@DeRonin_: Sam Altman literally dropped the playbook for turning an idea into a multi-billion company This 46-minute lecture is th…

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Summary

A tweet thread highlights Sam Altman's lecture on startup fundraising and shares a verified spreadsheet of top accelerators for 2026.

Sam Altman literally dropped the playbook for turning an idea into a multi-billion company This 46-minute lecture is the best thing I've watched on raising in 2026 It will help you understand how the early-stage game actually works and which side of the table you're really sitting on Sam ran YC from 2014 to 2019, scaled it into the most well-known accelerator on earth, then left to run OpenAI. He watched thousands of startups fail at every stage and he knows exactly what kills them The part most founders won't want to hear: > 90% of "fundraising advice" online is from people who never raised > the partner picking up your slack DM at 2am matters more than the brand on your cap table > "I raised at a $20M cap" is not a milestone, it's a debt to your next round > half the "top 30 accelerators" lists in your feed still quote 2022 numbers > the right accelerator decides your next 5 years more than the right investor right now the average founder picks an accelerator from a Medium article written 4 years ago.. applies to a program that quietly died.. loses 60 days waiting for a reply that's never coming they think they're doing the work they're using maybe 10% of what's actually available I went through 35 of them this week, verified every check size, every equity %, killed the ones that don't exist anymore Full corrected spreadsheet in the post below
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Cached at: 05/16/26, 01:20 PM

Sam Altman literally dropped the playbook for turning an idea into a multi-billion company

This 46-minute lecture is the best thing I’ve watched on raising in 2026

It will help you understand how the early-stage game actually works and which side of the table you’re really sitting on

Sam ran YC from 2014 to 2019, scaled it into the most well-known accelerator on earth, then left to run OpenAI. He watched thousands of startups fail at every stage and he knows exactly what kills them

The part most founders won’t want to hear:

90% of “fundraising advice” online is from people who never raised the partner picking up your slack DM at 2am matters more than the brand on your cap table “I raised at a $20M cap” is not a milestone, it’s a debt to your next round half the “top 30 accelerators” lists in your feed still quote 2022 numbers the right accelerator decides your next 5 years more than the right investor

right now the average founder picks an accelerator from a Medium article written 4 years ago.. applies to a program that quietly died.. loses 60 days waiting for a reply that’s never coming

they think they’re doing the work they’re using maybe 10% of what’s actually available

I went through 35 of them this week, verified every check size, every equity %, killed the ones that don’t exist anymore

Full corrected spreadsheet in the post below

ahaha, relax is good sometimes as well

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