skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
i can't say whether you should move to SF or not, but i can tell you my experiences.

i've lived in both seattle and san francisco, and currently live in SF. though i was more involved with the corporate scene than the startup scene in seattle, the vibe is entirely different down here. startups live here. you meet tons of smart people working on cool stuff. it's a great place to be.

competition ends up being a good thing -- as LA is to many of the best (and wannabe-best) people in the entertainment industry, so SF is to the nerd industry.

even though it can be a bummer sometimes to be coding when the weather is beautiful outside (as it is now), i find the overall environment more stimulating -- intellectually, culturally, geek-ally. there are also plenty of outdoorsy things to do very nearby in marin and the east bay, though not quite as close as the options in seattle. the only thing i miss is a lower rent and the seattle music scene.

though i can't tell you whether moving will make or break your startup, SF can be a very wonderful place to live (and work).
Ha. It's only mildly relevant here, but my inadmissibility to enter Canada just recently expired. I was touring with a band trying to play a show in Vancouver and we got banned for a year for lying to border guards. Boneheadedly, we let the bassist do the talking and the Canadians googled their way to quite a few holes in his story.
21 + 84 credits into a BS in Industrial Engineering.
If it were up to me amusing anecdotes would always be relevant.
Actually, the "negotiation" is proving what you're worth. If, when you come in, you're relatively far along, have a really compelling demo, you can prove a huge market, etc...you'll get a better valuation. The differences are small, but they do give somewhat different offers to different groups. And, of course, you can still say no when pg calls to give you the terms.

But, do take pity on pg--he's frazzled on that day. He calls everybody personally. I was impressed by how nice he managed to stay through the whole process (and even moreso now that I've seen first-hand how crowded pg's life is with people who want to be around him).

We went in knowing that we'd say "no" if the offer involved more than 6% equity...but it rarely does, so that wasn't a big concern. We're glad we weren't one of the "no" groups.
Thanks, guys.

I just need to clear one thing now: considering I incorporate in the US, how do I manage to "pay myself and my co-founder"? I mean bills, common expenses, rent, food, etc? Can I transfer company revenue to a personal account? I know it is bad to mix personal/company cash flow, but is it ok/acceptable to use a corporate credit card?

I know that this is not something to worry enough to make me lose my sleep, I am just curious about how things are handled fiscally and in terms of accounting.

* edit: Removed the "pre" formatting. Sorry.
paul, if there is a standard process, is the % based on the number of founders, an evaluation, or both?
10 percent of September iPhones sold to unlocking teams
Nobody is mentioning the free Zune startup founders will receive. That alone is worth like 25 bucks.
In general I would say Loopt is doing just about the best they possibly can given whats currently available. Last I heard Loopt's software was written in Java ME, which means they are using a GPS optional library (probably the Location API, or maybe OpenLAPI). Devices that support this are still few and far between. But they are on the rise. As long as a new device supports the required optional libraries, supporting it is not difficult (there are still usually quirks that need to be sorted out however, often requiring separate builds for each device even though its JavaME).

It may take a stomach to do this kind of stuff, but that is the cost of being on the bleeding edge.
Can you edit your reply? The pre/code screws up the layout (in Safari). Thanks!
It does it in Firefox too, it happens pretty regularly when someone accidentally puts a space in front of a paragraph of prose.
An unordered list of thoughts I had during a conference call with a potential client today
29 + MS in Industrial Engineering
Hi Joe. I like your writing.

http://www.mentallyincontinent.com/ for everyone else.
24 + BS in Computer Science
"At the moment, there is no one within big companies who gets in trouble when they buy a startup for $200 million that they could have bought earlier for $20 million. There should start to be someone who gets in trouble for that."

I think it's right that startups will be acquired earlier and earlier, but that makes me wonder: might those earlier acquisitions (which sometimes decrease productivity to 1/13th what it was) sabotage the success of the startup either because once acquired the founders don't have to work as hard to keep their heads above water or because when not constrained by a tiny startup budget the founders won't worry as much about finding efficient ways to do things--which in the past made them better startups/companies?
"JOIN ME MY MINIONS! ITS IN YOUR INTEREST!" - P.G.
That doesn't tell me very much. Should I forget about the Valley then, because visas are too hard to get? I've got better things to do than dealing with immigration issues - it seems a big drawback.

The next best option is probably London. I'm guessing it's the best place for start-ups in Europe?
25+Master's in Life (oh yea,I have a B.S. in EE too)
Perfectionists Despair: Digital World "Always in Beta"
I have to always remember this; Put speed over perfection: "Get something out there. Do it, even if it isn't perfect."
29 + G.E.D.
$9,250 a song?

Was the jury drugged?
That was at the low end of the possible damages.
I'd call that brainwashing.
26 + M.S. Computer Engineering / Management Science
22 + college dropout
26 + BA in Computer Science.
40 + BA in Architecture (buildings), sort of getting an MS in Computer Science
I might have focused the defense on the fact that these laws were intended to be used against black marketers, and not casual downloaders. (If that's the case--I believe it is.)

This case is like charging penny poker players with racketeering.
We would be much better off as a nation if juries made decisions as human beings instead of just looking at the law, but I guess non-brainwashed people that know about jury nullification don't usually end up in 12/12 spots on a jury.
The same old mistake, assuming a transitory boomlet will continue forever.
23+BBA in CIS and TLAs
20 + College Junior (BA Econ)
21 + College Junior studying Computer Science Engineering
30 + BSc. (Philos /Comp. Sci.)
I don't think this will catch on...You just can't think of a game one move at a time. This throws out the concept of strategy
there's a good reason for bay area to be that expensive (quoting your stuff, higher rent,higher competition,etc) and if you are in doubt simply follow the money.

not that you cannot do what you wanna do in seattle, I have lived in SF and now in Cambridge. I can simply tell you the vibe is far far better and you get stimulated to take risk when you see people around you taking far more risks (in seattle you are more likely to encounter people who say job is fine, buy house,have kids,etc). So yeah! my vote, move to the bay and be pleasantly surprised by what it offers
Just curious, what is the point?
The key to this is to discover the golden key of negotation:

BATNA- "Best Alternative To a Negotiated Agreement"

Your BATNA: To keep doing what you're doing, and not get rich by fulfilling your dream.

YC's BATNA: To fund someone else that is about 99% as good as you.

You have a lot more to lose by walking away, therefore YC holds an incredible amount of power in the negotiation.
25 + dropout twice. Never going back.
I've been learning about this transition in my software design class, and the funny thing is the waterfall method should never have been in the first place. The method is actually based on a misinterpretation of Dr. Winston Royce's paper, where he advocates a system like rational unified process, but a bit more nuanced.
28 + BS. Computer Engineering with near minors in art/ anthropology/ math/ and theo-philosophy 180 hrs attempted 148 accomplished.

3 semesters of continuing edu in japanese
29 + PhD
25 + BS in Business
20 BS in BS
19 + 2nd Year in UNI doing Com sci.
in general, the median's around 6% and i think is also the most common, and i didn't encounter anyone who had negotiated it down. i don't think there's a formula. we had a working demo, and thousands of lines of code, but got the same deal as other groups who just had an idea.

unless the % seems way out of kilter, it's probably not worth optimizing this or cutting yc down (after all, they're making rapid fire phone calls down a list of people who would gladly take your spot. things like your option pool and follow on investments will be the dominating factors in your dilution anyway.) they definitely earn their chunk, and contribute _vastly_ more than the equity they take, even at the highest end.
27 + didn't finish college.
The RIAA was happy to see this case go to trial!

It's their PR machine working here. I have never heard of this case before and all the sudden boom press all over the place about it. They knew its an easy win and a good way to distract from all the negative press their campaign has received lately.

Good job RIAA!
i wouldn't bother trying to push the $5k+$5k*n . i think that precedent is pretty much set in stone. and even if you tried, the extra cash wouldn't matter much, and you'd more likely piss pg off than anything else.
19 + 3rd year college
I think Arrington timed his Techcrunch post <http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/10/04/the-inevitable-march-of...; to occur at the same time as this case.

Today was one of those days where we'll look back and say, "the same day the RIAA won its first case, Michael Arrington predicted the end of DRM. Turns out..."

My bet is with Techcrunch.
20 + 3rd year Chemical Engineering student

engineering for 0 years and had enough

programming for 10 years and with luck many more
I think that what he meant is that hackers sucking at colours is a little bit... irrelevant.
32 + B.S. Recording Industry
Founder of Sleep.FM - The Social Alarm Clock
I think it just helps us know the community more, and it's a good reference in case we are eventually looking for someone with a MS in Electrical Engineering.
22 + BA in Philosophy
19 + High school
36 - B.A., M.A. Classics; undergrad minor in Comp. Sci. 2 startups: 1 acquired; 1 round C and soon-to-be-profitable.
There are several people posting here that are very new users.. it's good to get new users engaged, give them a little positive reinforcement and mod them up so they will feel good about sticking around.
Tailrank 2.5 Launches. It Still Falls Short
In short, no.

As far as I can tell the Silicon Valley offers value most to a very specific sort of start up. If you don't need to raise a lot of capital or require a large team of very gifted engineers (which probably requires a great deal of capital anyway), then I don't think the Valley is as valuable to you. That said, I think being connected to the important people in the industry may help your cause immensely. Perhaps spending the winter with YCombinator would accomplish that (as far as I can tell Mr. Graham is pretty important).

You also need to consider how much you value your home against the value you would bring your career. For me, moving away for a decade or two is a big deal.

No worries, I think there are a lot of good businesses that can be established by a few smart developers hacking away for a while, then launching and picking up angel funding as or if needed. I have a myriad schemes and I found that those criteria helped me cull the ten thousand to ten I am comfortable with and confident in.

It is easier to make a million dollars after a hundred thousand and a billion after a million. Don't get ahead of yourself.
26 BS. Major: Computer Science Minors: in Math and Physics

Some certificatioin for Finance and Management
Ask: what do all of you think of Cuill (and other search startups)?
I'm skeptical of anyone who tries to play in the same ballpark as Google, but it looks like Cuill is composed of a fair number of ex-Googlers and others who are smartypants.

Anyone know anything about Cuill and what they do that a Google search wouldn't turn up?
If you are from a friendly country, I understand it is easy to get a long tourist visa. All of the immigration drama is about employment, so if you do not get paid while in America then as far as I can tell you are actually a tourist.

edit: or ask petenixey
Cuill seems noteworthy in that two of the founders are ex-Googlers and all of them seem very smart. "Cuill is a stealth search engine startup which claims that it can index web pages significantly faster and cheaper than Google. Cuill has told potential investors that their indexing costs will be 1/10th of Google's, based on new search architectures and relevance methods."

I can't find anything that indicates whether there's any substance to their claims. Certainly very smart people can do interesting work whose significance they greatly embellish and overestimate (AI researchers in the 70s and 80s).
43 + BS in Business
i think this IS negative press. fining a random person who correctly chose not to pay exorbitant prices for music some $200,000 doesn't look so good
How would it benefit Chrysler to open the source? According to this article, their software gives them a competitive advantage. Why would they want to share it with other companies?
Ig Nobels honor crazy science with a point
20 + 3rd year Digital Media (BA) student
21 + Completing BS in CS, YC next summer?
The logical argument against that seems to be that indexing costs aren't Google's major problem and cheaper indexing wouldn't provide much of a competitive advantage.
Can IE's architect explain why it's so bloated?
44 + 2 yrs college (accounting! :) ) --p
I don't know why this was modded up. That's like saying if one can't pay the $20,000 credit card balance, American Express will delay charging interest as long as the user charges up $2,000/year more. I think one would be better off just paying the interest than adding $2,000 of classes that they will have to attend.

Also, free interest or low interest as "aid" is a joke. You still have to pay the entire amount you borrowed.

I think the only time your strategy makes sense is if you can pay $1,000 to enroll in community college for one semester in order to stay on your parents' health insurance from June to December, which comes out to $140/mo, and the quotes you received for health+dental+vision were $500 a month, therefore saving approximately $2,500 per semester, or $5,000 a year. (And I believe if you're from Massachusetts, you can stay on your parents insurance as long as you're a dependent in income level even if you're not a student.)
53+BS EECS + all non-thesis work toward PhD

But what's the point of data from a self-selecting sample?
I'm assuming you attend Seattle Tech Startups at the library every month (if you don't, you should, you've got a pretty good chance of finding a co-founder there).

Having lived in both places, I would personally rather start a company in the Bay Area all things considered.
Read the instructions first...

...decisions will include the amount we'll invest and the
percent of the company we'd want for it. We usually invest $5000 + $5000n, where n is the number of participating founders (i.e. 2 founders get $15,000, 3 get $20,000), in return for between 2% and 10% of the company. The median is 6%.
Reality Check: Jajah adds to eBay's click-to-call nightmare
Hacking radars: Why Syria's Air Defenses Failed to Detect Israelis
24 + BS EE
26 + B.B.A. + lots of self-taught geek skills
28 + BA in MIS and minors in Comp Sci and Chinese
This kind of product sabotage only works if you're a monopoly. Newspapers aren't.
Ease of immigration/visa to US depends on which country you are from. So ask around your place. If anyone has immigrated to the US they are the ones who will be capable of giving you the best picture.

And yes, if its too grim, forget about the Vally. Yes, its sad and disappointing especially with all the pundits stressing the value of location. But be wild. Its a constraint, and last time I checked constraints promoted creativity. So use your resourcefulness to make up for your lack of resources. Its fun. Really!
21 Completing BA in Economics
Sounds like http://www2.ljworld.com/ (original user of Django)
There was an article in Business 2.0 Magazine awhile ago titled: "Escape from Silicon Valley". OK, I just found it for you:

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2...

Although it discusses the pros and cons of big city vs. little towns for start-ups, it also touches upon a variety of factors which seem to be relevant to your question.

I started my startup in a tiny place (Flagstaff, AZ) thinking I could make it work there. It almost did, but the reality is that there are numerous benefits to be had not necessarily from living here (SF), but from having the contacts and network of people in this area; living here just happens to be one of the best ways to get it.

I lived in Portland, OR for awhile, and visited Seattle a few times. I seem to remember something about abnormally high depression and suicide rates being cited for residents of Seattle . . . also, isn't Seattle one of the few places that has had cost of living increasing significantly / deviating from the norm? Not to knock Seattle (hey, hey -- no income tax in WA state), but the success of a startup I imagine would be correlated to happiness of its founders/employees.

Anyway. One of the things that I think makes this area such a hub of successful startups is that people here truly believe they're going to change the world. And, a lot of them end up doing just that. :)
21 + B.F.A. ... Would you like fries with that?
Exactly, reducing the indexing cost has little to no impact on the customers, so there is no competitive advantage to using Cuill over Google for searchers. They claim more "relevancy" but there is nothing to support that claim so far, but I'm eagerly awaiting it.

Even better relevancy may not be enough as most people believe current search technology is "good enough". It would have to be very innovative. If nothing else, they're a good acquisition target for an existing search company looking to further reduce costs and increase profits or allocate more resources towards more computationally expensive algorithms (spam filtering, semantics, content targeting, etc.)
Technical Co-founder needed (Boston area)
Very comforting information.
24 (going on 25) BS Geology minor Computer Science
Soon there may exist the phenomenon of Google acquiring companies started by ex-Googlers. ;)
25 + Struggling to finish my last year as an undergrad; taking pointless bullshit required GE classes that I couldn't bring myself to complete the first time around.
30 + PhD
22 + 4th year in BA Philosophy (a very possible dropout)
Ask YC: Would you rather work from home or live in office?
This question is for the former & current YC'ers (and other startup founders).

I had this debate with some founders tonight in Cambridge regarding one guy who just moved into town.

Situation: you are a Web 2.0 startup moving to Cambridge from out of state. Would you recommend getting a residential apartment and working from home, or getting an office and sleeping on the couch/cot at night?

I had my opinion, but I'll save it to hear yours first.
That sounds like a good compromise. The real life example and a detailed description of the application process really shouldn't be part of the description, so I think adding them as extra resources at the end is ok. I wouldn't expect the links to be followed, though, unless you description is really good (there's just too many applications and not enough time to venture outside of the application, I would think).
this is not a statistical study, it's a forum thread. It's for entertainment, mostly
Lisp Usenet classics
41 + Architecture (building) college for 5 years - left school 2 months before degree for NYC + famous Architect - long story
28 + jd/mba
If being in silicon valley is important to mix with the best and brightest then being in a good university deserves the same argument/conclusion. Any old university won't have students capable of learning at fast pace and so the curriculum will be watered down. Any old university won't have high quality teachers that can mentor the most gifted students.

I do think taking that last exam and finishing university was a magical moment. Following a commitment through to the end even when things are tough or tedious is valuable experience. You can get this other ways but there is a huge difference between someone who stuck in there and finished university and someone who called it off just three credits short.
I'm also wondering about this.
J-1 visa (student visa, http://www.hooyou.com/j-1/index.html) seems to be an option, but it would be great to hear from people that actually went.
totally totally broken in safari
21 + almost out of college (studied EE/CS)
87 + High school
CSS SiteMap
Do I need to incorporate if I plan to sell audio book on my website?
Russia(future?) or Israel(I guess it is a leader now)
I moved to the Bay area for my Day job (ER nurse) while I complete my CS degree. Even as an ER nurse, 2-3 nurses that I work with are married to either VC's or angel investors.

One of our volunteers at the ER where I work is an executive assistant for a VC. Several other nurses are married to engineers who work for Yahoo, Google, etc... She's offered to put me into contact with whoever I want to in the VC world. I'm not ready for it yet, but I can imagine that she could arrange an introduction or two.

It's hard to avoid networking opportunities here. And, there is an acceptance even among the non-tech people that Startups are the place to be. It's the cultural norm to start a business here.

I've lived in Minneapolis, Chicago, outside of Boston, LA and now the Bay area. Every city is good at certain things. Tech and startups are what the Bay does, and we do it well.
Dinosaur Programmers Know More Than You
If the preponderance of evidence is that her defense lied in court, $9,250 sounds low.
Yes I do attend the event most months. It's a great group... many thanks to Gaurav setting it up, and folks like Tony for coming and speaking.
How to Give Criticism - useful if you have co-founders (I need to improve on this myself...)
Microsoft Removes Anti-Piracy Check From IE 7 (Seeks Additional Marketshare)
27 + math (ug) and computer science(pg) degrees. presently in Phd .might drop it.
It really freaks me out that there are people on this board who think the BATNA for a founder in the YC negotiation is "give up on their dream".
34 + AAS Nursing + 4th year CIS (finishing next summer)
39 + B.Sc.(Hons) CompuSci
All that time spent in school you'd be better off sticking it out,
My perception, from experience, is that it's actually harder to hire in the Bay Area than, well, anywhere else. Anyone with a modicum of talent that you interview in Sunnyvale can pull a $130k/yr job out of their back pocket, and the BigCo alternatives in the valley are actually pretty spectacular.

If you need a large team of very gifted engineers, start in a college town that isn't Palo Alto or Berkeley.
24 illegal song downloads cost US woman 220,000 dollars
Most importantly:

The money itself is NOT the reason to sign up for YC.
ba physics + phd physics in progress
My personal favorite winner:

PEACE: The Air Force Wright Laboratory, Dayton, Ohio, USA, for instigating research & development on a chemical weapon -- the so-called "gay bomb" -- that will make enemy soldiers become sexually irresistible to each other.

We need more research like this to counter the baseless claims the the US has been slipping in science.
I don't want my children to find out the amount of bullshit I can take. Thats one of the reasons I am considering dropping.
Revisiting Programming Fonts