According to DNS and WHOIS, news.ycombinator.com is hosted at ThePlanet.com Internet Services, Inc.

Since "where are YC funded companies hosted" is a common question, I'll answer that too, based on the list of YC-funded companies at http://www.ycombinator.com/faq.html:

$ echo reddit.com loopt.com clickfacts.com textpayme.com snipshot.com inklingmarkets.com flagr.com wufoo.com youos.com likebetter.com thinkature.com jamglue.com shoutfit.com scribd.com weebly.com virtualmin.com buxfer.com octopart.com heysan.com justin.tv iminlikewithyou.com socialmoth.com xobni.com versionate.com adpinion.com anywhere.fm fuzzwich.com bountii.com auctomatic.com disqus.com draftmix.com webmynd.com rescuetime.com reble.fm heroku.com tipjoy.com addher.com 8aweek.com | xargs -n 1 | lam -s 'www.' - | xargs -n 1 host -t a | grep 'has address' | cut -f 4 -d ' ' | xargs -n 1 whois | grep OrgName | sort | uniq -c | sort -srn | sed -e 's/OrgName://'

   8     Amazon.com, Inc.
   6     SoftLayer Technologies Inc.
   4     ThePlanet.com Internet Services, Inc.
   2     NoZone, Inc.
   1     BitPusher, LLC
   1     Columbus Network Access Point, Inc.
   1     Global Netoptex, Inc
   1     Layered Technologies, Inc.
   1     Performance Systems International Inc.
   1     RackForce Hosting Inc.
   1     ServePath, LLC
   1     Slicehost LLC
   1     Time Warner Telecom, Inc.

I think a lot of people came away form Startup School with the idea they want to hear more from dhh.

I like it that one of the reasons they're the next Google is they don't have a business model yet. Hey, come to think of it neither does my morning commute, maybe it's the next Google.

Thank you so much, 37signals guys.

I've always found pg's essays to be motivational and inspring, but there are two things that always turn me off; 1.) I don't live in San Fransisco, and probably never will, and 2.) I have a family. I often feel dismissed by PG and his disciples. DHH's stuff gives me hope that there's still a chance for "fogeys" (cripes, I'm only 33!) like me.

I have a feeling that, if I ever applied to YCombinator, my application would end up in the wastebasket the moment they caught a whiff of the fact that I have a wife and kids. Is that fair?

I stay up late into the night hacking after the kids go to bed, and I'm in the office hours before other people are there so I can do some extra hacking. Am I not motivated enough? Can I not be passionate? Perhaps DHH is onto something. Perhaps balancing the challenges of work and family five you a healthy dosage of time management and prioritization skills.

There are some interesting comments on DHH's site - several presumably young, single kids are crabby and crying "discrimination!" (e.g., "Wow, that’s actually offensive. And illegal in BC, Canada and I hope other enlightened jurisdictions.", or the more eloquent "I’m single and you can kiss my ..."). I wonder if these people have ever noticed that the discrimination often goes the other way, against the thirty-something parent crowd, too.

I think the reason for that is more one of risk. Starting a new company is a lot more risky than being an employee of one. And if you have a family to support, you're less likely to be willing to take on big risk.

So I absolutely agree that it's easier to start a company when you're single and have no obligations because you can tolerate much more risk.

Update: Seems that the original argument changed from "if kids are so great, why aren't more founders parents when they start their business" to "kids might make you more productive during regular working hours, but you need more than just regular working hours to start a business".

I'm happy to offer my thoughts on the second argument as well. I think people working on startups generally work way too much and the ones that succeed don't do so because they put in 14-hour days.

At 37signals, our "startup" (Basecamp) got off the ground on a 10 hour/week programming budget and designers who were busy doing client projects. For the first year, it wasn't the sole focus for the company.

We believe those constraints were instrumental in their way they shaped Basecamp and thus part of the success of the company.

Doesn't mean that there might not be other businesses out there where working lots and lots of hours can be beneficial somehow, but I think that it's a fallacy that you need to work crazy hours to succeed. I do believe that others believe this, though, I just don't think it's healthy or beneficial.

All of this is somewhat tangential to the original argument, though, which is that you shouldn't be afraid of hiring family people. Who should start a company is a great debate as well, though.

I think that's a pretty narrow definition of a startup. Also, there are plenty of businesses that start out small and then grow very large over time. Actually, most large businesses took a long time to get there.

Say like foot locker or Zappos for a "shoe store" (both big business) and say McDonald's or Olive Garden for a restaurant.

By the same measure, we're building 37signals to grow as well. Grow revenues, grow customers, grow influence. We're just not that hooked on growing head count or office space (which are often the most visible indicators of growth for a private company and thus often mistaken as the only indicators).

To me a startup simply means a new business that's getting off the ground. That business may well end up big one day and it may not, which is okay too.

I generally don't think that you can become a star by trying to be a star. I think you just try to be the best at what you do and if you are, hopefully the star part will take care of itself.

You're exactly right. Startup School was a great way to collect some thoughts that had been scattered for a while. A real energy boost.

I made a little bit more robust version. Some of the whois calls (like heroku.com) have 2 OrgName lines and some don't have one at all (like weebly.com).

  Amazon.com, Inc.                           7
  	youos.com
  	jamglue.com
  	shoutfit.com
  	socialmoth.com
  	webmynd.com
  	heroku.com
  	8aweek.com
  SoftLayer Technologies Inc.                5
  	scribd.com
  	xobni.com
  	anywhere.fm
  	bountii.com
  	disqus.com
  ThePlanet.com Internet Services, Inc.      5
  	snipshot.com
  	virtualmin.com
  	heysan.com
  	adpinion.com
  	reble.fm
  Hurricane Electric                         3
  	weebly.com
  	octopart.com
  	auctomatic.com
  Internap Network Services                  2
  	loopt.com
  	likebetter.com
  NoZone, Inc.                               2
  	flagr.com
  	thinkature.com
  Peer 1 Network Inc.                        2
  	rescuetime.com
  	addher.com
  ServePath, LLC                             1
  	reddit.com
  American Digital Network                   1
  	fuzzwich.com
  Columbus Network Access Point, Inc.        1
  	versionate.com
  Performance Systems International Inc.     1
  	justin.tv
  Global Netoptex, Inc                       1
  	clickfacts.com
  RackForce Hosting Inc.                     1
  	draftmix.com
  Time Warner Telecom, Inc.                  1
  	textpayme.com
  Logicworks Corporation                     1
  	inklingmarkets.com
  Layered Technologies, Inc.                 1
  	buxfer.com
  Rackspace.com, Ltd.                        1
  	iminlikewithyou.com
  BitPusher, LLC                             1
  	wufoo.com
  Slicehost LLC                              1
  	tipjoy.com

Actually there wasn't anything in DHH's talk that I really disagreed with, except the use of the word "startup" for the kind of company he was describing. There's already a word for companies like Italian restaurants: businesses. A startup is a very specific kind of business: one that starts small but could grow very large. Only a fraction of the 30 million businesses in the US are startups.

I think what made people think DHH's advice was relevant to startups was that he was talking about starting a business to write software, which is also what most startups do. But structurally the kind of small business he was talking about was more like a landscaping company or a shoe store or a restaurant. Which is a perfectly legitimate thing to do; it's just not a startup.

I believe he has decided to take the opposite position to pg on every point about how to start a business and see how well he can argue it.

Which is a healthy thing for Hacker News, I think, getting other perspectives.

I believe that David came away from Startup School with a heap of new ideas that he's been talking about back in Chicago.