i believe the yc startups follow the "if you build it they will come" type of philosophy, as opposed to the "shove it down your throats" or "cut costs to make a bigger margin" vibe i'm getting from the OP.
The problem is that "if you build it they will come" DOESN'T WORK in a field where thousands of startups are competing for the same set of eyeballs. Unless you market aggressively, and cut costs enough to survive longer than your competitors, you will fail, guaranteed.
If you're two guys, two laptops and a server in an apartment, there aren't many costs to cut. That's the typical YC company. Marketing doesn't seem to do as much for a new company as PR, and simply being YC-funded is a big boost in that area.
Heh, maybe I'm a bit biased, as at one point I used to work for a startup(not YC) that was only 3 guys in an apartment, but also spent thousands of dollars a month on hosting for a site that had only a hundred or visitors a day, because they were expecting that any day now, "they will come" and viral growth will make them huge.
Being YC-funded is a boost, but without marketing and efficiency, it's not enough. There have been numerous YC-funded startups that ran out of money.
"if you build it they will come" doesn't mean you don't also market or cut costs. its about focus, not exclusivity. product comes first.
i get the feeling that "lack of spine" in the OP is implying that the focus isn't on the bottom dollar or self promotion, is all. focus on the product doesn't garner the direct results like the other two will.
Or the "screw your best friend over by stealing an idea he's been working on, implement it behind his back and launch it before he even has a chance to register the domain name he told you about over lunch". Google it.
Sorry, but if you're implying that I was impersonating someone else (in this case, the person whose username is madoff, who I don't know) just to revisit this topic, you'd be incorrect. (You'd also be kind of rude.) I bring up what happened with Facebook when it has some contextual relevance. There's a lot people here who could learn from that series of events, and I think I'm entitled to discuss it just like anyone else. As you'll note, however, I didn't even mention it until you did--and I only noticed that due to a traffic spike.
And for the record, I agree. By and large, YC startups do lack spines.
Ff this is a ref to the "Facebook was my idea" drama, well, the screw you approach created Facebook. And the "nice-guy" approach? In this case, I think this proves the OP's statement well.
What is truly wrong of the OP is the age factor. Zuckerburg and Gates have both been accused of being ruthless thieves at an early age.
