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Back to Garry Tan on the Past, Present, and Future of YC, with Garry Tan.

Why Did Y Combinator Build Bookface?

Bookface is internal software at Y Combinator. On The Peel, Turner Novak had heard about Bookface and asked whether Garry Tan made it. Garry Tan said yes. Y Combinator started becoming a thing, people started pretending to be Y Combinator companies, and there was no way to verify them.

Garry Tan says Y Combinator had a Google group or something. Vibe coding was not a thing back then, so Garry Tan real-coded Bookface in Rails. At the start, Bookface was actually just a Facebook. The name is a little bit of an inside joke from a skit on The Office. Garry Tan says the joke is of a certain generation, and Garry Tan likes it. The 22-year-olds do not watch any of the stuff that generation came up with.

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Garry Tan on the Past, Present, and Future of YC ·

The Peel with Turner Novak

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  4. How Did Office Hours Turn Garry Tan Into an Investor?Garry Tan joined YC with no plan to invest. After he raised and quit his startup, he was really burnt out and needed to recuperate.
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  7. Why Does Surviving Rejection Mark a Y Combinator Founder?Garry Tan says 99% of people who apply to Y Combinator end up getting a mortal ego wound by being rejected.
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