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Garry Tan

@garrytan • 1,141,413 subscribers

President & CEO @ycombinator —Founder @garryslist—Creator of GStack & GBrain—designer/engineer who helps founders—SF Dem accelerating the boom loop

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YC Startup School 2026 just got going 3x bigger than last year We made this event for first time very technical young people to come to SF and figure out if starting a company is for them Let you in on a secret: it is

YC Startup School 2026 just got going 3x bigger than last year We made this event for first time very technical young people to come to SF and figure out if starting a company is for them Let you in on a secret: it is

410,842 просмотров

Everybody wanna be a bodybuilder but nobody wants to lift heavy ass weights. If you want to be a startup founder and you have a great idea, it won’t mean a thing until you design it, PM it, code it, and release it. Then you’ve got to sell it, market it, and make it better.

Everybody wanna be a bodybuilder but nobody wants to lift heavy ass weights. If you want to be a startup founder and you have a great idea, it won’t mean a thing until you design it, PM it, code it, and release it. Then you’ve got to sell it, market it, and make it better.

312,075 просмотров

What if your employees could easily search, understand, and query all company data, regardless of their technical ability? Been cool to get to know YC co Secoda (YC 21) which does that with their new AI offering LLMs are turning out to be turbo boosters for all knowledge work.

What if your employees could easily search, understand, and query all company data, regardless of their technical ability? Been cool to get to know YC co Secoda (YC 21) which does that with their new AI offering LLMs are turning out to be turbo boosters for all knowledge work.

175,454 просмотров

Ovation of applause for Cory Booker at the Little Tech Competition Summit today We are celebrating entrepreneurs today

Ovation of applause for Cory Booker at the Little Tech Competition Summit today We are celebrating entrepreneurs today

27,748 просмотров

Thanks Andrew Yang🧢⬆️🇺🇸 for your support of Garry’s List Wanna see more of what we talked about? We are a citizen’s union for common sense. Apply to join Garry’s List today for more content and join the waiting list for our launch party on March 4th

Thanks Andrew Yang🧢⬆️🇺🇸 for your support of Garry’s List Wanna see more of what we talked about? We are a citizen’s union for common sense. Apply to join Garry’s List today for more content and join the waiting list for our launch party on March 4th

10,807 просмотров

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The NYT is predictably tearing down Reese Witherspoon for encouraging moms to try AI before they ingest the anti-AI pablum as truth Instead of linking to the NYT op-ed, I think you should watch this video and encourage you to follow Reese Witherspoon on Instagram

The NYT is predictably tearing down Reese Witherspoon for encouraging moms to try AI before they ingest the anti-AI pablum as truth Instead of linking to the NYT op-ed, I think you should watch this video and encourage you to follow Reese Witherspoon on Instagram

1,253,369 просмотров • 5 месяцев назад

I asked Secretary Duffy what Americans should be able to do, if we get this decade right, that they can't do today. Sean Duffy is the Secretary of Transportation, and he sat down with me at our Startup Industrial Base event in DC today. He went straight to how our country's air traffic gets managed. At the command center, people sit in front of six screens with a paper flight chart above them, trying to make the calls on weather and routing. His example: four planes reach the same runway at the same time and only one can land. See it two hours out, speed up two, slow one down, and each one lands when the runway is open. "Like, not complicated stuff, but we don't do any of this." Paper and pencil and minimal human augmentation from software looks like this: Say an airport can take 15 planes in a 15 minute window. "Well, the airlines will schedule 32." He says he's handing the airlines that data and asking them to spread out. The tool is SMART, from Air Space Intelligence, a small company he says competed with the biggest companies and won. It predicts. His stage example: a 2.5 hour ground stop might only need 45 minutes. He's taken heat for supposedly handing air traffic control to AI. Duffy's answer? "it's dumb AI, not smart AI." Controllers still make every call. None of this needs a breakthrough. It needs the will of the people to know they need to use software and be ok with AI augmentation instead of insisting on a paper chart and copper wire.

I asked Secretary Duffy what Americans should be able to do, if we get this decade right, that they can't do today. Sean Duffy is the Secretary of Transportation, and he sat down with me at our Startup Industrial Base event in DC today. He went straight to how our country's air traffic gets managed. At the command center, people sit in front of six screens with a paper flight chart above them, trying to make the calls on weather and routing. His example: four planes reach the same runway at the same time and only one can land. See it two hours out, speed up two, slow one down, and each one lands when the runway is open. "Like, not complicated stuff, but we don't do any of this." Paper and pencil and minimal human augmentation from software looks like this: Say an airport can take 15 planes in a 15 minute window. "Well, the airlines will schedule 32." He says he's handing the airlines that data and asking them to spread out. The tool is SMART, from Air Space Intelligence, a small company he says competed with the biggest companies and won. It predicts. His stage example: a 2.5 hour ground stop might only need 45 minutes. He's taken heat for supposedly handing air traffic control to AI. Duffy's answer? "it's dumb AI, not smart AI." Controllers still make every call. None of this needs a breakthrough. It needs the will of the people to know they need to use software and be ok with AI augmentation instead of insisting on a paper chart and copper wire.

78,469 просмотров • 21 дней назад

AI coding agents hit a wall when codebases get massive. Even with 2M token context windows, a 10M line codebase needs 100M tokens. The real bottleneck isn't just ingesting code - it's getting models to actually pay attention to all that context effectively.

AI coding agents hit a wall when codebases get massive. Even with 2M token context windows, a 10M line codebase needs 100M tokens. The real bottleneck isn't just ingesting code - it's getting models to actually pay attention to all that context effectively.

976,981 просмотров • 1 год назад

Last year I asked Connie Chan to resign for her role in making San Francisco unsafe for Asian Americans This year she somehow got the endorsement from Pelosi Make it make sense. You can’t.

Last year I asked Connie Chan to resign for her role in making San Francisco unsafe for Asian Americans This year she somehow got the endorsement from Pelosi Make it make sense. You can’t.

289,629 просмотров • 5 месяцев назад

Alexandr Wang: The future isn't humans vs AI - it's humans managing AI chaos. Even self-driving cars need 1 human operator per 5 cars to handle edge cases. The last 10% of accuracy? That's where humans shine.⁣ ⁣ Management isn't going away, it's evolving.

Alexandr Wang: The future isn't humans vs AI - it's humans managing AI chaos. Even self-driving cars need 1 human operator per 5 cars to handle edge cases. The last 10% of accuracy? That's where humans shine.⁣ ⁣ Management isn't going away, it's evolving.

841,120 просмотров • 1 год назад

Now announcing: Garry's List We’re starting a citizen’s union for radical centrism. We proved local politics is winnable in SF. Now we’re building the community to do it everywhere — news, commentary, and accountability for policies that affect California and our society.

Now announcing: Garry's List We’re starting a citizen’s union for radical centrism. We proved local politics is winnable in SF. Now we’re building the community to do it everywhere — news, commentary, and accountability for policies that affect California and our society.

403,050 просмотров • 8 месяцев назад

The Pentagon's 300-page RFP "was designed for a lawyer and a lobbyist and a prime contractor to know how to fill out." That's Emil Michael, Under Secretary of War for Research & Engineering, saying it out loud to a room full of founders at our Startup Industrial Base event in DC today. A 10-person startup reads 300 pages, gets one thing wrong, gets kicked out. Or survives and grinds through 3, 6, 9, 12 month rounds until it's two years in. Meanwhile the prime has a team whose whole job is filling out every page perfectly. Emil’s fix? Write a one pager not 300. "I need to fly a missile 500 miles in this kind of environment." If your payload won't work, you hear that fast. Target is 90 days. Drone Dominance runs the same way. Apply, top 20 go to a fly-off, objective metrics, cuts every round, and he says half a billion dollars of orders at the end. "I'd rather know if I lose and why." Miss round one and there are more rounds coming, and "it'll be 2 or 3" winners, not one. Cost per intercept is the game now. Shoot down a $50k drone with a Patriot missile and "the math doesn't math." He's funding directed energy and high power microwave that cost thousands, not millions. The tech was never what kept startups out. The 300 pages were. Two pages and a fly-off means the best product can actually win, and the prime has to compete like everyone else.

The Pentagon's 300-page RFP "was designed for a lawyer and a lobbyist and a prime contractor to know how to fill out." That's Emil Michael, Under Secretary of War for Research & Engineering, saying it out loud to a room full of founders at our Startup Industrial Base event in DC today. A 10-person startup reads 300 pages, gets one thing wrong, gets kicked out. Or survives and grinds through 3, 6, 9, 12 month rounds until it's two years in. Meanwhile the prime has a team whose whole job is filling out every page perfectly. Emil’s fix? Write a one pager not 300. "I need to fly a missile 500 miles in this kind of environment." If your payload won't work, you hear that fast. Target is 90 days. Drone Dominance runs the same way. Apply, top 20 go to a fly-off, objective metrics, cuts every round, and he says half a billion dollars of orders at the end. "I'd rather know if I lose and why." Miss round one and there are more rounds coming, and "it'll be 2 or 3" winners, not one. Cost per intercept is the game now. Shoot down a $50k drone with a Patriot missile and "the math doesn't math." He's funding directed energy and high power microwave that cost thousands, not millions. The tech was never what kept startups out. The 300 pages were. Two pages and a fly-off means the best product can actually win, and the prime has to compete like everyone else.

37,655 просмотров • 21 дней назад

Better to hire and fund people who are scrappy and hungry, who can build, who have high velocity, than the person with the fancy resume with the huge ego YC has *never* had success funding or hiring the latter "Hire for slope, not y-intercept." —Paul Buchheit

Better to hire and fund people who are scrappy and hungry, who can build, who have high velocity, than the person with the fancy resume with the huge ego YC has never had success funding or hiring the latter "Hire for slope, not y-intercept." —Paul Buchheit

616,637 просмотров • 1 год назад

Sam Altman's advice to founders worried about OpenAI competition: "Don't build our core chat assistant. There's so much more space to go after."⁣ ⁣ Count on the models getting far smarter. Sam promises "Sign in with ChatGPT" which would be powerful with access to memory.

Sam Altman's advice to founders worried about OpenAI competition: "Don't build our core chat assistant. There's so much more space to go after."⁣ ⁣ Count on the models getting far smarter. Sam promises "Sign in with ChatGPT" which would be powerful with access to memory.

556,869 просмотров • 1 год назад

Holistic college admissions? More like hostile and racist. 18-yo prodigy Stanley Zhong gets Google L4 but is rejected by 16 colleges. I sat with his YC-alum dad Nan, who sued UC to crack open the admissions black box. The American Dream demands merit not more racism 👇

Holistic college admissions? More like hostile and racist. 18-yo prodigy Stanley Zhong gets Google L4 but is rejected by 16 colleges. I sat with his YC-alum dad Nan, who sued UC to crack open the admissions black box. The American Dream demands merit not more racism 👇

537,943 просмотров • 1 год назад

Sam Altman says Artificial Superintelligence is thousands of days away. There is a lot of compounding left to do. What happens then? Fix climate, space colonies, limitless intelligence, understanding physics, abundant energy. Think bigger. The age of abundance is nigh.

Sam Altman says Artificial Superintelligence is thousands of days away. There is a lot of compounding left to do. What happens then? Fix climate, space colonies, limitless intelligence, understanding physics, abundant energy. Think bigger. The age of abundance is nigh.

651,608 просмотров • 1 год назад

Solution in search of a problem

Solution in search of a problem

872,408 просмотров • 2 лет назад

I am so thankful for Paul Graham Jessica Livingston Brian Chesky Carolynn Levy for believing me and selecting me to be the President & CEO of YC. To be able to lead this brilliant band of partners is beyond the best job I’ve ever had! If you love what you do, you never work a day in your life

I am so thankful for Paul Graham Jessica Livingston Brian Chesky Carolynn Levy for believing me and selecting me to be the President & CEO of YC. To be able to lead this brilliant band of partners is beyond the best job I’ve ever had! If you love what you do, you never work a day in your life

210,332 просмотров • 7 месяцев назад

Elon Musk's formula for success: Ego ÷ Ability < 1⁣ ⁣ When your ego exceeds your ability, you break the feedback loop to reality. Smash your ego. Internalize responsibility. Do whatever it takes.⁣ ⁣ The goal isn't glory—it's true work that serves the most people.

Elon Musk's formula for success: Ego ÷ Ability < 1⁣ ⁣ When your ego exceeds your ability, you break the feedback loop to reality. Smash your ego. Internalize responsibility. Do whatever it takes.⁣ ⁣ The goal isn't glory—it's true work that serves the most people.

437,696 просмотров • 1 год назад

Oakland had 30 brutal attacks & robberies at Westlake Christian Terrace Senior Living in a week 85 year old Asian grandmas getting beaten/robbed so bad they're sent to the ER every few hours. And yet it is still not being investigated as a hate crime

Oakland had 30 brutal attacks & robberies at Westlake Christian Terrace Senior Living in a week 85 year old Asian grandmas getting beaten/robbed so bad they're sent to the ER every few hours. And yet it is still not being investigated as a hate crime

569,821 просмотров • 2 лет назад

Jung said: “The psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside, as fate.” Founders on their journey must overcome their inner situation and integrate their shadow. Only then will they have a chance at altering fate itself.

Jung said: “The psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside, as fate.” Founders on their journey must overcome their inner situation and integrate their shadow. Only then will they have a chance at altering fate itself.

360,505 просмотров • 1 год назад

Startups have to rediscover zero bug bounce Every few sprints get to zero P2 bugs before you start new feature work. Otherwise your product will be a low quality mess forever. One part of great craft is getting to zero known bugs regularly.

Startups have to rediscover zero bug bounce Every few sprints get to zero P2 bugs before you start new feature work. Otherwise your product will be a low quality mess forever. One part of great craft is getting to zero known bugs regularly.

323,935 просмотров • 1 год назад

Daniel Ek made >$5M at 22 and lived “that life” in the nightclubs of Stockholm to realize that all of it was just status games. So he returned to the things he loved: music and tech. So he started Spotify. The status games are a distraction from the fulfillment of building.

Daniel Ek made >$5M at 22 and lived “that life” in the nightclubs of Stockholm to realize that all of it was just status games. So he returned to the things he loved: music and tech. So he started Spotify. The status games are a distraction from the fulfillment of building.

512,409 просмотров • 2 лет назад