Many of the best YC companies have had phenomenally small number of employees for their first year, sometimes none besides the founders.
Who was the founder of American education? John Dewey - you know that very well - card-carrying Communist. The American education system, in America - one of the so-called 'founders' was a Communist
Before 20 or 25 employees, most companies are structured with everyone reporting to the founder. It's totally flat.
When our founders created America, it was in the age of the printing press, when individuals could freely join the conversation. And that robust, democratic dialogue more often than not lifted up the best available evidence and asserted what was more likely to be true than not.
[John] Adams never hid his jealousy and resentment of the other Founders, especially Benjamin Franklin.
The classic problem as an entrepreneur is that they have a hard time delegating. But that's really crazy. Recruiting other executives is critical, so is dealing with customers and dealing with regulators. Those are functions that only the top founders can do.
The great companies get built by their founders
Google is a place filled with open-minded, innovative people from all over the world. It's a fun place to work, and it's a place where different kinds of skills come together. As we grew from a startup, I remember our founders saying that people don't want us to change our culture, but we need to keep making it better. It's an attitude: "We are the ones we've been waiting for. " Silicon Valley in general, tech in general, means using technology to solve big problems in the world.
You can't always say what's popular and you ought to go with it. I think that's why the founders were concerned about direct democracy. That's why we have a republic and that's why we have representatives who who are supposed to look at the issues and to look out for the next generation as well.
The most interesting thing about Google is its founders hated advertising.
One thing that founders always underestimate is how hard it is to recruit.
The next generation of innovators, who need neutrality the most, are not at the bargaining table. They're hard at work in their labs or classrooms, dreaming of the next big thing, and hoping that the Internet is as open to them as it was to the founders of Google.
Our country's founders cherished liberty, not democracy.
History, is made up of the bad actions of extraordinary men and woman. All the most noted destroyers and deceivers of our species, all the founders of arbitrary governments and false religions have been extraordinary people; and nine tenths of the calamities that have befallen the human race had no other origin than the union of high intelligence with low desires.
It's better to have no cofounder than to have a bad cofounder, but it's still bad to be a solo founder.
Calvin was virtually the founder of America.
How many people in the pews know that [ Jonathan Edwards] is both a founder of evangelicalism and, say, an idealist who denied that the material world exists?
Live the principles and the values. Almost nobody in America is living them. Learn the truth. Live the life of our founders. Be a decent, righteous, forthright honest man or woman.
We pretty much won't fund a company now where the founders don't have vested equity because it's just that hard to do.
Every business is manmade. It is a result of individuals. It reflects the personalities and the business philosophy of the founders and those who have directed its affairs throughout its existence. If you want to have an understanding of any business, it is important to know the background of the people who started it and directed its past and the hopes and ambitions of those who are planning its future.