You're saying no ninety-seven times out of a hundred, and most founders find they have to make a very conscious effort to do this.

Don't let the company get distracted or excited about other things. A common mistake is that companies get excited by their own PR.

There's no way I know, to get through the pain of a startup without belief that the mission really matters.

Many of the best YC companies have had phenomenally small number of employees for their first year, sometimes none besides the founders.

If you can just learn to think about the market first, you will have a big leg up on most people starting startups.

You need to have a culture where people have very high quality standards in everything the company does, but still move quickly.

Facebook has this famous poster that says move fast and break things. But at the same time they manage to be obsessed with quality.