Comment by roberthahn | Hacker News Reader

Comment by roberthahn | Hacker News Reader

A lot of commenters here saying the tone of the OP is bitter. I say the tone is human.

This team has every good reason to succeed: they spent 2 years of their life working together building something that's now getting significant traction - and making them money.

Every fundamental metric indicating whether the business will work or not were established facts. That should put them head and shoulders over anyone else.

Given all that, it's hard NOT to feel emotionally invested after 2 years. And it's hard not to want to spend time processing the experience the way they did.

At this point, it doesn't matter why they didn't get in. It would be great to know, and yes, it's awesome that they got some actionable feedback -

Actually, I want to say something about that too. Even if the feedback isn't what you wanted, shaolin69, it's all the more valuable because it's coming from someone who isn't like you. I agree with your priorities - especially your viral loop tricks (way to go on that, by the way). But I hope you'll tuck it away somewhere for the day you scratch your head and wonder "ok, what can I do now to boost traffic?"

But. As I was saying, it doesn't matter why you didn't get in. You still know you have the makings of a successful business. YC's rejection doesn't invalidate your track record. So be encouraged! I'm glad to see you took advantage of your time stateside to look at other accelerators and got some interest. Best of luck, looking forward to hearing your success stories!

Moreover, the author is exactly right. With ten minutes all they can do is evaluate the lead person and the team. Sadly the takeaway is closer to "we didn't like you (enough)" and the "feedback" is a best guess as to why.

The assessment is thin slicing straight out of Blink by Gladwell and that approach has been shown to be very influenced by a whole host of pre-existing biases by the judges. Even very smart people are subject to those biases and experts are especially prone.

Wow, thanks for the encouraging words :)

I'd like to offer an analogy: fast food chain franchise vs boutique restaurants. It seems to me that your startup is a boutique restaurant and so is not a good fit for a McDonalds-style franchise contract. However, at the end of the day, running a boutique restaurant is a lot more satisfying, at least in my opinion, and most of the time, more financially rewarding too. On the other hand, you do need authenticity to be a successful boutique restaurant owner, not the attitude "we are disrupting XXX", "we are changing YYY, one ZZZ at a time".

What to make of Chipotle? They basically took the SF burrito joint from a boutique/local food dive to a viable biz franchise. Hugely successful at scale...

Sadly the takeaway is closer to "we didn't like you (enough)" and the "feedback" is a best guess as to why.

What does this say about the importance of culture fit?

It seems like there are a lot of people in these circles who view themselves as far more rational and less prone to prejudice in matters of business.

The truth seems to be more like slightly more rational, but not _that_ much more rational. From my experience, the more a company proclaims strict meritocracy, the less true it is.

I think a certain amount of angst or bitterness or disappointment is perfectly acceptable.

Their application probably didn't say "First Yoga, Then THE WORLD!!" If it's too niche or couldn't possibly have enough upside you can evaluate that looking at the application. No need for all the flying and jetlag and lost productivity, etc.

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