YC Advisor

Overview

This skill provides access to Y Combinator's comprehensive library of 443 startup resources - essays, podcast transcripts, and video transcripts from YC partners, successful founders, and industry experts.

How to Use This Skill (Tiered Retrieval)

Key Principle: Use quick-index for discovery, but ALWAYS load full source content before answering.

Step 1: Understand Context (for broad questions)

For broad questions, clarify the user's context:

• Stage: Pre-idea | Idea | Building MVP | Launched | Scaling

• Type: B2B | Consumer | Hardware | AI/ML | Marketplace

• Role: Technical founder | Non-technical | Solo | With co-founder(s)

Step 2: Discovery

• Load references/quick-index.md to scan available resources (~500 lines, grouped by topic)

• Identify 3-5 most relevant resources based on the question (line counts help estimate size)

• Check references/learning-paths.md if user is on a founder journey

• Check references/frameworks/ for decision questions - use glob references/frameworks/*.md to list files, then read specific ones

• For deeper search, use grep on references/summaries.md (too large to load fully)

Step 3: Deep Dive

• Find files using the code - use glob pattern references/{CODE}-*.md

• Example: For code DZ , use glob references/DZ-*.md to find the file

• WARNING: NEVER read index.yaml

• it exceeds token limits (64K tokens)

• Load the FULL content of top 2-3 resources

• Read completely - do not skim

• Extract key insights, quotes, and actionable advice

Step 4: Synthesize Answer

• Combine insights from multiple sources

• Quote directly from source material when valuable

• Always cite author and title for each point

• Acknowledge tradeoffs and contradictions between sources

• Never answer from summaries alone - always load full source content

Topic Categories

The library covers these main areas (use for initial filtering):

• Getting Started: Should you start? Startup ideas, order of operations, student founders

• Co-founders: Finding, relationships, equity splitting, technical vs non-technical

• Product: MVP, product-market fit, design, building for users

• Fundraising: Seed, Series A, investor pitching, SAFEs, term sheets

• Growth & Metrics: Growth strategies, KPIs, conversion, retention

• Customers & Sales: Talking to users, first customers, pricing, enterprise sales

• Hiring & Team: First hires, engineering teams, equity, management

• Culture & Leadership: Building culture, CEO evolution, board management

• Common Mistakes: Startup killers, financial health, when to quit

• Pivoting & Launching: Pivot strategies, launch timing, press

• Scaling: Later stage advice, unicorn characteristics

• Mindset: Resourcefulness, handling rejection, goal setting

• AI Startups: AI opportunity, moats, vertical agents, vibe coding

• Founder Interviews: Airbnb, Stripe, Coinbase, Reddit, Twitch, DoorDash

• Specialized: Hardware, biotech, dev tools, crypto, location

• Joining Startups: Choosing a startup, stages, equity

• YC Application: Application tips, process, YC effect

• Legal: Startup mechanics, terms, agreements

Usage Guidelines

For Complex Decisions

Questions like "Should I start my own startup or co-found with someone?":

• Load quick-index.md to identify relevant resources

• Read 3-5 full source files covering different perspectives

• Synthesize across sources - look for consensus and contradictions

• Present balanced view acknowledging tradeoffs

• Cite specific authors and titles

• Ask clarifying questions about user's specific situation

For Factual Questions

Questions like "What are the most common mistakes that kill startups?":

• Use quick-index.md to find the most authoritative source

• Load and read the full source file

• Present comprehensively - don't over-summarize

• Cite the source

For Learning Journeys

When users want to learn systematically:

• Check references/learning-paths.md for curated sequences

• Guide them through resources in order

• Summarize key takeaways at each step

Resources

references/quick-index.md (Primary Discovery)

Lightweight index (~500 lines) grouped by topic. Each entry shows:

• Code, title, author, type, line count, founder stage

• Use this first - small enough to load fully

• Use glob pattern references/{CODE}-*.md to find files by code

references/summaries.md (Deep Search)

Detailed summaries with content previews (~4300 lines). Too large to load fully.

• Use grep to search for specific keywords

• Provides more context than quick-index when needed

references/index.yaml (Maintenance Only - DO NOT READ)

Structured metadata for all resources. Too large for runtime use (64K tokens). Used only by maintenance scripts. For filename lookups, use quick-index.md instead.

references/learning-paths.md

Curated resource sequences for common founder journeys:

• First-time founder path

• AI startup path

• Fundraising path

• And more...

references/frameworks/ (Use glob to list, NOT Read)

Decision frameworks for common questions. Use glob references/frameworks/*.md to list files. Available frameworks:

• should-i-start-a-startup.md

• solo-vs-cofounder.md

• bootstrap-vs-raise.md

• when-to-pivot.md

• when-to-quit.md

• technical-cofounder-needed.md

references/*.md

The 443 full-content source files. Each follows this structure:

[Title]

Author: [Author Name] Type: [Essay|Podcast|Video] URL: https://www.ycombinator.com/library/[CODE]-[slug]

[Full content - essays, transcripts]

File naming: [CODE]-[descriptive-name].md (e.g., 8z-how-to-get-startup-ideas.md )