We all know the % of success stories from accepted companies. How does YC know it made scientifically sound decisions to reject companies that then went onto succeed via other means? How can YC know the quality of decisions are getting better without this data?
I have held Zynga throughout the year. The extent of leadership fail here is unprecedented. n number of remediation tactics should have taken hold early to prevent where we are now. Here is a copy of my e-mail to Pincus (still gone unanswered):
"Mark -
Can we have a man-to-man? Seriously, please explain to me, a small shareholder in Zynga, exactly what the fuck you have been doing with my investment? Clearly, the answer is not building value in any meaningful way. Any third year entrepreneur will have trouble seeing your performance this year amounting to anything other than a collected check, a leveraged office, a leased plane ($3K a wet flight hour?!? What is that a fucking citation X?!?) and an overpaid security team. If the plan is to ride this thing to the nines, let me know so that I can pull out and forget any thoughts of a really well integrated ecosystem of gaming.
BTW: If you see the OMGPOP/Draw Something team, tell them to get the fuck off of their asses (if they're still around) and do something about long-tail gamification model if they want to do something about user retention.
We have a corp policy now but when I first started out I did pick up E&O as well as a couple other little coverages. Contracts (larger ones) require them and conducting events (trade shows, conferences) do as well. Shouldn't cost too much.
Just wrapped up drinks with a CTO of a large enterprise, he's feeling the vibe after a hearty SOPA chat and has committed to move their portfolio of over 1,700 domains off GoDaddy by year's end. Their expenditure is over 20K/year and with a discount code floating around here (thanks guys!), he's putting the savings into bonuses
Firms do not usually take stances on legislative matters their own. SOPA's passage significantly benefits firms' activity levels and in turn the revenue produced in the furtherance of protecting their clients' rights. While outward facing corporate positions may take a neutral or negative stance on SOPA, many overt and implicit stances are taken by their respective counsel. SOPA claims made via premptive cease and desist letters or active litigation may or may not claim SOPA in their position statements to prevent drawing clear relationships between their clients and SOPA. Most agreements come with gag clauses to further protect and guarantee the cat doesn't get out of the bag. Unfortunately, firms are notoriously good for keeping secrets, so I am not expecting Wikipedia like bombshells connecting brand X to SOPA support.
Our startup, HireShot.com is. We are in the middle of a build and expect to have first version to beta users in January. Sign up is on the site if you're interested. http://www.HireShot.com