I'm a rising sophmore in university, and I really want to work for a YC-backed startup this Fall (leaning towards consumer products).

I think I have solid experience (interned at AWS this summer as a SWE, and I've also built and scaled consumer mobile apps solo to 20k+ downloads).

My main method so fair has been sending cold DMs to founders on Linkedin for startups I find interesting, but so far I've had no luck. Any advice?

Have you tried Work at a Startup?

https://www.ycombinator.com/jobs

You can apply for internship roles there (by configuring it in your profile).

cold dms and emails are what landed me (senior in hs) YC internship, and honestly just being within the community and showing passion about the product helps drastically

>Any advice?

Yeah, don't put YC on a pedestal. Whatever ship the supposed prestige was on sailed a long time ago, then sank.

One would hope that would create a habitable reef, but in practice it's probably closer to an underwater super fund site.

>...and I've also built and scaled consumer mobile apps solo to 20k+ downloads

I highly recommend watching HBO's Silicon Valley.

good luck