The accelerator paradox

I've been following YC content for months. The message is consistent: Move fast. Ship your MVP. Talk to users. Iterate quickly. Don't overthink. Don't overbuild.

Then I started seeing people share their interview experiences on TikTok and Twitter. One question kept coming up: "How hard is this to copy?"

I stopped. Wait—these two things go completely against each other.

The MVP advice says: Get something people can use right away, in its minimal form. Ship fast.

But the interview question asks: Is this defensible? Hard to copy?

I'm sitting here trying to figure out how you do both. Build something minimal in weeks with a tiny team, but make it hard to copy? By definition, if it's truly minimal and fast, it's copyable. That's what makes it minimal.

Nobody seems to talk about this contradiction openly. The public advice says one thing. The private evaluation criteria says another.

I can't unsee it now.