The story
Y Combinator turned down their food-ordering idea, then invited them back to build something else. The pair filled the early site with fake accounts so it would look busy, and it went public in 2024.
No. 023 · 2005 · Medford
Their first idea got rejected. Their first users were fake.
Front page of the internet
Make my startup a legend- 1 Two UVA roommates pitch food ordering by phone.
- 2 Y Combinator says no.
- 3 Then calls back: build the internet's front page.
- 4 Three weeks to launch.
- 5 Nobody's there. So they post as fake users.
- 6 Eventually real people outnumber them.
- 7 Every subculture finds a home.
- 8 Nineteen years later: IPO.
- Founders
- Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian
- Founded
- 2005, Medford
- What they do
- Communities on every topic imaginable.