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Startup founders set up hacker homes to recreate Silicon Valley synergy
In Y Combinator’s early days, founders would move to Palo Alto, split a two-bedroom with five others to save money and trade notes around the clock with their new, like-minded roommates.
Now, as remote work continues and the pandemic persists, scores of entrepreneurs are working from home around the world. Y Combinator isn’t requiring its recent cohorts to relocate and collaboration is a screen-to-screen affair.
Now that they can work from literally anywhere, many entrepreneurs are forming homes with other founders. Hacker homes, the newest iteration of remote work adaption, feels like a nostalgic attempt to recreate some of the synergies COVID-19 wiped out. Generally speaking, it’s a nod to the digital nomad lifestyle, but in some cases, hacker homes feel closer to Hype House, a TikTok mansion laden with sponsored indulgence and wealth.
For Greg Isenberg, a growth advisor to TikTok and former head of strategy at WeWork, entrepreneur homes are a signal of what the foreseeable future of building could look like.
“The type of vibe you used to get from Y Combinator just doesn’t exist anymore,” Isenberg said, as these houses could recreate some of the scrappiness and like-mindedness that defined the incubator’s early days.
While some see founder communes as vehicles for creating a more level playing field, critics say the model perpetuates Silicon Valley cultural constructs that favor white men.
In other words, sometimes there’s a cost to after-work happy hours making a comeback.
Product Hunt, and then TikTok
Michael Houck, a former product manager at Airbnb and Uber, rented a home in Tulum, Mexico in May 2020. He put $21,000 of non-refundable money on his credit card and invited friends and people he met on the internet before hopping on a plane. Anyone who came had to be okay with a few rules: you must pay rent, launch projects and you have to be okay with building your company in public.
In all, 18 entrepreneurs, including Houck, formed The Launch House. Residents include former startup fellowship participants from On Deck, product managers and solo entrepreneurs. On the plane ride over, house founder Brett Goldstein launched its first tool.
Habitants of the Launch House use the pool for recreation and brainstorm sessions, called “pool-storms.” Image Credits: The Launch House
“How do you actually launch a consumer product? You need wide reach, influence, community and media properties all together,” Goldstein said. “I wouldn’t say we’re the next Y Combinator, but the next YC would look something like that.”
In just a few weeks, The Launch House has produced nine products, including a discovery platform for the best OnlyFans accounts, an anonymous Twitter bot that sends positive comments and tools that enhance newsletter and email reading experiences.
Launch House members described a strong focus on inclusion when populating future homes and just opened up the application process for Launch House 2. One way the house is trying to give access to other people is by open-sourcing information and projects that residents build together.
The website has a Launch Library where builders can submit their email addresses to access resources on how to build anything from a podcast to a clothing brand to a community.
“There’s this sort of veil of mystique that surrounds a lot of entrepreneurs and founders,” Goldstein said. “The curtain has been lifted, and now you can get a social media perspective, and inside look at what it takes to start and launch a company.”
Now, more than 1,500 people are on the Launch House waitlist. Multiple investors have approached the group to sponsor internal and external events and some companies have even asked for the right to do product placements.
The concept has surely brought in an audience, and copycats: an unaffiliated group called The Rocketship House posted a trailer on Twitter in October:
Welcome to
. pic.twitter.com/tnp9MQ03V7
—
When reached via e-mail, organizers of Rocketship House declined to answer specific questions about the launch, or as they put it, “blast off.” The group confirmed that it is funded by a few unnamed large investors based in Beverly Hills, and includes a mix of marketers and influencers that invest in social media. It is currently accepting applications, drawing itself as similar to a TikTok mansion.
“Similar to Sway House [a residence for TikTok personalities], we will be making fun and dramatic dope bro content, centered around launching startups. We all live exciting lives, and there’s plenty of drama, so we’re excited to showcase that,” the e-mail from Rocketship House read.
Not all entrepreneur homes are following suit in terms of strategy, for more reasons than one.
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Dear Sophie: I came on a B-1 visa, then COVID-19 happened. How can I stay?
Sophie Alcorn is the founder of Alcorn Immigration Law in Silicon Valley and 2019 Global Law Experts Awards’ “Law Firm of the Year in California for Entrepreneur Immigration Services.” She connects people with the businesses and opportunities that expand their lives.
Here’s another edition of “Dear Sophie,” the advice column that answers immigration-related questions about working at technology companies.
“Your questions are vital to the spread of knowledge that allows people all over the world to rise above borders and pursue their dreams,” says Sophie Alcorn, a Silicon Valley immigration attorney. “Whether you’re in people ops, a founder or seeking a job in Silicon Valley, I would love to answer your questions in my next column.”
Extra Crunch members receive access to weekly “Dear Sophie” columns; use promo code ALCORN to purchase a one- or two-year subscription for 50% off.
Dear Sophie:
I’m currently in the U.S. on a business visitor visa. I arrived here in early March just before the COVID-19 pandemic began here to scope out the U.S. market for expanding the startup I co-founded in Bolivia a few years ago.
I had only planned to stay a couple months, but got stuck. Now my company has some real opportunities to expand. How can I stay and start working?
— Satisfied in San Jose
Hey, Satisfied!
Appreciative for the jobs you’ll be creating in the U.S. since you desire to remain in the U.S. and expand your startup. The U.S. economy greatly benefits from entrepreneurs like you who come here to innovate. Since you’re already in the U.S., you may have options to change your status without departing.
If you were granted a stay of six months when you were admitted most recently with your B-1 visitor visa, you can seek an extension of status for another six months. There are additional alternatives we can explore that would allow you work authorization. For more details on some of the options I’ll discuss here and for additional visa and green card options for startup founders, check out my podcast on “What is U.S. Startup Founder Immigration? A Step-By-Step Guide for Beginners.”
Because most green cards (immigrant visas) take longer than nonimmigrant (temporary) visas, a conservative strategy to pursue would be to find another temporary nonimmigrant status (what is often nicknamed a “visa”) — rather than a green card, which takes longer — that will allow you to create and grow your startup in the U.S. without having to return to Bolivia.
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Dear Sophie: How can employers hire & comply with all this new H-1B craziness?
Sophie Alcorn is the founder of Alcorn Immigration Law in Silicon Valley and 2019 Global Law Experts Awards’ “Law Firm of the Year in California for Entrepreneur Immigration Services.” She connects people with the businesses and opportunities that expand their lives.
Here’s another edition of “Dear Sophie,” the advice column that answers immigration-related questions about working at technology companies.
“Your questions are vital to the spread of knowledge that allows people all over the world to rise above borders and pursue their dreams,” says Sophie Alcorn, a Silicon Valley immigration attorney. “Whether you’re in people ops, a founder or seeking a job in Silicon Valley, I would love to answer your questions in my next column.”
Extra Crunch members receive access to weekly “Dear Sophie” columns; use promo code ALCORN to purchase a one or two-year subscription for 50% off.
Dear Sophie:
I’ve been reading about the new H-1B rules for wage levels and defining what types of jobs qualify that came out this week. What do we as employers need to do to comply? Are any other visa types affected?
— Racking my brain in Richmond! 
Dear Racking:
As you mentioned, the Department of Labor (DOL) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) each issued a new interim rule this week that affects the H-1B program. However, the DOL rule impacts other visas and green cards as well. These interim rules, one of which took effect immediately after being published, are an abuse of power.
The president continues to fear-monger in an attempt to generate votes through racism, protectionism and xenophobia. The fatal irony here is that companies were in fact already making “real offers” to “real employees” for jobs in the innovation economy, which are not fungible and are actually the source of new job creation for Americans. A 2019 report by the Economic Policy Institute found that for every 100 professional, scientific and technical services jobs created in the private sector in the U.S., 418 additional, indirect jobs are created as a result. Nearly 575 additional jobs are created for every 100 information jobs, and 206 additional jobs are created for every 100 healthcare and social assistance jobs.
The DOL rule, which went into effect on October 8, 2020, significantly raises the wages employers must pay to the employees they sponsor for H-1B, H-1B1 and E-3 specialty occupation visas, H-2B visas for temporary non-agricultural workers, EB-2 advanced degree green cards, EB-2 exceptional ability green cards and EB-3 skilled worker green cards.
The new DHS rule, which further restricts H-1B visas, will go into effect on December 7, 2020. DHS will not apply the new rule to any pending or previously approved petitions. That means your company should renew your employees’ H-1B visas — if eligible — before that date.
The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) has formed a task force to review the rules and help with litigation. Although both the DOL and DHS rules will likely be challenged, they will likely remain in effect for some time before any litigation has an impact. They are actively seeking plaintiffs, including employees, employers and representatives of membership organizations who will be hurt by the new rules.
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Dear Sophie: Is it easier and faster to get an O-1A than an EB-1A?
Sophie Alcorn is the founder of Alcorn Immigration Law in Silicon Valley and 2019 Global Law Experts Awards’ “Law Firm of the Year in California for Entrepreneur Immigration Services.” She connects people with the businesses and opportunities that expand their lives.
Here’s another edition of “Dear Sophie,” the advice column that answers immigration-related questions about working at technology companies.
“Your questions are vital to the spread of knowledge that allows people all over the world to rise above borders and pursue their dreams,” says Sophie Alcorn, a Silicon Valley immigration attorney. “Whether you’re in people ops, a founder or seeking a job in Silicon Valley, I would love to answer your questions in my next column.”
“Dear Sophie” columns are accessible for Extra Crunch subscribers; use promo code ALCORN to purchase a one- or two-year subscription for 50% off.
Dear Sophie:
Is it easier and faster to get an O-1A extraordinary ability visa than an EB-1A extraordinary ability green card? What are the pros and cons of each?
—Outstanding in Oakland
Dear Outstanding:
Thanks so much for your timely questions about the extraordinary ability visa and green card. The short answer to your first question is yes, the O-1A visa is generally easier and faster to get than an EB-1A green card. In fact, I once helped a client get an O-1A approved in three days — of course, that was before the COVID-19 pandemic.
We recently launched “Extraordinary Ability Bootcamp,” a new, 15-module online course that takes a deep dive into the O-1A extraordinary ability nonimmigrant (temporary) visa, the EB-1A extraordinary ability green card, the EB-2 NIW (National Interest Waiver for exceptional ability) and what it takes to file a successful application in each category. Check my podcast where I discuss the Bootcamp in more detail. Register for the Extraordinary Ability Bootcamp and use code DEARSOPHIE for 20% off the enrollment fee.
In general, the requirements for a green card, which enable its holder to live permanently in the U.S., are more stringent than those for nonimmigrant visas, which only allow a temporary stay in the U.S. And U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) typically takes longer to process green card petitions than nonimmigrant visa petitions. Moreover, the U.S. imposes numerical and per-country caps on the number of green cards issued each year, which means some green card categories for people born in some countries, such as India and China, face long waits. Only a few visas have an annual cap (like the H-1B), but the O-1A visa is not one of them.
That said, the EB-1A has one of the shortest USCIS processing times, compared to other employment-based green cards. Also, EB-1A petitions are eligible for premium processing, which requires USCIS to make a decision on a petition within 15 days (whether it is “calendar” days or “business” days is currently in flux!). The I-140 petition can be adjudicated quickly in a few weeks, but for somebody whose priority date is “current” on the Visa Bulletin, the determining factor for how long a green card takes is often the I-485 processing time in the local field office. Recently that’s been taking about 1.5-2 years for interviews in the Bay Area.
Meanwhile, nonimmigration visa petitions can face delays for a number of reasons, but a delay happens most often when USCIS responds to a petition with a Request for Evidence (RFE). An RFE is a written notice from USCIS seeking additional evidence to make a decision on a case. During the past few years, the number of RFEs issued by USCIS for both visas and green cards has increased substantially.
Last month (September 2020) USCIS extended its policy of giving petitioners an extra 60 calendar days to respond to certain USCIS notices, including RFEs, intent to deny, revoke, rescind and terminate due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. For any of these notices dated between March 1, 2020, and January 1, 2021, a timely response will be considered 60 days after the date listed on the notice. Whether you want to take advantage of this extra time is a conversation to have with your attorney, based on the strength of your pending petition and the urgency of getting an approval.
As you probably know, the O-1A visa is for individuals who have achieved national or international acclaim and have risen to the top of their field in the areas of science, education, business or athletics. The EB-1A enables individuals who have achieved substantial international or national success in their field due to their extraordinary talent to live permanently in the U.S.
Here’s a summary of the pros and cons of the O-1A and the EB-1A:
| O-1A NONIMMIGRANT VISA
(Temporary Stay) |
EB-1A GREEN CARD
(Permanent Residence) |
Pros
|
Pros
|
Cons
|
Cons
|
Keep in mind that like the EB-1, the EB-2 NIW (National Interest Waiver) green card does not require an employer sponsor. However, the eligibility requirements for the EB-2 NIW are less stringent than for the EB-1A. For individuals born in India and China, the downside to the EB-2 NIW green card is that they face a much longer wait compared to the EB-1A. Unlike the EB-1A, premium processing is not available for EB-2 NIW petitions.
Remember, U.S. embassies and consulates are not processing green cards so you should try to apply for a green card while you remain in legal status in the U.S. Otherwise, you may have to return to and stay in your home country for a while.
Still, getting a visa or green card abroad remains possible. I recommend working with an experienced immigration attorney to discuss which options best match your accomplishments, goals and timing. Remember, you can sign up for Bootcamp and use code DEARSOPHIE for 20% off the enrollment fee to get qualified!
All my best,
Sophie
Have a question? Ask it here. We reserve the right to edit your submission for clarity and/or space. The information provided in “Dear Sophie” is general information and not legal advice. For more information on the limitations of “Dear Sophie,” please view our full disclaimer here. You can contact Sophie directly at Alcorn Immigration Law.
Sophie’s podcast, Immigration Law for Tech Startups, is available on all major podcast platforms. If you’d like to be a guest, she’s accepting applications!
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Dear Sophie: Will October 2020 Visa Bulletin changes expedite my immigration case?
Here’s another edition of “Dear Sophie,” the advice column that answers immigration-related questions about working at technology companies.
“Your questions are vital to the spread of knowledge that allows people all over the world to rise above borders and pursue their dreams,” says Sophie Alcorn, a Silicon Valley immigration attorney. “Whether you’re in people ops, a founder or seeking a job in Silicon Valley, I would love to answer your questions in my next column.”
“Dear Sophie” columns are accessible for Extra Crunch subscribers; use promo code ALCORN to purchase a one- or two-year subscription for 50% off.
Dear Sophie:
I’ve been waiting for years for my green card. Is there any way to expedite my case? What does the October shift in Visa Bulletin priority dates mean for me?
—Waiting in Woodside
Dear Waiting:
Thanks! There are a lot of ways to speed up the immigration process. Great news — last week the State Department released the October 2020 Visa Bulletin, which significantly reduces the waiting time for many folks from around the world seeking green cards. Basically final action dates progressed for EB-1, EB-2 and EB-3 and are all current now if you can use categories besides being born in India or China! Feel free to check out my recent podcast on seven ways to expedite an immigration case and check out our upcoming free educational webinar on October 8 for the latest on H-1Bs and other immigration updates.
If you were born in India or China, dates for filing for Adjustment of Status and the National Visa Center also sped up significantly for individuals in these categories. Here’s a typical question I receive: “I’m currently in the U.S. in valid nonimmigrant status. If I was born in India or China, can I file my I-485 in October 2020?” See below to check your priority date and talk to an immigration attorney to see what you can file in October 2020!
Is my China/India priority date current in October?
Here’s an overview of how to figure out whether you can file your I-485 this month if you need to use the categories of being born in India or China:
- Step 1. Double-check your I-140 I-797C approval notice to determine your category and priority date:
- Sec. 203 (b)(1) → EB-1 Category
- Sec. 203 (b)(2) → EB-2 Category
- Sec. 203 (b)(3) → EB-3 Category
- Step 2. Check out the October Visa Bulletin. To understand the Visa Bulletin in more detail:
- The number of green cards the U.S. issues each year is capped based on the type of green card and the green card candidate’s country of birth
- As my podcast on priority dates explains, it is the date your green card petition was submitted or the date your employer submitted your PERM labor certification application.
- Step 3. Find the date in the cell at the intersection of your category and country.
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2 strategies for creating top-of-funnel marketing content
Amanda Milligan is the marketing director at Fractl, a prominent growth marketing agency that’s helped Fortune 500 companies and boutique businesses alike earn quality media coverage, backlinks, awareness and authority.
More posts by this contributor
Even when you’re excellent at making the sale, you still need people to know you exist in the first place.
Content is excellent at making the case for your product or service, but it also excels at providing value to potential customers in a more tangential way, introducing them to your brand and building awareness and authority.
Here’s how utilizing content marketing and digital PR can make huge strides in getting your brand name out there.
Ranking on-site content for awareness keywords
When on-site content you created ranks well in the search engine results pages (SERPs), that doesn’t just mean you get more traffic (although that’s certainly a major benefit).
You’re also getting your brand name in front of searchers because you’re appearing in the results. You’re building authority because Google appears to believe you have the best answer for their query. You’re giving the searcher and answer to their question and beginning to build trust.
So how do you know which keywords/topics to target and what kind of content to create? You perform keyword research, which basically means examining what keywords people are searching for, how many people search for them per month and how hard it’ll be to rank for them.
Google Ads Keyword Planner provides this information, but you can also use Chrome plugins like Keywords Everywhere and Keyword Surfer or free tools like Ubersuggest.
Image Credits: Ubersuggest (opens in a new window)
When your goal is to build awareness, it’s important that the keywords and topics you target have high volume. In other words, they’re searched a lot. Awareness objectives mean reaching as many people as possible so more people know that your brand exists and begin to understand what it’s about.
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Dear Sophie: How can I get my 2-year foreign residency requirement for my J-1 waived?
Sophie Alcorn is the founder of Alcorn Immigration Law in Silicon Valley and 2019 Global Law Experts Awards’ “Law Firm of the Year in California for Entrepreneur Immigration Services.” She connects people with the businesses and opportunities that expand their lives.
Here’s another edition of “Dear Sophie,” the advice column that answers immigration-related questions about working at technology companies.
“Your questions are vital to the spread of knowledge that allows people all over the world to rise above borders and pursue their dreams,” says Sophie Alcorn, a Silicon Valley immigration attorney. “Whether you’re in people ops, a founder or seeking a job in Silicon Valley, I would love to answer your questions in my next column.”
“Dear Sophie” columns are accessible for Extra Crunch subscribers; use promo code ALCORN to purchase a one- or two-year subscription for 50% off.
Dear Sophie:
I’m entering my second year in the U.S. under a five-year J-1 research visa from Italy. When we came we thought it would be temporary, but our plans have changed and now we want to try to stay in the U.S. My husband started his own company here on his J-2 visa work permit, and our daughter was born here. However, we’re supposed to return to Italy for two years. How can we get a 212(e) waiver?
—Positive in Palo Alto
Dear Positive:
Congrats on your accomplishments — the birth of your daughter, your research position and your husband’s startup. Happy to share about the J-1 visa, the two-year home residency requirement (a section of the law called “212(e)”) and obtaining a waiver so you can seek a green card or another type of visa. For more background, check out my podcast on the two-year foreign residency requirement and filing a waiver and last weeks’ Dear Sophie column with an overview of the types of J-1 visas. The earlier you begin preparing your waiver application, the better.
The J-1 Educational and Cultural Exchange Visa is intended for people from around the globe to work or study in the U.S. and then take their newly acquired knowledge and skills back to their home country. Given that, it is not a direct path if you decide after your arrival to remain longer term in the U.S. I recommend working with an experienced immigration lawyer to devise a strategy for reaching your goals beyond getting a waiver. I also recommend talking with your employer to assess whether they can later sponsor you for a green card.
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What can growth marketers learn from lean product development?
Andrea Fryrear is co-founder of AgileSherpas, a leading authority on optimizing customer acquisition and retention processes, the author of two books on organizational agility and an international speaker and trainer.
Old-school approaches to marketing were often described as “spray and pray.” Marketers would launch a massive campaign in as many places as possible and hope that something worked.
More customers would show up, so it would appear that something had in fact worked.
But nobody could be sure exactly what that something was.
When we can’t predict what will have an impact, we need campaigns that cover all the bases, and those campaigns are consequently huge. They take a long time to create, are expensive to launch and come chock full of risk.
If a spray-and-pray campaign is a total failure (and we don’t have to go far to find examples of those), it’s quite possible an entire year’s worth of marketing budget has just been wasted.
Instead, marketers need to take a page from lean product development and begin creating Minimum Viable Campaigns (MVCs). Rather than wait until a massive multichannel launch is perfect, we can incrementally release a series of smaller, targeted, data-driven campaigns.
Over time these MVCs coalesce to look and act much like a Big Bang-style campaign from the spray-and-pray days, but they’ve done so in a much more data-driven and less risky way.
What exactly is an MVC?
Just as with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP), it can be easy to misunderstand the real definition of an MVC. It’s not something thrown together with no regard for brand standards or strategic goals, and it’s not a blind guess.
Instead, a good MVC represents the smallest amount of well-designed work that could still achieve some of the campaign’s goals. Before we have any chance of figuring out what that looks like, we need to know the ultimate goal of the bigger campaign or initiative. If we don’t know this, we can’t possibly measure the effectiveness of the MVC.
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5 steps for building a thriving developer community
Bear Douglas leads Developer Relations at Slack, where she and her team help developers build more pleasant and productive ways to work.
Every API or platform that has been successful long term owes a large part of their success to a thriving developer community — including Slack. As the lead of our Developer Relations team and a senior marketing manager, we oversee the Slack Platform Community. The community has grown quickly, so we’re both often asked how to successfully build a similar group.
At Slack, our app ecosystem has expanded alongside the product. The Slack App Directory contains 2,200 apps and over 600,000 custom apps (apps people build just for their teams) are used every week. No technology company creates its ecosystem alone. The growth in ours is part of a wider trend, as the total number of APIs has increased by 30% over the last few years. We’re also currently experiencing a surge in app submissions as more workforces operate entirely at home, and companies need tools to support remote operations. In early April, we saw a 100% increase in app submissions week-over-week.
As more developers try a platform, community support is critical to everyone — the platform company, new developers and those who have been developing for years. If your platform doesn’t have a developer community yet, creating one takes a few purposeful steps. Here are some of the best practices we’ve learned over nearly three decades’ worth of combined work in developer communities.
Start (and continue) listening
You can’t build a community without participating in one first. If you already have people developing on your platform, and they’re open to receiving contact from you, reach out! Get to know the people behind the integrations you’re seeing built.
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Earn the best backlinks with high-quality content and digital PR
Amanda Milligan is the marketing director at Fractl, a prominent growth marketing agency that’s helped Fortune 500 companies and boutique businesses alike earn quality media coverage, backlinks, awareness and authority.
More posts by this contributor
A lot is debated in the SEO world, but nearly everyone can agree that links are and will continue to be vitally important to the health and rankability of a website.
Luckily, link building and brand awareness goals can be built into your content marketing strategy, which can be vastly elevated by combining your efforts with digital PR.
I’ll walk through how creating high-quality content and pitching it correctly to top publishers can earn you the valuable backlinks you’ve always wanted (and if you employ this strategy on an ongoing basis, the increase in organic traffic you’ve always wanted, too).
Choosing the right content idea
I have to start by saying that the most important thing about being cited in news sources is that you have to be newsworthy. Now that might go without saying, but what we as marketers might consider newsworthy about our brands isn’t necessarily newsworthy to a writer or to the greater public.
Content ideation tip #1: The best way to ensure your newsworthiness is to gather and analyze data. Even if the data set already exists, if it hasn’t been analyzed and presented in a straightforward, applicable, easy-to-understand way, your illustration of the data could be considered new and valuable.
I’ll touch on this again in a moment. But first, let’s dive into the content example I’ll be using throughout this piece.
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