I hope I didn't come across as not willing to go "all in." I certainly didn't intend that. My intent was to outline the issues we considered, with the hope that others might find it useful and even suggest variables we hadn't considered.
At this point, I really couldn't back out if this startup even if I wanted to (and I have no desire to): I quit my job, spent a ton of money to move, and told everyone I know about my plans. As Dharmesh Shah of onstartups would say, I'm emotionally committed, which is more significant than my financial commitment (He has a good post about this at http://onstartups.com/home/tabid/3339/bid/1204/Startup-Founders-The-Involved-vs-The-Committed.aspx ).
As dfranke pointed out, we have more options than only accepting YC funding or not accepting. The real question is whether it makes more sense for us to keep going with money we have in Denver and find angel funding on our own, or move and take YC funding in a few months.
How many angels and VCs do you personally know? How many other startup founders do you regularly meet with there in Denver?
People who already have a lot of startup connections and experience probably don't need YC, but I don't get the impression that you are one of those people.
That's a good point. We don't have a strong network of angels, VCs, and other founders here in Denver. That's definitely a huge plus of the YC experience. I do wonder if we could build a network that would be good enough in the next few months, since we have a few good contacts and Denver/Boulder is pretty good for that type of stuff (admittedly, not as good as Cambridge or the Bay Area).
Again, not knocking YC, just weighing our options.
'... The real question is whether it makes more sense for us to keep going with money we have in Denver and find angel funding on our own, or move and take YC funding in a few months. ...'
No the 'real question' is, in the words of pg is ...
'... Most of the groups applying have not stopped to ask: of all the things we could do, is this the one with the best chance of making money? ...' [0]
The article link is cactus. [1]
Reference
[0] pg, 'Why Smart People have bad ideas, A Familiar Problem'
At this point, I really couldn't back out if this startup even if I wanted to (and I have no desire to): I quit my job, spent a ton of money to move, and told everyone I know about my plans. As Dharmesh Shah of onstartups would say, I'm emotionally committed, which is more significant than my financial commitment (He has a good post about this at http://onstartups.com/home/tabid/3339/bid/1204/Startup-Founders-The-Involved-vs-The-Committed.aspx ).
As dfranke pointed out, we have more options than only accepting YC funding or not accepting. The real question is whether it makes more sense for us to keep going with money we have in Denver and find angel funding on our own, or move and take YC funding in a few months.