Update: my computer died shortly after Andrew's talk with Jessica. I finished off the day with some old fashioned hand written notes. I'll transcribe those this evening and get them posted.
For a bit of context. Ron was specifically speaking about VC partners that find and pick companies to invest in. He notes that the folks actually using these new products should be the ones deciding if they are worthwhile investments.
I was there as well this morning, and this is correct.
Ron C. added: "People in their 20s are the good pickers," and said he wants his investment team at SV Angel to recruit younger folks to join them by the time they hit 30 years old. He said that older and more experienced investors are better at giving advice to the companies they fund.
In other words, the "age bigot" quip refers to the people picking the investments, not the people receiving investments. I don't know what Ron C's views are about younger vs. older founders, and as far as I recall he didn't make them apparent today.
I'll preface by saying that I'm usually a fan of what Ron has to say. I've seen him speak at several Startup Schools, but this chat kind of rubbed me the wrong way. He came off as a man who's finally settled into more extreme, absolutist, and comfortable views. Very binary platitudes that have no regard for context.
This idea that you're either born with it or not is an opinion of his with which I take particular issue. A lot of people have their growth spurts later in life. Many are born in environments that often stifle self-derived drive, flounder, and take off. To reduce it to two main camps of haves and have-nots is not a healthy attitude, and will lead to a lot of folks doubting themselves, or viewing others who're successful as those who were just born with it, as if people cannot change and qualities develop. In fact, Ron, during SS13, mentioned Ben Silbermann's (Pinterest founder) soft-spoken and unaggressive nature, and how Ron was trying to get him to speak up. Ben certainly doesn't seem to fit the image of the prototypical founder that Ron is painting.
And as to the "age bigot," I think that's fine if you're focused on social -- that demographic is by nature closer to the pulse of what's hot and trendy. But I think it is highly unlikely that a person in their 20s could have feasibly founded a SpaceX or Tesla, or really any seriously industry-toppling startup without having either the connections, the wealth, and/or the industry experience to pull it off.
I say all this as a 27yo who hopes to found his own startup in the near future.
This is great -- thanks for sharing :). But of you find these notes informational, I urge you to watch the videos themselves later when they're made available, since what will strike each of us as the greatest takeaways will differ pretty wildly depending on what stage of life we're in, which space we're interested in, etc. (Also, things like "they want to hire really smart 20 year olds) can be interpreted in a variety of ways since it's taken largely out of context of the greater discussion)
It obviously takes a much larger time commitment, but worth it IMO.
Howdy, I'm the CTO of UtilityAPI (one of the on-stage office hours companies). Before we went on, they made it clear that these office hours were not similar to or substitutes for the YC interview. These were intended to be more examples of typical office hour interactions in the program.
pasted from the other thread: "... we'll put them on YouTube like the other Startup Schools. It does take awhile for us to transcribe the talks for closed captions, so that might take a week. but the videos will hopefully be up by Monday."
