Orange

Why does YC (the firm) consistently get crypto wrong?

(Caveat: Many YC founders are elite and figure out crypto after they leave the program) https://twitter.com/ycombinator/status/1772337658703884414

Counter: backed Coinbase, Filecoin and OpenSea.

Would be hard to find a better crypto track record for generalist VC. And more DPI than most crypto funds.

I feel like early 2010s YC is just different (not their fault)

Early YC seems to attract a lot of great hacker archetype; as YC became more and more popular, it seems to attract a lot of status seeking archetypes that are also typically laggards and trend chasing.

Which sums up many YC's crypto and AI co.

Founder of /opus (world’s simplest wallet) and /stacks (#1 Bitcoin L2); building community @ /eacc & /ny-devs

Cofounder @curated | Actively /vibecoding

Our batch was a golden crypto batch. The most crypto companies for a while. 7 depending how you count. Sam went all in on it. Then for years most batches didn't have many at all.

Also Hiro / Stacks, @ryanshea.eth was S14 🙂

Great point! Although at YC's stage, getting "crypto wrong" and still picking the right founders to bet on is still possible. 

They've often claimed they will back founders with ok ideas because they know they can help them pivot after. There reinforced core advice of "make something people want" makes them tick.

Did YC get file token or mainly equity of protocol lab?(still worth billions)🤔