Joshua, Delicious/popular was mentioned a bunch of times in the podcast as a main inspiration. I'll send you a transcript someday if I can arrange it :)
"But remember that making something for yourself is just a heuristic to guide you in finding an idea. In the actual execution, you need to focus on users. You need to understand what they want, and be fanatically dedicated to making them happy."
This point aside, I haven't written anything in 2 years, so it's possible I'm out of shape :)
Incidentally, Drew's relationship with the HN community is even older than his relationship with Y Combinator. Two weeks before we interviewed Drew and Arash, Drew posted Dropbox to HN:
I was giving a talk to 800+ women (most of whom were not affiliated with YC in any way) who attended the Female Founders Conference last April in SF. A majority of them have already started a startup, so of course I'm hoping they will become successful someday.
"But if a university really wanted to help its students start startups, the empirical evidence, weighted by market cap, suggests the best thing they can do is literally nothing." This is an important insight and will be totally counterintuitive to universities.
Actually, I "blamed" myself for that because I never set up any formal parental leave program at YC back in 2009, which I would have been responsible for doing.
No, there's no connection with this essay and the last one. He's been thinking about writing about this topic for a long time. In fact, one of the things Paul and I talk most about is that life is short and we need to savor time with our kids and do things that are meaningful to us. So trust me when I say that, as PG's wife, I believe you are mistaken.
I hear you, though some folks will feel as if you are dismissing the impact of their products (e.g. Watsi). If it helps, check out (to name just a few randomly):
Rather than responding to everyone's complaints about the site: I whipped this together in less than a day, I was mostly focused on content, no one at YC who usually makes beautiful designs was available to help, I can't program, I'm using Strikingly, this is version 1.
I'm happy to get feedback, but please go easy on me. We will plan much further in advance next year and make it easy to scroll through ideas and look beautiful and not be annoying in the countless ways it seems to be currently :)
It was my (Jessica Livingston) idea. I'm giving one of these as a gift to someone who will love it and am simply printing a picture of it. Not as great as the real thing on Christmas Day for sure, but I'm hoping they'll still be pleased.