I have submitted the application. I can't wait until the 9th to hear back from them.

I think I'll just leap on my own. And if I funding was based on enthusiasm I would have been a millionaire years ago. It takes a little more than that to get a spot.

It's a bit crushing to put forward your best and not get in. However for those who get in it is way better then going it on your own.

don't worry, it's not personal.

i've seen similiar dynamics in conference program committees:

if you receive a lot of high quality submissions you just have to throw (often truly excellent) stuff away till you're down to a manageable size.

and that's not even a judgment of the individual submissions - often it's just a matter of making a balanced program.

>if you receive a lot of high quality submissions you just have to throw (often truly excellent) stuff away till you're >down to a manageable size.

According to a post by pg on HN accepts all applicants that they feel can make it through the program (ie the idea and team are ok). Therefore they are not going to exclude good applications because they have reached an arbitrary limit.

I theorize that downward pressure on group size is actually applied at the application level...since they set aside a single long weekend for the interviews, and there are only so many hours in a day...they can't possibly interview everybody, and they may (consciously or otherwise) prune while reading applications in order to avoid having too many to interview. That's just a theory, of course, and the size has been creeping up each cycle (to the point where I found the dinner I attended from WFP08 too crowded and noisy for comfortable conversation). It could be that they'll eventually switch to having two interview weekends, or a whole week of interviews.

It's true PG says this, but at least on a subconscious level (if not a conscious one) its probably not 100% true. There are practical limits to the number of companies YC can fund (space, time, money).