Paul Graham
Co-founder of Y Combinator and Viaweb; essayist at paulgraham.com.
Paul Graham did not write this page. What is this?
It collects the places they publish and what they have said there, each linked to the source. They have no account here. Is this you? Claim it, correct it, or ask us to remove it.
Where they publish
@paulgx.com Short-form, and where essays get announced.
Short-form takes on startups, writing and whatever else, and the place new essays get announced. The replies are where the takes get argued.
Recent
- Prediction: Nox is going to be a big deal. They're growing at software growth rates shipping metal. And Zane is one of the most committed CEOs I've met in the… 1 Sept 2026
- RT @yarotrof: The rise of the jet-powered drone — in essence a cheap cruise missile — and the havoc Russia has been inflicting on Kyiv by s… 1 Sept 2026
- RT @ccatalini: 1/ Stop anthropomorphizing. It's dangerous because it points attention at the wrong problem and the wrong solution. The mode… 1 Sept 2026
Show 17 more
- RT @bscholl: When I tell people about Boom, one of the things that surprises people most is just how small the team is. The XB-1 team was a… 31 Aug 2026
- RT @RepThomasMassie: On the House floor tonight, I read the names of several Epstein coconspirators who should be investigated and prosecut… 31 Aug 2026
- RT @zachdotai: fundraising before @ycombinator is very different from fundraising after. i thought fundraising meant weeks of meetings and… 31 Aug 2026
- These guys are from just down the road from where the Collisons came from, so office hours with them had a lot of deja vu. 31 Aug 2026
- RT @MichaelDmrks: today we're launching Frontier Computing (YC S26) we grow neurons that colocate memory and compute, so you can more easi… 31 Aug 2026
- One way I knew LLMs themselves were a big deal was that the people most surprised by what they could do were the insiders. 31 Aug 2026
- A dedicated fan at the UVA-NC State game. (It was a blowout. UVA won 34-8.) https://t.co/OmrLLOVTaR 31 Aug 2026
- RT @gustaf: Circleback is now free. Circleback was the fastest growing product in their YC batch and have an enormous internal adoption amo… 31 Aug 2026
- RT @levie: Sometimes people don’t have an intuitive sense of what Jevons paradox looks like for token consumption. Those of us working with… 31 Aug 2026
- RT @ledwards: “OpenAI has contributed $236 million in gross receipts taxes over the past several years.” This is about 4x what they’d pay… 30 Aug 2026
- RT @paulg: When smart people get excited to work on something that sounds boring, you know they're in earnest — that they're not just doing… 30 Aug 2026
- Something I told 14 yo: You have to be able to throw stuff away to do great work. You never get so good that you get everything right the first time. You have… 30 Aug 2026
- Is this plane in ground effect off the roof of the stadium? 30 Aug 2026
- Strange as it sounds, YC wants companies it rejects to succeed. Otherwise we won't know if we reject someone good. 30 Aug 2026
- RT @AmourskyCyrille: 💔🇺🇦 C’est un enfer sans fin. 37 morts dans la région de Kyiv. 72 heures d’attaques non-stop contre Kyiv. Une fille de… 30 Aug 2026
- RT @Numalunah: Got hacked yesterday. The link came from inside Claude chat. I was installing a transcription app. Claude sent the download… 30 Aug 2026
- RT @patrickc: Overall, I’m very surprised at how little media coverage there’s been around the OpenAI / Hugging Face attack. It’s clearly o… 30 Aug 2026
Link verified 1 Sept 2026. Recent items update automatically from the channel.
On record
What they believeKorents 14 beliefs — each backed by an exact quote.
Compiled by korents.com, not by them: the one-line wordings are korents', the quotes are theirs.
Recent
Founders' reputation for overconfidence is sample bias; most good startups actually underrate themselves.
Startup founders have a reputation for overconfidence, but this is just sample bias; the arrogant ones are also the loudest. Even now most good startups underrate themselves, so it really helps to encourage them.
@paulg on X Said 26 Aug 2026
The best thing a 17-year-old could do today is learn to build LLMs from scratch and train the most powerful ones they can get hardware for.
Someone asked what I'd do if I were 17. I'd learn how to build LLMs from scratch, and then train ones as powerful as I could with whatever hardware I could get access to.
@paulg on X Said 23 Aug 2026
Blocking data center construction in America would not slow the rate of AI progress, only the rate of AI progress in America.
Preventing companies from building data centers in America wouldn't slow down the rate of progress in AI. It would merely slow down the rate of progress in AI in America.
@paulg on X Said 22 Aug 2026
Show 11 more
The way to win at capitalism is to make customers' lives better rather than to squeeze them, because creating new things returns 10x where squeezing returns 2x at best.
The way to win at capitalism is to focus on what it actually does (make customers' lives better) rather than the socialist caricature of it (squeeze every penny out of them). The latter gets you 2x returns at best, whereas making new things for people can get you 10x.
@paulg on X Said 21 Aug 2026
In ten years few people will be able to write, or want to read, anything longer than a page or two — and the few who still can will be powerful.
There may not be many people left in 10 years who can write, or want to read, things longer than a page or two. But there will be at least a few of us, and we'll be a powerful club.
@paulg on X Said 21 Aug 2026
One reliable tell of AI writing is excessively colorful verbs where a normal person would use a plain one.
I was thinking about how I recognize AI writing, and one big tell is excessively colorful verbs. A handful of journalists might write that a proposal "drew" 100 votes, but any normal person will just say "got".
@paulg on X Said 19 Aug 2026
Economic inequality is growing because technology makes companies easier to start and faster to grow, not because of tax policy.
There's a pervasive myth that "tax policy changes" are the reason economic inequality is growing. Actually it's because technology makes it increasingly easy to start companies, and makes them grow faster once you do.
@paulg on X Said 16 Aug 2026
Founding alone is still a bad idea even though AI lets one person get more done, because the point of a cofounder is to share the stress.
I still don't think it's a good idea though. The reason to have a cofounder is not just to get more done. It's to have someone to help bear the stress.
@paulg on X Said 14 Aug 2026
If AI turns the world upside down, the safest place to be is a small, fast-moving company that can change direction easily.
A lot of founders I talk to are worried about what will happen with AI. So am I frankly. But they're actually better off than anyone else. If the world is going to get turned upside down, the safest place to be is in a small, fast-moving company that can easily change direction.
@paulg on X Said 12 Aug 2026
Almost all standard startup advice is still true in the AI era.
One common question I get now is how much of the standard startup advice is still true in the AI era. So far almost all of it. There's more difference between the advice I give different startups in one batch than between what I've given pre-AI and post-AI startups.
@paulg on X Said 12 Aug 2026
Within a couple of decades there will not be many people who can write, because AI has removed the pressure to learn.
I'm usually reluctant to make predictions about technology, but I feel fairly confident about this one: in a couple decades there won't be many people who can write.
Writes and Write-Nots (October 2024) Said 1 Oct 2024
Because writing is thinking, a world divided into writers and non-writers becomes a world divided into thinkers and non-thinkers.
So a world divided into writes and write-nots is more dangerous than it sounds. It will be a world of thinks and think-nots.
Writes and Write-Nots (October 2024) Said 1 Oct 2024
Intelligence is becoming a choice rather than a byproduct of daily work: there will still be smart people, but only those who choose to be.
There will still be smart people, but only those who choose to be.
Writes and Write-Nots (October 2024) Said 1 Oct 2024
Returns for performance are superlinear rather than proportional across most domains that matter.
One of the most important things I didn't understand about the world when I was a child is the degree to which the returns for performance are superlinear.
Superlinear Returns (October 2023) Said 1 Oct 2023
Latest
Everything, newest firstFeed Posts, videos, repos and beliefs from every card above, in one stream.
Filter & sortAll sources · condensed
- Prediction: Nox is going to be a big deal. They're growing at software growth rates shipping metal. And Zane is one of the most committed CEOs I've met in the… 1 Sept
- RT @yarotrof: The rise of the jet-powered drone — in essence a cheap cruise missile — and the havoc Russia has been inflicting on Kyiv by s… 1 Sept
- RT @ccatalini: 1/ Stop anthropomorphizing. It's dangerous because it points attention at the wrong problem and the wrong solution. The mode… 1 Sept
- RT @bscholl: When I tell people about Boom, one of the things that surprises people most is just how small the team is. The XB-1 team was a… 31 Aug
- RT @RepThomasMassie: On the House floor tonight, I read the names of several Epstein coconspirators who should be investigated and prosecut… 31 Aug
- RT @zachdotai: fundraising before @ycombinator is very different from fundraising after. i thought fundraising meant weeks of meetings and… 31 Aug
Show 23 more
- These guys are from just down the road from where the Collisons came from, so office hours with them had a lot of deja vu. 31 Aug
- RT @MichaelDmrks: today we're launching Frontier Computing (YC S26) we grow neurons that colocate memory and compute, so you can more easi… 31 Aug
- One way I knew LLMs themselves were a big deal was that the people most surprised by what they could do were the insiders. 31 Aug
- A dedicated fan at the UVA-NC State game. (It was a blowout. UVA won 34-8.) https://t.co/OmrLLOVTaR 31 Aug
- RT @gustaf: Circleback is now free. Circleback was the fastest growing product in their YC batch and have an enormous internal adoption amo… 31 Aug
- RT @levie: Sometimes people don’t have an intuitive sense of what Jevons paradox looks like for token consumption. Those of us working with… 31 Aug
- RT @ledwards: “OpenAI has contributed $236 million in gross receipts taxes over the past several years.” This is about 4x what they’d pay… 30 Aug
- RT @paulg: When smart people get excited to work on something that sounds boring, you know they're in earnest — that they're not just doing… 30 Aug
- Something I told 14 yo: You have to be able to throw stuff away to do great work. You never get so good that you get everything right the first time. You have… 30 Aug
- Founders' reputation for overconfidence is sample bias; most good startups actually underrate themselves. 26 Aug
- The best thing a 17-year-old could do today is learn to build LLMs from scratch and train the most powerful ones they can get hardware for. 23 Aug
- Blocking data center construction in America would not slow the rate of AI progress, only the rate of AI progress in America. 22 Aug
- In ten years few people will be able to write, or want to read, anything longer than a page or two — and the few who still can will be powerful. 21 Aug
- The way to win at capitalism is to make customers' lives better rather than to squeeze them, because creating new things returns 10x where squeezing returns 2x at best. 21 Aug
- One reliable tell of AI writing is excessively colorful verbs where a normal person would use a plain one. 19 Aug
- Economic inequality is growing because technology makes companies easier to start and faster to grow, not because of tax policy. 16 Aug
- Founding alone is still a bad idea even though AI lets one person get more done, because the point of a cofounder is to share the stress. 14 Aug
- Almost all standard startup advice is still true in the AI era. 12 Aug
- If AI turns the world upside down, the safest place to be is a small, fast-moving company that can change direction easily. 12 Aug
- Intelligence is becoming a choice rather than a byproduct of daily work: there will still be smart people, but only those who choose to be. 1 Oct 2024
- Because writing is thinking, a world divided into writers and non-writers becomes a world divided into thinkers and non-thinkers. 1 Oct 2024
- Within a couple of decades there will not be many people who can write, because AI has removed the pressure to learn. 1 Oct 2024
- Returns for performance are superlinear rather than proportional across most domains that matter. 1 Oct 2023