Tell HN: YC Summer 2009 application is due today.

[sarvesh]

The YC summer 2009 application is due today at 10pm PST. I am curious as to how many of you submitted, or will be submitting, the optional video of founders?

http://ycombinator.com/s2009.html

[pg]

We just passed the number of applications from last cycle, so it looks like this will be another record, considering we usually get around a third of the applications on the last day.

[netsp]

At this point, does more applicants mean better participants?

[unalone]

Now that it's closed - what was the final count?

[grinich]

I wonder how the rate of submission grows up until the deadline.

[sarvesh]

Given that picking the right startups is hard how will this increase in applications be handled over time? Increasing the reviewers will not necessarily mean that the quality is still the same. Will the number of days for review be increased in future?

[grinich]

I'm just now clearing my room of coffee mugs, pizza boxes, and bowls of soggy cereal. I'm unshaved, and have hardly stepped outside my dorm room for the past 48 hours. There's a celebratory beer in the fridge, and then I'll probably sleep for an entire day.

We've started building something really awesome, and although I'm sleep-deprived and red-eyed, I'm incredibly excited. I can't wait until the summer when I can go full time on this project. YC or no YC, it's going to be a wild ride.

[jdileo]

your post is an inspiration.....what it's all about! Best of luck w/ your startup.

[YuriNiyazov]

Submitted on saturday, with a video of me in my living room, unshaven and underslept. No expectations :)

[pg]

Chances are it will be watched in a living room by someone who's unshaven and underslept, so don't worry about it.

[kanny96]

Oops, the slot for unshaven and underslept is taken! Gotta shave.

It was a good exercise and now I appreciate much better why Cali Lewis, Amber Mac and Natalie Del Conte - show off their fumbling at the end.

It was done with both hands on the cam. The cam's auto-focus had problem adjusting to the tube light in the basement and created a few blurs.

It wasn't scripted, but i practiced it 4-5 times, everytime missing some links or forgetting a key word!

[zaius]

We submitted on Monday with a simple photo booth video made in a cafe. It was just of us talking about the project and ourselves. Took us about 20 minutes from start to finish - may as well do it!

[siong1987]

We did the same thing too. We use photo booth to make a real short video intros.

[idm]

What about percentages? Frequencies are nice, but I wonder what percentage of applications include the optional video.

[nanexcool]

We'll be submiting the video. You can say so much (or so little) in one minute though that we're still figuring out if we want to just ad-lib or have like a mini-script to read.

[pg]

From the videos I've seen so far, I'd recommend ad-libbing. The point of the video is to see what you're like, and most people don't seem particularly bright when delivering (or worse still, reading) a prepared speech.

Since this was the first time we'd tried videos we didn't realize this would be a problem. Next year we'll advise everyone to ad-lib.

[kkocis]

We mini scripted - did the intro of the founders, then did a scenario and explained how our idea would address the issue.

[khangtoh]

Paul: Did you guys reviewed early submissions this time round? We submitted our application when it was only half done 2 weeks ago but have been editing and resubmitting for the past 2 weeks and there was quite a bit of change from our very first submission.

We sort of figured out that our application hasn't been reviewed since our demo url did not register any visitors yet on google analytics.

[andrewljohnson]

We submitted a video for www.trailbehind.com.

I have a Macbook, and it was really quick to make the video. MacBooks come standard with camera, recording, and editing software.

[Eliezer]

Remember, everyone, there's no point in sending in more than one copy of your application!

Applying to Y Combinator twice has the same effect as applying once.

[iamwil]

As an aside, I took a look at your submissions, and it's paltry, meaning that you got most of your 1400 points from commenting. Good comments.

[flooha]

Props to the YC crew for giving all of us this opportunity and hacking (machete, not keyboard) their way through the applications.

I hope our video isn't too boring. We tried to keep it light, but we had to script it to say everything we wanted to say in <= 1 minute. I would have much rather submitted the outtakes, but we aren't getting graded on hilarity. :)

Good luck to all!

[dustineichler]

Solo founders? Anyone besides me.

[unalone]

I've talked to a few solo founders, so they're definitely there! Good luck to you all.

[YuriNiyazov]

Goin' solo

[sarafsaurabh]

count me in too.. probably we can make a team of 5 :-)

[maxwell]

Me.

[jdileo]

Me 2

[ohkanon]

What if we never got a rejection letter, BUT We also never got contacted for a confirmation. Does that mean they are still going through them?

[amichail]

I wonder if this video will be used to identify founders who would look good in a TV interview... and so enhance their chances of getting funding from VCs, especially early on.

[cperciva]

No. PG has said what it will be used for, and judging TV interviewability is not part of it.

[wwwjscom2]

You can give negative points? lol, I require that button ;)

PS. Good luck peoples

[pclark]

we're literally deploying our demo now, and then submitting.

[pclark]

except github is down and we have various gems we need to deploy. Gonna be a late one, first [many] of many we hope ..