And to account for the maximum, which is 51, or 17 additional years on the right side, we must really drop the left-hand total by 17 to maintain the same mean... and we cannot... The best we can do is to give everybody younger than 34 the minimum age, which still leaves 9 years unaccounted for, making the average 28.7...
One cannot make the numbers below the stated median (34) any lower (because the minimum age was 21), and any change to the numbers above the median will only increase the mean, since the numbers on the right are as low as can be. Another alternative is to increase or decrease the number of successful applicants from 26 to something greater, like 30 or 35. However, that would still leave a lot of 21 and 22 year olds, and almost no 23-33 year olds, which does not appear to be likely. Therefore, the numbers don't make sense. In other words, the only way these statistics make sense is if TechStars consisted entirely of students that are right out of college and thirty-four and thirty-five year olds.
I consider this great news, it gives me hope (I'm 42). I'm not buying the received wisdom that says that only very young entrepreneurs found tech startups.
Consider who's setting the tone of the conversation - people with money who want a return on their money. Older folks are not as eager to work for less so they don't make a good investment. Doesn't make them bad businessmen tho. :-)
I think you can found a company at any age. Just go do it. But you're not gonna create a game-changing company if you're past a certain. Old people simply aren't able to see the world correctly anymore. I have yet to see a single person over 30 write anything intelligent about Facebook. I don't really feel bad for you older people. You had your shot - heck, you had the best chance ever with the dotcom boom. Completely talentless individuals were building garbage products and making big bucks. The bar is much higher now than it was back then.
For the record, I had absolutely nothing to do with the dot-com bomb; at that time I was working in the trenches doing sysadmin work for a company that still exists today.
He seems to have likely switched the mean and median, so the median may actually be 28.3. It's interesting to see the numbers, but the given statistics don't seem to quite make sense.
Min: 21 Avg: 28.3 Median: 34
21 21 21 22 22 23 34 34 34 34 34 34 34
When you consider that there are about 26 people selected (ten teams times three people each, or about 30), we can simply double the above:
21 21 21 21 21 21 22 22 22 22 23 23 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34
And to account for the maximum, which is 51, or 17 additional years on the right side, we must really drop the left-hand total by 17 to maintain the same mean... and we cannot... The best we can do is to give everybody younger than 34 the minimum age, which still leaves 9 years unaccounted for, making the average 28.7...
21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 34 51.
One cannot make the numbers below the stated median (34) any lower (because the minimum age was 21), and any change to the numbers above the median will only increase the mean, since the numbers on the right are as low as can be. Another alternative is to increase or decrease the number of successful applicants from 26 to something greater, like 30 or 35. However, that would still leave a lot of 21 and 22 year olds, and almost no 23-33 year olds, which does not appear to be likely. Therefore, the numbers don't make sense. In other words, the only way these statistics make sense is if TechStars consisted entirely of students that are right out of college and thirty-four and thirty-five year olds.