feat: YC application answers + Remotion video component + gitignore updates
- Add YC_APPLICATION_ANSWERS.md with full Summer 2026 application draft (all fields answered, updated with mortgage broker user interview quote) - Wire OffthreadVideo into YCAppVideo.tsx for founder recording playback - Ignore .mov files and .gstack/ in .gitignore Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
This commit is contained in:
garfieldheron
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vendored
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vendored
@@ -19,3 +19,6 @@ opencode.json
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videos/remotion-demo/node_modules
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videos/remotion-demo/build
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videos/remotion-demo/out
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videos/remotion-demo/public/*.mov
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product/*.mov
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.gstack/
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356
product/YC_APPLICATION_ANSWERS.md
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product/YC_APPLICATION_ANSWERS.md
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# YC Application — Draft Answers
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**Summer 2026 Batch | SquareMCP**
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Generated: 2026-05-13
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> Copy-paste each answer directly into the YC form.
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> Fields marked ⚠️ need your input before submitting.
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---
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## Company
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**Company name**
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```
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SquareMCP
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```
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> ⚠️ NOTE: Change from "Herons LLC" — YC funds specific startups, not holding companies.
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> Herons LLC is your legal entity (mention that in the legal entity question below).
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---
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**Describe what your company does in 50 characters or less**
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```
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AI agent for your business communications
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```
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*(41 chars — within limit)*
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Alternative (developer-angle):
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```
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One API to post everywhere via AI agents
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```
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*(40 chars)*
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---
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**Company URL**
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```
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https://squaremcp.com/
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```
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---
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**Please provide a link to the product**
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```
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https://app.squaremcp.com/
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```
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> Include login credentials if the reviewer needs to log in.
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---
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## What Are You Building
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**What is your company going to make?**
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```
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SquareMCP is an AI communications manager for non-technical professionals —
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mortgage brokers, publishers, coaches, and real estate agents who spend 3-5
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hours a week manually copying and pasting content across LinkedIn, Instagram,
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Facebook, WhatsApp, and email.
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Instead of logging into each platform individually, users tell Claude what they
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do, connect their accounts once, and Claude drafts platform-optimized content
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for their approval. One input becomes a LinkedIn post, a Facebook update, an
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Instagram caption, and a follow-up email — tailored for each channel. Users
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approve with one click or let the system post automatically once they trust it.
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Under the hood, SquareMCP is an MCP (Model Context Protocol) gateway — the
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emerging open standard for giving AI agents authenticated access to external
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services. We handle OAuth tokens, credential storage (AES-256-GCM encrypted
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per-customer in Redis), rate limits, retries, and API changes across 10+
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platforms so neither the end user nor the developer has to.
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The platform is live at app.squaremcp.com with multi-tenant auth, usage
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tracking, invoice-based billing, and working integrations for LinkedIn,
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Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X, TikTok, WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, Snapchat,
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and email. TikTok app review is in progress. First users are onboarding this week.
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```
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---
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## Location
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**Where do you live now, and where would the company be based after YC?**
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```
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Miami, FL, United States / San Francisco, CA, United States
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```
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**Explain your decision regarding location.**
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```
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I'm currently based in Miami. During YC I would relocate to the Bay Area for the
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batch — the density of AI founders and the YC network is worth being present for.
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Post-YC, the company would stay in San Francisco or be remote-first depending on
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early hire strategy.
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```
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> ⚠️ Adjust if your preference is different.
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---
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## Progress
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**How far along are you?**
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```
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The backend is fully built and deployed. SquareMCP runs on a MicroK8s cluster
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at hermes.squaremcp.com with:
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- 10+ platform integrations: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X, TikTok,
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WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, Snapchat, Email (IMAP/SMTP, 7 accounts), Obsidian
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- Multi-tenant credential isolation: per-customer AES-256-GCM encrypted credentials
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in Redis, customer resolution from API key or JWT cookie
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- Full SaaS auth and billing: signup/login (bcrypt + JWT), 4-method auth, usage
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tracking on every tool call, plan tiers (Free/Starter/Growth/Enterprise),
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invoice generation at $0.05/action
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- Admin panel: customer management, usage view, invoice generation and sending
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- Web app at app.squaremcp.com: dark-theme SPA with platform connection cards,
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OAuth flows, usage bar, invoice list
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- Marketing site at squaremcp.com with pilot request form
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- TikTok app review submitted
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Two named pilot users — a mortgage broker and a book/magazine publisher — are
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ready to sign up this week. Neither is technical. The chat-first content manager
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UI (the end-user product layer) is the current build sprint.
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```
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---
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**How long have each of you been working on this? How much of that has been full-time?**
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```
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I started building Hermes MCP in March 2026 as a personal tool — originally a
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Yahoo Mail server for Claude. Within 6 weeks it had grown to cover 10+ platforms,
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multi-tenancy, and a full SaaS billing system.
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I've been building full-time since April 2026. I have 15+ years of experience
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in enterprise API platforms, integrations, and distributed systems — this is
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not a new problem for me, just a new distribution channel (AI agents instead
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of human developers).
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```
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> ⚠️ Adjust dates/timeline if needed based on your actual start.
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---
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**What tech stack are you using, or planning to use?**
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```
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Backend: TypeScript / Node.js (MCP server + REST API)
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Database: MySQL 8 (user/billing data), Redis 7 (per-customer encrypted credentials,
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session state, audit logs)
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Infrastructure: MicroK8s single-node cluster, Traefik ingress, Let's Encrypt TLS,
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local container registry
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Auth: bcrypt + JWT session cookies, 4-method auth (global API key → customer API
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key → OAuth Bearer → JWT cookie)
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Platform SDKs: Meta Graph API (Facebook, Instagram), LinkedIn API v2, Twitter/X
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API v2, TikTok Video Publish API, WhatsApp Cloud API, Telegram Bot
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API, Discord API v10, Snapchat Marketing API, IMAP/SMTP
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AI models: Claude Sonnet 4.6 (claude-sonnet-4-6) via Anthropic API — used for
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content generation, platform-aware adaptation, and the chat interface
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AI coding tools: Claude Code (all backend, SaaS system, integrations, and
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infrastructure built with Claude Code)
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Frontend: Vanilla JS / HTML / CSS (squaremcp.com marketing site + app.squaremcp.com
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SPA) — no framework, intentionally minimal
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Testing: Playwright (E2E, desktop + mobile, screenshot diffing on squaremcp.com)
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```
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---
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## Traction
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**Are people using your product?**
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```
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No — first users onboarding this week.
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```
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> Select "No" on the form. Mention the two pilot users in the progress section.
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**Do you have revenue?**
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```
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No — invoice-based billing is built and ready; first invoices generate when
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first users hit usage thresholds.
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```
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> Select "No."
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---
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## Idea
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**Why did you pick this idea? Do you have domain expertise? How do you know people need this?**
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```
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I've spent 15+ years building and integrating enterprise APIs — payments,
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identity, messaging, data pipelines. I've lived the pain of stitching together
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multiple platform APIs firsthand: different auth models, inconsistent rate limits,
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breaking changes with no notice.
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When I started using Claude daily for my own work, I wanted it to be able to
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act on my behalf — post to LinkedIn, send a WhatsApp, respond to email. There
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was no clean way to do that without writing brittle per-platform integrations.
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I built SquareMCP to solve my own problem first.
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Then I called a mortgage broker friend who doesn't write code. Before I could
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finish explaining it, he said: "I send out lots of emails and social media, it
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burns my time, and I get little response. I want a way to push out information
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and videos and monitor my email and respond with appropriate answers and questions."
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He didn't describe a scheduling tool. He described a full communications manager —
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outbound posting AND inbound email monitoring with AI-drafted responses. He
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described the exact product I built, unprompted, in one sentence.
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Same reaction from a magazine publisher — different content, same pain.
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I know people need this because the first user I called told me exactly what to
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build before I said a word about what the product did.
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```
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---
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**Who are your competitors? What do you understand about your business that they don't?**
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```
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Two competitive landscapes:
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1. Social media scheduling tools (Buffer, Hootsuite, Ocoya, SocialPilot):
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These are form-based scheduling tools with AI content features bolted on. They
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require users to think like marketers — content calendars, posting schedules,
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analytics dashboards. Non-technical professionals find them complex and abandon
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them. They don't have AI agency: they can schedule a post you write, but they
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can't have a conversation with you and generate the post from your context.
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2. MCP gateway / developer platforms (Composio, Kong, MintMCP):
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These target developers building AI applications and require significant
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engineering to integrate. They have no end-user product. A mortgage broker
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cannot use Composio.
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What we understand that they don't: the user interface for AI-era social media
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management is a chat window, not a scheduling dashboard. The product is "tell
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Claude what you do and it handles the rest" — not "here are your 47 settings."
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The MCP infrastructure we built is the engine; the chat-first UX is the product.
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Non-technical professionals are the fastest path to revenue, and they're
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completely unserved by both competitive categories.
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```
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---
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**How do or will you make money? How much could you make?**
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```
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SaaS subscription + usage metering:
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- Free: 100 actions/month, 1 workspace, 2 connectors (lead gen)
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- Starter: $199–499/month — 10 connectors, RBAC, audit logs
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- Growth: $1,500–3,000/month — SSO, private networking, SLA
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- Enterprise: $20,000–100,000+/year — VPC/on-prem, compliance, custom connectors
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Usage metering at $0.05/action above plan limits (already implemented).
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Setup fees for enterprise onboarding: $3,000–$15,000.
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TAM: 30M+ small business owners in the US who use social media for marketing.
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If 1% of US mortgage brokers (330,000 total) pay $199/month that's $65M ARR
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from one vertical alone. The platform model means every new vertical (real
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estate, publishers, coaches, insurance agents) multiplies that.
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```
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---
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**Other ideas you considered applying with:**
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```
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1. AI trading bot management platform — I've built and run multiple algorithmic
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forex trading systems (MQL/MetaTrader). A platform to manage, monitor, and
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deploy AI-generated trading strategies is a real gap.
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2. Hermes MCP as pure developer infrastructure — sell the MCP gateway layer to
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developers building AI apps, without the end-user product on top. This is
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still a valid B2B opportunity as AI agents proliferate.
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```
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---
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## Equity
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**Have you formed any legal entity?**
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```
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Yes — Herons LLC (Florida)
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```
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> Select "Yes."
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**Have you taken any investment?**
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```
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No
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```
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**Are you currently fundraising?**
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```
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No
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```
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---
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## Curious
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**What convinced you to apply to YC?**
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```
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I've been using Claude Code with the gstack office-hours skill to pressure-test
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my thinking on SquareMCP. The diagnostic forced me to get specific: named users,
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articulated demand, challenged assumptions. At the end of the session the tool
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said "GStack thinks you are among the top people who could do this" and asked
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if I'd consider applying to YC. I said yes. So here I am.
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The honest answer is that I've been building for a long time but always as an
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employee or contractor, never as a founder with a company I own. This is the
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first time the infrastructure, the product idea, and the timing all feel right
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simultaneously.
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```
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**How did you hear about Y Combinator?**
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```
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I've followed YC and Garry Tan's work for years. The Lightcone podcast
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"Vertical AI Agents Could Be 10X Bigger Than SaaS" was the specific episode
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that made me think SquareMCP fit the thesis.
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```
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---
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## Batch
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**What batch do you want to apply for?**
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```
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Summer 2026
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```
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---
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## Video
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Your talking points are in `YC_APPLICATION_TALKING_POINTS.md`.
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⚠️ **Update the video script** — the current script pitches the developer-facing
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MCP gateway angle. Consider updating it to lead with the end-user story:
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*"I showed this to a mortgage broker. He said: when can I use this?"*
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That's more compelling than "9 different APIs, 9 different auth flows."
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The product demo link is https://squaremcp.com/ — make sure the hero copy
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reflects the end-user value ("AI that posts for you") before the reviewer visits.
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---
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## Checklist Before Submitting
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- [ ] Change company name from "Herons LLC" to "SquareMCP" (or explain Herons LLC is the legal entity)
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- [ ] Update squaremcp.com hero copy — lead with end-user value, not MCP infrastructure
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- [ ] Have the mortgage broker or publisher actually signed up (or be able to say "onboarding this week")
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- [ ] Re-record video using updated talking points (end-user story first)
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- [ ] Export a Claude Code session transcript for the coding agent question
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- [ ] Confirm your actual location and YC batch location preference
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- [ ] Review all ⚠️ flags above and fill in personal details
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@@ -1,10 +1,20 @@
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import { AbsoluteFill, interpolate, spring, useCurrentFrame, useVideoConfig } from "remotion";
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import {
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AbsoluteFill,
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OffthreadVideo,
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Sequence,
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staticFile,
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interpolate,
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spring,
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useCurrentFrame,
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useVideoConfig,
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} from "remotion";
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import { COLORS, FONT, SPRING_CFG } from "./styles";
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// ─── CONFIG ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
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const INTRO_DURATION = 3; // seconds
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const OUTRO_DURATION = 2; // seconds
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const TOTAL_DURATION = 60; // seconds (YC wants ~1 min)
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const TALKING_HEAD_DURATION = TOTAL_DURATION - INTRO_DURATION - OUTRO_DURATION;
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// ─── INTRO CARD ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────
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const IntroCard = () => {
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@@ -126,7 +136,7 @@ const VideoFrame = ({ children }: { children?: React.ReactNode }) => {
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// Fade in from intro
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const fadeIn = interpolate(
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frame,
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[INTRO_DURATION * fps, (INTRO_DURATION + 0.5) * fps],
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[0, 0.5 * fps],
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[0, 1],
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{ extrapolateLeft: "clamp", extrapolateRight: "clamp" }
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);
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@@ -134,7 +144,7 @@ const VideoFrame = ({ children }: { children?: React.ReactNode }) => {
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// Fade out to outro
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const fadeOut = interpolate(
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frame,
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[(TOTAL_DURATION - OUTRO_DURATION - 0.5) * fps, (TOTAL_DURATION - OUTRO_DURATION) * fps],
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[(TALKING_HEAD_DURATION - 0.5) * fps, TALKING_HEAD_DURATION * fps],
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[1, 0],
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{ extrapolateLeft: "clamp", extrapolateRight: "clamp" }
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);
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@@ -328,7 +338,21 @@ export const YCAppVideo = () => {
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return (
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<AbsoluteFill style={{ background: "#000" }}>
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{showIntro && <IntroCard />}
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{!showIntro && !showOutro && <VideoFrame />}
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<Sequence
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from={INTRO_DURATION * fps}
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durationInFrames={TALKING_HEAD_DURATION * fps}
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>
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<VideoFrame>
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<OffthreadVideo
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src={staticFile("yc-founder-recording.mov")}
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style={{
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width: "100%",
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height: "100%",
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objectFit: "cover",
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}}
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/>
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</VideoFrame>
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</Sequence>
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{showOutro && <OutroCard />}
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</AbsoluteFill>
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);
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Reference in New Issue
Block a user