Top all-time · #436
Elad Gil
Personal blog · blog.eladgil.comstartupsbusiness
Elad Gil writes Elad Blog, a personal blog at blog.eladgil.com about startups and business. Since 2009, 128 different Hacker News readers have linked it 327 times, most often “What May Be Coming to Startups, 2022 Edition”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-04-20, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (27) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Elad Gil's blog for his startup and venture-market essays, such as on hot markets, co-founder selection, reference checks, and re-orgs. Commenters mostly cite individual posts as sources or background.
- Recommended for · 3 comments
- One commenter says to read the startup-miracles post; another says the co-founder post is right on spot and a guide on reference checks is good.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 27 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
I am a serial entrepreneur obsessed with technology and startups. Click to read Elad Blog, a Substack publication with tens of thousands of subscribers.
Most-linked posts?
- What May Be Coming to Startups, 2022 Edition6 people · 6 mentions · first linked 2022-07-06
- Move your company out of Delaware to Nevada or Texas5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2025-02-05
- Career Decisions5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2015-03-27
- Startups & Miracles 5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2012-10-24
- AI: Startup vs Incumbent Value4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2022-10-31
- Startups are an act of desperation4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2022-11-23
- The False Narrative Around Theranos4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2021-09-26
- Industry Towns – Where You Start a Company Matters (2019)4 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2019-06-18
- How To Fire A Co-Founder3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2013-01-08
- A Brief Guide to Startup Pivots3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2019-05-22
What Hacker News says?
"End of Cycle"[1] is mentioned. Key points: - The easy hits in social and mobile have been done. - Investors are looking for the Next Big Thing, and to some extent throwing money at what's probably the wrong stuff. - Startups which involve making real physical stuff are a lot more complicated as businesses than pure compute-based startups. [1] http://blog.eladgil.com/2016/07/end-of-cycle.html
Comment linking /2016/07/end-of-cycle.html
on “YC’s Summer Reading”Submitted Products I Wish Existed as a story · 798 points
HN discussionArbitrage vs Innovation - consider that startups that are using technology to make an existing market more efficient are profiting due to arbitrage of technology. Consider that startups that are using technology to create a new form of value are innovating. Technology arbitrage is kinda boring, but can have big rewards. I imagine the profit distribution among these startups looks kinda bell curvish. Technology innov…
Comment linking /2011/01/m-ladder-position-your-startup-to-sell.html
on “The Problem With Silicon Valley Is Itself”Submitted Startup Ideas Every Nerd Has (That Never Work) as a story · 313 points
HN discussionYou should read: http://blog.eladgil.com/2012/10/startups-miracles.html I think you're shooting for two miracles here - the core idea PLUS the idea that open work is the best way to create a consumer/facing service when all of the evidence seems to point that it's not.
Comment linking /2012/10/startups-miracles.html
on “Gittip, Year Two”Submitted Things I don't know about AI as a story · 248 points
HN discussionhttp://blog.eladgil.com/2016/07/end-of-cycle.html :)
Comment linking /2016/07/end-of-cycle.html
on “Tech workers think Silicon Valley and startups are losing their luster”Submitted Why is every layoff 10-15%? as a story · 177 points
HN discussionOK thanks. Will prioritize those. Also, here is a blog I wrote on re-orgs: http://blog.eladgil.com/2018/04/how-to-do-re-org.html
Comment linking /2018/04/how-to-do-re-org.html
on “Interview with Sam Altman from the High Growth Handbook”Submitted End of Cycle? as a story · 163 points
HN discussionEdit: he has another article with si6nce explanation about CEOs need to directly interact with employees when the company is of certain size https://blog.eladgil.com/p/back-to-office But reading between the lines, he seems to consider remote workers being the lowest performers and a danger to the company culture and mission. If fell he is also deliberately missing the point of remote work even when it hits him in th…
Comment linking /p/back-to-office
on “Why is every layoff 10-15%?”Submitted Interesting Tech Markets for 2019 as a story · 156 points
HN discussionFor 2015 I listed out: "Gold markets" -Big data (with emphasis on things like Cloudera (~$3B co), Mesosphere) -SaaS with an emphasis on APIs and Dev Tools -Genomics And then a set of markets I thought would be smaller or binary. Full post here: http://blog.eladgil.com/2015/01/hot-markets-for-2015.html For genomics in particular, Illumina is now a $40 billion company while Exact Sciences ($9B), Invitae ($1 billion),…
Comment linking /2015/01/hot-markets-for-2015.html
on “Interesting Tech Markets for 2019”Submitted Hire For The Ability To Get Shit Done as a story · 145 points
HN discussionYeah, we would put the coding exercise at the end: http://blog.eladgil.com/2011/06/our-10-step-engineering-hiri... It was also a burden on our team to spend all this time with a candidate, so this would often be our last step. We would next expect someone to invest in us if we did not also invest time on our end.
Comment linking /2011/06/our-10-step-engineering-hiring-process.html
on “Hire For The Ability To Get Shit Done”Submitted The Benefits of Thinking Small (2010) as a story · 124 points
HN discussionHere are a few: - http://paulgraham.com/startupideas.html - http://cdixon.org/2010/03/14/developing-new-startup-ideas/ - http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/08/st_qareis/ These are tangentially related: - http://blog.eladgil.com/2012/02/entrepreneurial-turbulence.h... - http://500hats.com/niche-to-win I have more general "starting a startup" links here: http://bitly.com/bundles/o_7ki5mkvgf8/1
Comment linking /2012/02/entrepreneurial-turbulence.html
on “Finding Ideas For Your Next Project”Submitted Facebook Must Really Suck At Machine Learning as a story · 122 points
HN discussionI think we are starting to see some, with coda.io and airtable, there is a trend I don't know about the name "devsumer" but it's out there. http://blog.eladgil.com/2019/01/interesting-markets-2019-edi...
Comment linking /2019/01/interesting-markets-2019-edition.html
on “HyperCard Users Guide (1987) [pdf]”Submitted A Brief Guide to Startup Pivots as a story · 118 points
HN discussionI'm sorry to hear about this. Elad Gil[1] has written about this in depth about 12 months ago: http://blog.eladgil.com/2013/01/how-to-fire-co-founder.html [1] https://angel.co/eladgil
Comment linking /2013/01/how-to-fire-co-founder.html
on “Ask HN: How to fire your co-founder?”Submitted Software markets and businesses are 10x bigger due to the internet as a story · 118 points
HN discussionSomething interesting about the startup scene in India is how the center of gravity has shifted over the last 10 years from Bangalore / Hyderabad to New Delhi. Elad Gil's recent post mentions this: http://blog.eladgil.com/2020/10/unicorn-market-cap-industry-... with Bangalore having 8 unicorns vs Delhi's 11. "While Bangalore continues to thrive, some point to bad governance locally (traffic, high rents, passive gove…
Comment linking /2020/10/unicorn-market-cap-industry-towns-2020.html
on “Pay attention to the Indian startup scene”Submitted Unequal Cofounders as a story · 117 points
HN discussionI think the value of stealth mode really depends on context. E.g. I think GroupOn's series A created a lot of competition, as VCs all told their portfolio companies to pivot in that direction. http://blog.eladgil.com/2011/04/is-stealth-mode-stupid.html
Comment linking /2011/04/is-stealth-mode-stupid.html
on “Stealth Startups Are Stupid”Submitted AI Market Clarity as a story · 111 points
HN discussionNice Compilation. A few more views on this topic: - From Elad Gil: http://blog.eladgil.com/2012/02/how-to-choose-co-founder.htm... - From Venture Hacks: http://venturehacks.com/articles/co-founder-interview
Comment linking /2012/02/how-to-choose-co-founder.html
on “Questions to Ask Potential Cofounders: The Master List”Submitted How To Fire A Co-Founder as a story · 110 points
HN discussionhttp://blog.eladgil.com
Comment linking /
on “Ask HN: Articles like Sam Altman's startup playbook?”Submitted You Dont Need a Good Idea To Start a Great Company as a story · 105 points
HN discussion
