Get the latest tech news
Y Combinator's Chief Startup Whisperer Is Demoting Himself
As the influential startup incubator downsizes—and navigates political pushback—managing director Michael Seibel is taking a new role to spend more time working with founders.
When Michael Seibel lost his position at the startup incubator Y Combinator, he didn’t find out in typical tech industry fashion, which might entail an email calling him to a Zoom meeting where the bad news would be delivered. Forbes has reported that he was disappointed not to be tapped as CEO after the incubator’s president, Geoff Ralston, who had taken over when Sam Altman went full time leading OpenAI, left at the end of 2022. These looney videographers prowled a San Francisco highrise where so many YC founders rented space that it was nicknamed the “Y-scraper.” One might argue Justin.tv was a precursor to the influencer economy—after several pivots it morphed into streaming platform Twitch, purchased by Amazon for almost a billion dollars.
Or read this on Wired
