Was this at a time before YC began favoring founders over ideas? Serious morbid curiosity here and not a troll attempt and I thank you for indulging me.
The next morning, on the train back to Virginia, hung over, somewhere in the middle of Connecticut, I get a call from Paul. He says, "I'm sorry, we made a mistake. We don't like your idea, but we like you guys." We got off the train, and I was able to sweet-talk the Amtrak lady into not charging us to turn around. In our conversation, Paul said, "You guys need to build the front page of the Internet." That was all Paul, and that became Reddit.
No, YC has always favored founders over ideas. But one of the main way you judge someone is what ideas they have.
When drew was first applying to YC I didn't know him. But I'm going to presume that, like most young people, 6 months or a year is a lot of time for personal growth.
