Forbes 30 under 30 in 2012

[pg]

I can fit it in an HN comment: Congratulations Nate, Adora, Aaron, Patrick, John, Dave, Eric, Adam, Steve, Danny, Robby, Victor, Matt, Drew, Arash, Alex, Boris, Alexis, Joshua, Blake, David, Zach, Dan, Kate, Seth, Ben, Anand, Philipp, and Prayag!

[pg]

Yipes, I missed an entire category: Congratulations Suhail, John, Apoorva, Matt, Mazy, Ben, and Emmett too!

[sethbannon]

Thanks PG. I counted 29 names -- if there were only one more YC alum on the lists we would have 30 YC Forbes 30 Under 30.

[raldi]

What's Emmett, chopped liver?

[cemregr]

Featured in Tech category is a YC reject :)

[hack_edu]

At the risk of offending the rah-rah YC back-patting... the entire Tech section is full of people who run or founded companies. Those all could fall into the Media, Social, or Marketing sections. It just seems like they're piling all the big-named startup dudes in wherever they can.

Shouldn't people blazing trails of real, new technologies get some recognition here? Those who bootstrapped this year's hundredth social-local-mobile app are rarely the ones creating new technologies and platforms that change the way we use technology. And yes, there are exceptions, but lets be honest here. Heaven forbid some academics or open-source maintainers get some attention. They went that route quite a bit before this boom.

[klochner]

The Forbes brand is about money and wealth - they're most famous for the Forbes 500 list of 500 wealthiest individuals - so including academics or open-source people wouldn't make sense.

[trentmb]

social-local-mobile apps are easy to comprehend.

Genuine innovation isn't always so.

[sixQuarks]

Forbes 30 under 30 is a joke. One of the characters on Bravo's "Startup Silicon Valley" was chosen a couple of years ago:

http://www.forbes.com/pictures/eeji45ikli/sarah-austin-host-...

Anyone that's watched that show can tell you what a joke/fake she is.

I'm not saying everyone on that list isn't impressive, but I would certainly take it with a grain of salt.

[pg]

She was in the media category. For some people in that category being included in even a silly TV show is a desirable career move.

[mnicole]

It seems odd to me that they highlighted Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, Justin Bieber, etc. under Music when there are plenty of successful internet-/self-created acts that are much more impressive in talent and ability to market. Seems unfair to people who don't have millions of dollars and dozens of handlers.

When I think 30 Under 30, I think people I don't know that are pushing the industry forward, not people that are shoved down my throat through old methods.

[joonix]

Forbes is a joke and so are popular media publications when they attempt to discuss the "under 30" crowd. Generalize an entire demographic into only a couple of big trends. No thanks.

[eranation]

As someone 35 years old, I wonder - how many successful co-founders are there between 30-40? are there any statistics on that? What is the histogram by age for top 1000 startups? (any metric marking what "top" means will do)

And congratulations by the way to all the people on the list, instead of hurting my ego and discouraging me, I see this as a way to motivate me to make it to a 40 under 40 list (I'm sure there is one somewhere)

[petercooper]

how many successful co-founders are there between 30-40?

Historically, at least, it'd be most. In Gamers at Work, Nolan Bushnell (founder of Atari) even noted that he was seen as being a "young" founder in Silicon Valley being in his 30s in the 1970s. What we're seeing nowadays with 20-somethings is relatively new.

[mbesto]

how many successful co-founders

If you want to get into metrics, it'd help to define what you would consider successful. I'd think you'd do a disservice by conducting such a study.

[dotBen]

Just remember this list is not based on meritocracy, most/all these people will have publicists and/or their startups will have "good" PR firm representation.

If you secretly wish you were on this list but don't have the above then you are doing it wrong.

[DaniFong]

Nobody I know who is on the list has a publicist.

[paganel]

> Just remember this list is not based on meritocracy, most/all these people will have publicists and/or their startups will have "good" PR firm representation

Yeah, somehow even I, a guy who has never been to the Staets, could figure that out only by reading the "Arts" section. Almost all of the people there were New-York-based or from around the area, it's like 2010s New York it's like Paris from 1920s full of bright artists and what have you, which I get the impression it's not true. Too bad for the arts, a pretty sweet deal for people making money out of it.

[joshfraser]

No, but most of these founders are from an incubator like TechStars or YC. The lists are usually created by reaching out to a few key people and asking for recommendations.

[petercooper]

Also true of many awards for companies, like "[$someMagazine]'s 10 Top Companies in Biotechnology". There are even cases where companies have to pay to be considered for such awards. I think a lot of people know that too but the awards are still considered reasonably prestigious.

[cwe]

Is there an actual list of only 30 names? Trying to read through this, I see 30 in each category. I guess "450 under 30" doesn't have the same ring.

[trotsky]

There are actually 40 names in just the tech category. Talk about completely unwilling to stick to the format.

[pla3rhat3r]

This list just makes me depressed that I'm nearly 40 and haven't done half of what these brianiac kids have done. Er, I mean, BRILLIANT!

[Matt_Mickiewicz]

Nice to see so many familiar names on the Tech 30 under 30 list, congrats to Dan Siroker from Optimizely, Anthony from Kaggle and Darian. (Disclosure: I was on the list last year).

[kayoone]

that disclosure sounds like bragging, sorry

[adebelov]

YC dominates the list :)

[georgecmu]

Telling quote:

At age 14, Wilson became the youngest ever to build a nuclear fusion reactor.

[arkem]

Congratulations to Parisa!

It's good to see security represented on the list, and Parisa's work at Google makes her a brilliant choice.

[robryan]

I am skeptical on these lists, how many tech people are they actually aware of to choose the list, would surprise me if it was chosen from a pool of less than 100 possible people.

Also as I have seen in the past from these lists they use money raised as a metric for achievement/ success.

[jacquesm]

Even Forbes outsources their vetting to YC ;)

[jordo37]

Congrats to all the YC folks! Amazing to see how much they dominated the list.

[Impatient]

Does anyone under 30 (or 40, for that matter) read Forbes?

[dysoco]

I'm 15 and I read Forbes occasionally, some articles about startups are interesting.

[argumentum]

The ones named to the lists (and their family/friends) do ;)

[Matt_Mickiewicz]

Yes.

[jedberg]

I tweeted it, but I think I'll repeat it here: Proud to know and have worked with more than a few folks on Forbes' 30 under 30. Congrats to all of them!

[sunsu]

Congrats to Darian! Radius is doing some amazing things!

[kerno]

So. Much. Clicking. Around.

[TommyDANGerous]

Props to the FiveStar guys.

[tedkalaw]

Congrats Remind101 and ClassDojo! It's cool to see ImagineK12 teams up there :)