Paul GrahamVerified account

One day, every Curation Business hears the siren song to scale: "You can get big and stay exclusive. Just keep raising your prices." But scale inevitably dilutes quality, especially at the top. *As YC scaled to 100+ startups per batch, it hired many new partners.

Curation Businesses usually break when they scale beyond their founders. Like a law firm or talent agency, you can keep trying to hire new rising star partners, but the best people will always be out starting their own businesses. *YC has faced this problem too.

Eventually, the noise outweighs the signal, and demand and supply spiral downward. Just like YC eclipsed Harvard/Stanford as the top credential for startups, someone will eclipse YC. This is the Circle of Life for Curation Businesses.

There's a clear lane out here to build the Next YC. @eriktorenberg started this thread on Curation Businesses because he's trying to build it with @beondeck. They will face this same Circle of Life.

My advice for those trying to build the next YC is to stay boutique as long as possible. We should have 100 small YCs, not one big one. Founder-owned. Founder-operated.

The endgame is direct decentralized funding of startups. Basically the same as @kanyewest's vision for the music industry. The talent owns their art and their equity and can sell either directly to anyone.

The best producers will go solo too. If you want Rick Rubin to produce you today, you don't go to Def Jam, you go to Rick Rubin. Institutions → Individuals

The Next Paul Graham will raise a solo fund and personally vet, mentor, and invest in 1-10 new startups per year. We should have 100 of these solo funds instead of the best and brightest fighting to be partners at YC.