The Airbnbs
I had the incredible good fortune to not only be in the same YC batch as Airbnb, but also be the only other founder in SF, which meant I just happened to carpool a lot with them and hang at their place a lot.<p>I still remember when Nate first told me the idea at our first batch meeting and I immediately loved it—at the time I lived in a 4-br house with ~10 people, and we constantly had people on the couches or in a tent on the roof. I would go on to make more money thanks to the Airbnbs during my YC year than I would from my own startup.<p>But a million times more valuable than money was the path that those guys sent me down. Sure, we both had gotten into YC, but I could immediately sense there was a huge gap between us. I think I&#x27;ve always had a strong work ethic and desire to serve others, but I didn&#x27;t have the craftsmanship or teamwork skills that these guys had—and they had it in spades. Everyone talks about the cereals, but their apartment had more impressive things they designed and built than that (IMO). Nate was a no non-sense engineer who took software seriously and built great things. His code was far beyond mine at the time. And the team work was incredible.<p>I dabbled with joining Airbnb early, but never went down that path. I like to joke with my friends that I turned them down, but in reality it wasn&#x27;t because I had better options, the truth is I knew they were out of my league skills wise, and I had a long way to go to catch up.<p>The lesson that I learned from the Airbnbs that I think isn&#x27;t always stressed enough in the &quot;power law startup world&quot; is that you need to be building many, many things—with other people—, and get really, really good at that, before you can go on and &quot;make something people want&quot; and do something world changing, like these guys have done.<p>I&#x27;ll never forget driving home in the dark after our Tuesday night dinners in a rental van, the 3 airbnbs and me. After hours of loud demos about their new stuff and listening to everyone in the room about how they could build things better, the drive home would be quiet. You could tell that they were utterly exhausted, but also quietly determined. I doubt that they will stop and rest enough to celebrate this moment, but they &quot;earned this&quot; moment.<p>They&#x27;re the real deal. To this day continually inspired by them.