YC rejection emails are out!
39 comments
Also, be grateful you weren't this guy.
http://distilled.wordpress.com/2006/02/23/ycombinator/ I think they got an interview for the round after, not sure if they got in from there.
This is terrible. I had no idea this had happened till now. I am so sorry. If I had known we'd accidentally sent these people an invitation to interview, we would have just gone ahead and interviewed them.
As far as I am concerned, this is the worst mistake YC has ever made, and we will try never to let this happen again.
As far as I am concerned, this is the worst mistake YC has ever made, and we will try never to let this happen again.
None of my business, Paul, but you might want to contact the guy and apologize. That had to suck big time.
Good idea; I just did.
Oh, please. Shit happens.
Sure does. And when it happens to your users, you'd better be able to do some scooping real quick. But like I said, not my call.
Sheesh. An administrative error.
Hate to sour this little love-in, though.
Hate to sour this little love-in, though.
Its easy to create perceptions of yourself that are simply not true. I was one of the people who got that mail. I really thought about shooting an upset sounding email to Paul. But thought the better of it -- amazing that every other person on that list did the same. Only when I met the YCombinators on the interviews to a subsequent cycle did I figure that they were nice people (inspite of not making it). Absolutely no hard feelings, though. Looking back, I simply was not prepared enough to do a startup. I eventually got around to realizing that I did not need money to built a product -- just a committed co-founder -- and so thats what I did. Yesterday's rejection did not sting at all.
He went to UNC. I didn't know Adi personally - but from what I hear, he's a great hacker and is working at Microsoft.
Yeah, looks like they did get an interview eventually, but didn't make it all the way:
http://www.adiunnithan.com/blog/?p=100
http://www.adiunnithan.com/blog/?p=100
Thanks to all of the Y Combinator Staff for taking the time to read our application. I wish those who made it through best of luck with the interviews. To everyone who didn't, I'm going to keep going, I hope you will also!
Ditto the thanks to the YC Staff for going through the slush pile. Best of luck to those who got invited to Boston.
We didn't make the cut, so we're incorporating within the week, cementing our partnership with a 3rd team member (Columbia biz school prof), and immediately seeking funds from more conventional (although more dilutive) sources. We are also looking for one more hacker to join us. We can pay $5k for sure (possibly more depending on alternative funding) + equity for Jan-Mar in Palo Alto area. We're building a collaborative investing system that's quite different than the ones out there, and we have team members with deep domain expertise.
We didn't make the cut, so we're incorporating within the week, cementing our partnership with a 3rd team member (Columbia biz school prof), and immediately seeking funds from more conventional (although more dilutive) sources. We are also looking for one more hacker to join us. We can pay $5k for sure (possibly more depending on alternative funding) + equity for Jan-Mar in Palo Alto area. We're building a collaborative investing system that's quite different than the ones out there, and we have team members with deep domain expertise.
We're in a similar position. Could you mention sites you found useful for info on incorporation?
Thankyou
Thankyou
We're going with an ex-Cooley Godward lawyer for our incorporation. It's more expensive but in the big scheme of things, we think it's better to get this done right and have someone experienced to handle equity arrangements and contracts.
There are other YC threads on incorporation. For general information, Wikipedia is pretty good :) [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incorporation_(business)]
There are other YC threads on incorporation. For general information, Wikipedia is pretty good :) [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incorporation_(business)]
legalzoom.com
At least we'll all qualify for a future version of Jessica Livingston's Hackers at Work book...being rejected at least once is a general theme of the interviews!
It's a hard email to swallow, but I'm going to continue my work. I was excited at the idea to be a part of Y-Combinator; it's tough to entertain the idea of pursuing your product with the support of peers and successful people. Then realize you're not going to have a chance to WOW Y-Combinator at the interviews in November, nor will you be there in January to love the three months. I know my idea is great and I can make it happen, call me if you want to join in - you have my number.
I kind of take it like a diss from a girl.
I just want to find a hotter girl with bigger, better assets and make sure that one girl that didn't give me a chance see's that she really lost out. Maybe even send her a nice sex tape.
I just want to find a hotter girl with bigger, better assets and make sure that one girl that didn't give me a chance see's that she really lost out. Maybe even send her a nice sex tape.
I can't imagine why Y Combinator would reject someone with such impeccable taste in similies...
I know.
Technically, it was a diss from a girl. ;)
Nah, a diss is personal. There's nothing personal about this.
Nah, a diss is personal. There's nothing personal about this.
Also, nobody has said diss in about a decade. Or in hacker terms, nobody has said diss since people wrote web apps in Perl.
[deleted]
I am from Florida, 'diss' still works here.
It's personal because everyone on our team put in personal time, meaning more time than we allotted for our normal procedures to apply.
It sucks to be rejected. I needed to vent somehow.
It sucks to be rejected. I needed to vent somehow.
Just treat YC like you would any other VC. I doubt you'd be broken up if one of them rejected you; you'd (ideally) have many more lined up anyway.
There are opportunities all over the place. Keep your hopes up.
There are opportunities all over the place. Keep your hopes up.
It does suck to be rejected. But there's sucks like "we spent a week with you analyzing your entire team and pulling apart opportunities and leverage you didn't know you had, but we're just going to have to pass because we don't think you'll make it" and then there's sucks like "we looked at fourteen hundred forms people filled out on our web page in the last two days and the matrices didn't line up for you guys.
Hopefully you could handle either of those scenarios, but if I had to take one, the YC one is a pretty easy rejection. Heck, we even got a nice e-mail.
Hopefully you could handle either of those scenarios, but if I had to take one, the YC one is a pretty easy rejection. Heck, we even got a nice e-mail.
We got that e-mail, but I promptly replied that they sent us the wrong one. Still waiting for the Boston invite. ;)
Will be interesting to see who got the invite and goes through to the 3 months. Does any one document this?
Congrats to all who made it!
R.
Will be interesting to see who got the invite and goes through to the 3 months. Does any one document this?
Congrats to all who made it!
R.
What is important is that YCombinator has already built a community even by rejecting most of applicants.
Don't loose a chance to network, cooperate and succeed, we all are in a great team over here!
Don't loose a chance to network, cooperate and succeed, we all are in a great team over here!
Well that was fun.
Back to coding.
Back to coding.
last cycle's thread: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11496
Congrats to all who got an interview! Make it count, because once you interview that is your only chance...
Congrats to all those who made it. For those who didn't, it's time to work even harder.
[deleted]
I haven't received anything yet. Should I be happy, sad, or just confused?
We realize this process is fraught with error. It's practically certain that groups we rejected will go on to create successful startups. If you do, we'd appreciate it if you'd send us an email telling us about it; we want to learn from our mistakes.
Thanks,
Y Combinator Staff"