focus with the goal getting in the summer batch, I'm all for it.
zerr
Also, if you really believe in success of your company, why would you give a significant chunk of it to some investor?
tapatio
Are you creating a breakthrough technology instead of incremental improvements?

Are you starting with a big share of a small market?

Will your market position be defensible 10 and 20 years into the future?

Have you identified a unique opportunity that others don't see?

I'm guess you've answered no to several of the questions above. That's why they didn't pick you.

coralreef
I like Thiel's book and ideas as much as the next person, but it disturbs me to see them parroted, because some of these questions aren't even good. Especially these two:

Are you creating a breakthrough technology instead of incremental improvements?

Will your market position be defensible 10 and 20 years into the future?

Did any of Uber, Facebook, Twitter, AirBNB, Dropbox, etc. have breakthrough technology? Meaning something no one else could copy? No, the first iterations of those products could have been built by nearly anyone, but wasn't. Technology is clearly not an important reason why they succeeded.

tapatio
He states in his book that one's company does not have to exhibit all of the characteristics he mentions. I think Uber, FB, Twitter, AirBnB, and Dropbox do have a majority of them though. I think there are much better problems to solve in spaces other than email.
DeanTheHacker
Thanks for the comments. We are fully committed to the project and trying to get into YC was sort of a clearing the vision and putting everything into one single document. It helped a lot. Though we'd do our best to get into summer batch we'll keep on doing on what we're doing regardless if we succeed or not. It is just another motivational element:) Trying to get into YC and making progress with customers and users are the same to me. The more we are attractive for YC the better are the chances.
lazyjones
With all due respect to YC, but perhaps product <=> market fit is actually more important than product+company <=> YC fit? I'd work on the product rather than the YC presentation...