If you didn’t get in this year, you probably did the smart thing by just focusing on building your startup. Follow me @clemens_chr and I will promise to give my unfiltered opinion about loads of stuff….

That’s my honest feedback. Don’t get me wrong @ycombinator : it was a massive event, and the scale and effort behind it were incredible and I’m very grateful that it happened! But I hope sharing some of these thoughts helps make it even better next year.

Blazing-fast image creation – using just your voice. Try Grok Imagine.

Yes, I met interesting people, but there was no real structure for networking. Many missed opportunities: discussions at tables of 10, demo stands from past YC batches to talk 1:1 with founders, startup speed-dating, pitches with feedback from YC partners. The list goes.

Too much input, no output: my friends and I felt drained after 5 back-to-back sessions. No one can focus that long and your brain just shuts off.

@elonmusk interview was mehh. Answers were things we’ve all heard hundreds of times. Why didn’t Garry take audience questions? I would’ve done 20% intro, then 80% Q&A. I mean, an hour of the world’s richest man is insanely valuable, and this just felt like a missed opportunity.

Of course, the speaker lineup was insane, but none of the talks were truly life-changing. Everything stuck to the script. Interviews and presentations felt generic. If you watch @sama or @karpathy interviews online and take notes, you’ll get the same insights faster.

(Un)popular opinion: YC’s Startup School didn’t live up to the hype. If you didn’t make it this year, drop the fomo, because it was probably not what it looks like on social media. Here’s why ⬇️:

Make sure to follow 🤌 to stay up to date on robotic hands!!.

Then of course there were a lot of lower DoF hands, like the Inspire Hand or the XHand 1, and of course the legendary @shadowrobot hand, but you are probably familiar with it!

ORCA took part in the WBCD challenge, where we teleported the hand with gloves!

❤️ 3. ORCA Hand.🫶🏼 Open Source Hardware and software.💰 2.5k if you build it yourself.🙏 17 DoF including Wrist.🪡 Tendon driven.Learn more @orcahand

2. SHARPA Hand .🤑 Biggest booth at the conference .📐 1:1 human form factor.👋 22 DoF.💥 Extremely accurate sensors.❌ Thumb seemed a bit limited in range of motion.🤑 Cheaper than the Shadow Hand, if that means anything.

1. TESOLLO Hand .🤚 22 active DoF.❌ Bulky and bigger than human form factor.👌 Very accurate through direct driven design.💰 $16.9k

A little belated, but here‘s a list of some of the coolest robotic hands at #ICRA in Atlanta. You definitely don’t want to miss out on the specs 👀. A thread 🧵 ⬇️

RT @orcahand: We’re officially releasing the ORCA Hand tomorrow for the research community! 🤯.Get early access to the CAD files and assembl….

When your @orcahand escapes the lab and goes sightseeing…