Top all-time · #6000
Zac Townsend
Personal blog · blog.zactownsend.comstartupsbusinesscareer
Zac Townsend's personal blog at blog.zactownsend.com covers startups, business and career. Since 2013, 12 different Hacker News readers have linked it 61 times, most often “A Successful YC S13 Application”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2025-10-29, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (2) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
Startup posts, including an analysis of Standard Treasury's Series A pitch deck and material on Y Combinator applications. Commenters link them as reference material and do not judge the writing.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 2 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Who has no faults? To err and yet be able to correct is best of all.
Most-linked posts?
- A Successful YC S13 Application2 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2013-10-18
- Building the Next Generation of Financial Infrastructure2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2014-08-29
- Founders and mental health2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2014-06-16
- The Housing Market in San Francisco and Ideas to Fix It2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2016-03-30
- Standard Treasury's Series A Pitch Deck2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2015-07-28
What Hacker News says?
- zt · 2014-03-04
It is hard to get in to YC without something, but we didn't have a demo. You can read our whole app at: http://blog.zactownsend.com/our-yc-s13-application In my YC class, I would say the median age was roughly mine: 28. Any number of founders were in their late 30s and 40s.
Comment linking /our-yc-s13-application
on “Going Through Y Combinator (YC S13): Lessons Learned” Submitted The Housing Market in San Francisco and Ideas to Fix It as a story · 158 points
HN discussionIt's interesting going back and looking at their pitchdeck now: http://blog.zactownsend.com/standard-treasurys-series-a-pitc...
Comment linking /standard-treasurys-series-a-pitch-deck
on “Standard Treasury Acquired by Silicon Valley Bank”- zt · 2025-05-04
Submitted How three years at McKinsey shaped my second startup as a story · 154 points
HN discussion - zt · 2014-02-24
http://blog.zactownsend.com/our-yc-s13-application
Comment linking /our-yc-s13-application
on “Ask HN: Please share your YC applications” - zt · 2014-03-04
Submitted Going Through Y Combinator (YC S13): Lessons Learned as a story · 154 points
HN discussion Here is are some past YC applications that I have saved over the years. These may help. Lot's of great applications to learn from. The recent course, "How To Start a Startup" run by Sam Altman has tons of actionable lessons from past founders many of which are YC companies and partners. 1. http://www.scribd.com/doc/111078156/Yc-Application 2. Dropboxes Application - https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/27532820/app.h…
Comment linking /our-yc-s13-application
on “Ask HN: YC Application Advice”- zt · 2014-10-13
Submitted Losing 58.3 Lbs for Science as a story · 128 points
HN discussion Submitted Standard Treasury Acquired by Silicon Valley Bank as a story · 106 points
HN discussion- zt · 2013-10-18
Submitted A Successful YC S13 Application as a story · 92 points
HN discussion Submitted The Path Not Taken by Simple to Remake Finance as a story · 89 points
HN discussion- zt · 2013-09-26
Submitted Credit Card Processing is a Hard Business as a story · 87 points
HN discussion - zt · 2013-10-08
Submitted Why I Invest in Online-to-Offline Businesses as a story · 74 points
HN discussion - zt · 2013-10-15
Submitted Getting in to YC as a story · 68 points
HN discussion - zt · 2015-07-28
Submitted Standard Treasury's Series A Pitch Deck as a story · 64 points
HN discussion - zt · 2014-06-16
Submitted Founders and mental health as a story · 63 points
HN discussion - zt · 2013-09-27
Submitted Credit Card Processing as a Commodity Business as a story · 55 points
HN discussion - zt · 2013-10-04
Submitted Ultimately, Banks are ‘Big Data’ and Technology Companies as a story · 45 points
HN discussion - zt · 2016-04-15
Submitted Let's Get Organized and Fix Housing Affordability in San Francisco as a story · 38 points
HN discussion - zt · 2013-10-17
Submitted Advice on the YC Application as a story · 36 points
HN discussion - zt · 2014-04-16
Submitted Startup Banking’s Looming Leviathan as a story · 34 points
HN discussion Submitted Building A Great Core Team as a story · 30 points
HN discussionSubmitted How Standard Treasury Built a Founding Team as a story · 23 points
HN discussion- zt · 2014-08-29
Submitted Building the Next Generation of Financial Infrastructure as a story · 17 points
HN discussion - zt · 2013-11-18
Submitted Giving Credit Card Processing Away as a story · 17 points
HN discussion - zt · 2014-04-21
Submitted APIs, App Stores, and the Era of Mass Customization in Banking as a story · 16 points
HN discussion Submitted How we built our YC founding team at Standard Treasury as a story · 14 points
HN discussionSubmitted Building the next generation of financial infrastructure as a story · 13 points
HN discussion- zt · 2016-04-11
Submitted Let's Get Organized and Fix Housing Affordability in San Francisco as a story · 7 points
HN discussion - zt · 2014-08-22
Submitted Mental Health, Trauma, and Startup Founders as a story · 7 points
HN discussion
