Top all-time · #5039
Michael Seibel
Personal blog · michaelseibel.com/blogstartups
Michael Seibel's personal blog at michaelseibel.com covers startups. Since 2015, 16 different Hacker News readers have linked it 17 times, most often “How to Ask for Advice”. The last post was in 2019, but the archive is still widely read.
Too few sampled comments (9) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
Michael Seibel's blog, by a former Socialcam founder and Y Combinator CEO, covers startup advice: product development, product-market fit, equity splits and candid views on startup odds. HN cites it often.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 9 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Michael Seibel's personal website.
Most-linked posts?
- How to Ask for Advice2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-11-01
- The Real Product Market Fit2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2018-04-15
- /blog/product-development-cycle-fundamentals2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2016-12-06
What Hacker News says?
I went through an IPO. Joined the company early enough that I made enough for 15ish years if I continue my same lifestyle. Prior, entrepreneurship has been my passion. Founded 3 startups in the past with zero to small success, but nothing life changing until this IPO. Journey to IPO is not easy. Culture and values are no longer the same. It's not a surprise. Different culture / values is fine, but they declined in m…
Comment linking /blog/why-should-i-start-a-startup
on “Ask HN: What you up to? (Who doesn't want to be hired?)”Submitted Product Development Cycle Fundamentals as a story · 12 points
HN discussion> And yet frame.io seems to be doing very well, it is popping up more and more places. The key is knowing who your target customer is and solve for them [0]. Then, you are in a good place where you either fire ones who aren't [1] or change your solution (rather, start with a burning, hair-on-fire problem your target customer has, not solutions) [2]. Typically in a b2b setting, one starts out by addressing all needs…
Comment linking /blog/users-you-don-t-want
on “Ask HN: How do you validate demand for your side-project?”Submitted How to Ask for Advice as a story · 4 points
HN discussionYeah! I agree! I asked that because I think it's hard to distinguish yourself by solving this general consumer entertainment problem. Seems that all game companies do that, even when thinking about small studios, it is hard to find differentiating factors that does not rely on the game itself. I also agree that A/B testing is super important! We are following exactly what you have described here http://www.michaelse…
Comment linking /blog/product-development-cycle-fundamentals
on ““Scientific Method for Startups”, and AMA with Michael Seibel”Submitted How to pitch your startup: Michael Seibel as a story · 2 points
HN discussionReally enjoyed your piece on product dev cycle fundamentals: http://www.michaelseibel.com/blog/product-development-cycle-... Just curious growth wise, did Socialcam have a lot of word of mouth, or was some growth hacking involved as well. 16 million downloads in 3 months is incredible.
Comment linking /blog/product-development-cycle-fundamentals
on ““Scientific Method for Startups”, and AMA with Michael Seibel”Submitted The AM/PM Debate (2011) as a story · 1 points
HN discussionInterestingly, this cuts exactly against the advice of Michael Seibel, the current CEO of Y Combinator, who advises co-founders split equity equally: http://www.michaelseibel.com/blog/how-to-split-equity-among-...
Comment linking /blog/how-to-split-equity-among-founders
on “Unequal Cofounders”Submitted The Am/PM Debate – Or How Not to Be an Idiot CEO as a story · 1 points
HN discussionBig fan of Michael's content over the years - will miss his videos with Dalton. One incredible thing about Michael is behind every sentence you can hear the amount of pain he had to endure to succeed. He's not just giving you startup advice, he's a lone survivor who's come back to tell the tale. The whole startup game is about extreme outliers and he's always been very real about this fact. Was re-reading his post o…
Comment linking /blog/how-to-pitch-your-company
on “Michael Seibel is leaving Y Combinator”Submitted The Real Product Market Fit as a story · 1 points
HN discussion> Building a profitable business reduces both the problem and the solution space by a huge margin, and if you can find a way to get rid of that, the space opens up. That's one way to look at it. Usually though, for upstarts, what's paramount is not the profits part, but the risks inherent in working on a solution for a perceived problem (or worse, for customers one is ill-placed to sell to [0]). I like what Seibel r…
Comment linking /blog/users-you-don-t-want
on “Cord didn't win. What now?”Submitted How to ask for advice as a story · 1 points
HN discussionGrowth hacking is hard . We had to learn a few tricks to grow our Hacker News alternative ( https://laarc.io ) Suppose you were to start a site similar to HN. How would you get the word out? The most reliable way to grow is to have an audience (or access to one). But they have to be interested in what you're showing, else you're little better than a spammer. Looking over the traffic for the last month ( https://imgu…
Comment linking /blog/getting-press-for-your-startup
on “A Post Mortem on Growth Hacking”Submitted How to ask for advice as a story · 1 points
HN discussionMichael Siebel[0] said in YC Startup School that you have product market fit if (and only if) you can't keep up with the demand for your product and you don't have time for anything else except closing sales. If it's not there yet, it's not product market fit. [0] http://www.michaelseibel.com/blog/the-real-product-market-fi...
Comment linking /blog/the-real-product-market-fit
on “Ask HN: Need help to figure out if we have product-market fit or not?”
