"Michael Seibel is a professional hater. I've never been denied so consistently by such a charming, kind, and basically snuggly person."
Investors are both skeptics and speculators. And they can't be a good speculator without being deeply skeptical.
That's very different from hating and haters, though.
Haters hate irrationally, often driven by malicious envy.
Skeptics rightly ask people to give evidence for their claims, especially if those people are asking for funding. Why should they believe you?
Don Valentine, the founder of Sequoia, was famous for asking: "Why the f*ck should I give you my money?"
He was right to ask that, and that was a tone that worked at the time, when capital was scarcer.
For the record, Michael Seibel is not a hater. He is a skeptic when he has to be. And he is right to be skeptical. The burden of proof, when you have neither product nor traction, must be on the founder to prove to an investor that they should give them money.
The term is entertainingly used here to contrast it with the positive traits listed immediately after it. The sentence loses most of its humor if you change "hater" to "skeptic."
Everybody understands what the author is saying and that it isn't an insult.
I don't believe every one understands that, and while I recognize the attempt at humor, it was not effective for me. It would have been better if the author had chosen the mot juste.
I liken Michael in question-mode to being on train tracks with an engine bearing down on you. He will follow a line of reasoning with deep questions rapid fire. This puts you off guard and makes you lower your defenses – that way he gets to the shared understanding faster.
The important thing for the entrepreneur to do afterwards is to remember your responses and try to understand what he was driving at. There is a lot of emotion in the moment, but when you look back you find the wisdom.
For reference we were lucky enough to get him and Dalton as our YC advisors.
I got interviewed by Michael Seibel and didn't get into YC. The difference is my startup was doing 6-figures a month & growing 20% monthly but Michael just hated the idea. It was in cannabis and YC publicly stated they were interested in cannabis companies but apparently not cool with the whole smoking weed part.
It honestly felt like a big waste of time. The critiques weren't helpful, mostly just along the lines of "Why should I like your idea?". I thought we did well in the interview and kept our cool the whole time. We weren't in it for the money as we were profitable and wanted to expand our professional network and talent pool. It felt like we were just there to teach them about the cannabis market. We were acquired a couple years later with a nice outcome and I hold nothing against Seibel but I wish it hadn't felt like he was so antagonistic from the start.
Investors are both skeptics and speculators. And they can't be a good speculator without being deeply skeptical.
That's very different from hating and haters, though.
Haters hate irrationally, often driven by malicious envy.
Skeptics rightly ask people to give evidence for their claims, especially if those people are asking for funding. Why should they believe you?
Don Valentine, the founder of Sequoia, was famous for asking: "Why the f*ck should I give you my money?"
He was right to ask that, and that was a tone that worked at the time, when capital was scarcer.
For the record, Michael Seibel is not a hater. He is a skeptic when he has to be. And he is right to be skeptical. The burden of proof, when you have neither product nor traction, must be on the founder to prove to an investor that they should give them money.