Editing Paul Graham (programmer) (section)

==Career==
In 1996, Graham and [[Robert Tappan Morris|Robert Morris]] founded [[Viaweb]] and recruited [[Trevor Blackwell]] shortly after. They believed that Viaweb was the first [[application service provider]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Graham |first1=Paul |title=Was Viaweb First? |url=http://www.paulgraham.com/first.html?viewfullsite=1 |access-date=19 February 2023}}</ref> Graham received a patent for webapps based on his work at Viaweb.<ref>{{Cite web |title=US Patent for Method for client-server communications through a minimal interface Patent (Patent # 6,205,469 issued March 20, 2001) - Justia Patents Search |url=https://patents.justia.com/patent/6205469 |access-date=2024-02-15 |website=patents.justia.com}}</ref> Viaweb's software, written mostly in [[Common Lisp]], allowed users to make their own [[Internet store]]s. In the summer of 1998, after [[Jerry Yang]] received a strong recommendation from [[Ali Partovi]],<ref>{{Cite book|last=Jessica.|first=Livingston|url=http://worldcat.org/oclc/705381923|title=Founders at work : stories of startups' early days|date=2010|publisher=Apress|isbn=978-1-4302-1078-8|oclc=705381923}}</ref> Viaweb was sold to [[Yahoo!]] for 455,000 shares of Yahoo! stock, valued at $49.6 million.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://docs.yahoo.com/docs/pr/release184.html |title=Yahoo! to Acquire Viaweb |publisher=Yahoo! Inc |date=8 June 1998 |access-date=14 April 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070701083734/http://docs.yahoo.com/docs/pr/release184.html |archive-date=1 July 2007}}</ref> After the acquisition, the product became [[Yahoo! Store]].

Graham later gained notice for his essays, which he posts on his personal website. Essay subjects range from "Beating the Averages",<ref>{{cite web |last=Graham |first=Paul |url=http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html |title=Beating the Averages |website=Paulgraham.com}}</ref> which compares Lisp to other [[programming language]]s and introduced the hypothetical programming language ''Blub'', to "Why Nerds are Unpopular",<ref>{{cite web |last=Graham |first=Paul |url=http://paulgraham.com/nerds.html |title=Why Nerds are Unpopular |website=Paulgraham.com}}</ref> a discussion of [[nerd]] life in high school. A collection of his essays has been published as ''[[Hackers & Painters]]''<ref name="hackersandpainters"/> by [[O'Reilly Media]], which includes a discussion of the growth of Viaweb and the advantages of Lisp to program it.

In 2001, Graham announced that he was working on a new [[Dialect (computing)|dialect]] of Lisp named [[Arc (programming language)|Arc]]. It was released on 29 January 2008.<ref>{{cite web |last=Graham |first=Paul |url=http://paulgraham.com/arc0.html |title=Arc's Out |date=29 January 2008 |website=Paulgraham.com |access-date=2020-04-09}}</ref> Over the years since, he has written several essays describing features or goals of the language, and some internal projects at Y Combinator have been written in Arc, including the Hacker News web forum and news aggregator program.

In 2005, after giving a talk at the Harvard Computer Society later published as "How to Start a Startup", Graham along with [[Trevor Blackwell]], [[Jessica Livingston]], and [[Robert Tappan Morris|Robert Morris]] started [[Y Combinator]] to provide [[seed funding]] to [[Startup company|startups]], particularly those started by younger, more technically oriented founders. Y Combinator has invested in more than 1300 startups, including [[Reddit]], [[Twitch (service)|Twitch]] (formerly [[Justin.tv]]), [[Xobni]], [[Dropbox (service)|Dropbox]], [[Airbnb]], and [[Stripe (company)|Stripe]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://ycuniverse.com/ycombinator-companies |title=Y Combinator Companies |website=Y Combinator Universe |date=April 2020 |access-date=9 April 2020}}</ref>

''[[BusinessWeek]]'' included Paul Graham in the 2008 edition of its annual feature, ''The 25 Most Influential People on the Web''.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://images.businessweek.com/ss/08/09/0929_most_influential/7.htm |title=The Papa Bear: Paul Graham |website=Bloomberg BusinessWeek |date=29 September 2008 |access-date=29 September 2008 |archive-date=24 April 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120424120241/http://images.businessweek.com/ss/08/09/0929_most_influential/7.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref>

In response to the proposed [[Stop Online Piracy Act]] (SOPA), Graham announced in late 2011 that no representatives of any company supporting it would be invited to Y Combinator's Demo Day events.<ref name="Demo Day SOPA cutoff">{{cite news |last=Tsotsis |first=Alexia |title=Paul Graham: SOPA Supporting Companies No Longer Allowed at YC Demo Day |url=https://techcrunch.com/2011/12/22/paul-graham-sopa-supporting-companies-no-longer-allowed-at-yc-demo-day/ |website=[[TechCrunch]] |date=22 December 2011 |access-date=23 December 2011}}</ref>

In February 2014, Graham stepped down from his day-to-day role at Y Combinator.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2014-02-21 |title=Paul Graham Steps Down as President of Y Combinator |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna54471815 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210308030616/https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna54471815 |url-status=dead |archive-date=8 March 2021 |access-date=2024-02-15 |website=NBC News |language=en}}</ref>

In October 2019, Graham announced a [[Technical specification|specification]] for another new dialect of Lisp, written in itself, named Bel.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Bel|url=http://www.paulgraham.com/bel.html|access-date=2021-09-26|website=paulgraham.com|first=Paul|last=Graham|year=2019}}</ref>