It's been obvious for years that AI will bifurcate society even more between the haves and have nots, contrary to "democratizing AI" niceties espoused by big AI CEOs.

It was less obvious that access will be further gated by an Old Boy Network. I guess the frontier model whitelists of yestermonth were a portent.

▲

pj_mukh 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

YCombinator has its biases, but I don't know of many other investment firms that have a university style, "application" process. It's almost always, warm-intros you need.

This Early access network is just an intro system once you get through the Application process (like Universities having a job fair).

▲

avaer 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

TBF YC has always said the value is in the network.

What's interesting (alarming?) is them formalizing exclusion of access to technology via the network. It's explicitly ossifying an access control system over what used to be handshakes.

▲

pj_mukh 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

I don’t understand, Ycombinator company list is public information list, go buy from any one of them anytime?

AFAICT, this is mostly a way for YC companies to get warm intros into potential customers. Almost exactly like a job fair at a university but for software contracts instead of jobs.

	▲	avaer 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		> Ycombinator company list is public information list, go buy from any one of them anytime Unless this prototype model works out financially for the companies, and every AI company starts telling you to go through an (inevitably AI vetted) application process to get access. Decades ago, getting a Google account to use GMail wasn't seen as a problem because you could run your own mail server. Try getting your own mail server to deliver mail today.

▲

gxs 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

It’s funny how we always celebrate (or at the very least don’t comment negatively) when someone/a startup sets out to build an ecosystem and then love punishing them after they succeed. How very American of us

Just curious, how exactly do you propose they do this instead?

Rent out a convention center, open invitation, and then still complain when all xxK slots are taken up?

Or do it virtually and inundate these startups with thousands of requests and get mad when half don’t get responded to?

Outlaw private capital altogether and force people to IPO to raise money? And then what, complain when only a fraction of those companies work out and the average guy with an E*trade account not in on the joke gets screwed over and over?

At least YC takes applicants and the process is somewhat transparent

Of course there’s a (prob big) element of who you know going on, but it seems to me like the least shitty approach if your goal is to make this at least somewhat accessible

This aspect of yc is good - I know plenty of come from nowhere, unprivileged backgrounds who got into yc and were able to start a company

Now, they fact a lot of them get super douchey once they are in is a different story

▲

ModernMech 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Pretty much every incubator I've seen has an open application process.

▲

pj_mukh 2 days ago | parent [-]

I mean now..yes. Not in 2008.

▲

dgellow 2 days ago | parent [-]

Why would we be talking about 2008?

▲

pj_mukh 2 days ago | parent [-]

Because that's about when YC started this open application system? When no one else was.

	▲	jedberg 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		First batch was 2005. :)

▲

popalchemist 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Do not mistake any VC's eagerness to find fresh meat for the grinder for a philanthropic or otherwise virtuous motive. VC exists for one purpose only. Extract value from others.

▲

alansaber 2 days ago | parent [-]

There are far worse gigs than VC backed founder.

	▲	popalchemist 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		What I said was not a critique of founders, just the devil they make (sometimes necessary) deals with.

▲

tptacek 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

What's the "old boy network" thing here? This looks like a sales outreach event. It's connecting enterprise startups that want to do pilots with enterprises that will consider pilots.

▲

aleqs 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Seems just like another case of collusion - continuing the story of VCs pushing all of their companies to use each other and 'stay within the network'. The good news (kinda) for the rest of us, is that many of these VC marketing/product/'strategy' people aren't actually all that competent - this is literally the best they can come up with.

▲

random3 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

Nature has shown variety wins over inbreeding, I don't see how AI will change this

	▲	mitxela 2 days ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Inbreeding won all human societies until about 1900 and will win all human societies from now on.
	▲	2 days ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		[deleted]