Amazon is selling Mixergy founder Andrew Warner's eBook Paul Graham: The Art of Funding a Startup for $5, which has left some Hacker News members wondering whether publisher Hyperink simply scraped the content from Warner's interview with Graham, the co-founder of accelerator Y Combinator.

However, Andrew says on HN that Paul is entirely aware of the eBook publication and points out that Hyperink, an eBook publisher, is a YC company (winter 2011 class).

"My site wasn't scraped. This is more than the interview," Andrew writes.

The eBook has 50+ sections including, "The Y Combinator Model," "In 3 Months: From Startup Idea To Product," "Startup People You'll Need: A Mentor & Co-Founder" and "Hacker News Community." Currently, the book is ranked at 155,451 on the bestseller list for paid eBooks in the Kindle Store, while the yet-to-be-released Steve Jobs biography is ranked ninth.

LAUNCH has contacted Andrew, Paul, Amazon and Hyperink, and will update if we receive a response.

Warner posted the interview, entitled, "How Y Combinator Helped 172 Startups Take Off -- With Paul Graham," in February 2010.

Andrew says that founders of companies like Hyperink are heroes for opening up more distribution platforms. Hyperink has published books including The Best Course On Elite Admissions, Build Like An Ant: How My Mom Helped Me Become Valedictorian and The Best Book On How to Barefoot Run.

"Till I'm old and unable to move, you should expect to see me experimenting with ways to get their stories out," Andrew writes. "If I knew how to draw comic books, you'd see my interviews in the comics section of amazon too."

CONTACTS & LINKS

Mixergy
Twitter: @mixergy
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Mixergy
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/company/mixergy

Andrew Warner, Mixergy founder
Twitter: @AndrewWarner
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewwarner
Google+: https://plus.google.com/107459724193454016289/posts

Paul Graham, Y Combinator Co-founder
Twitter: @paulg

Hyperink
Twitter: @hyperink http://twitter.com/#!/hyperink
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Hyperink

LAUNCH Blog