I have already asked them all those questions and more explaining that the evolution of the product should be guided by its usage/userbase and will almost certa

I have already asked them all those questions and more explaining that the evolution of the product should be guided by its usage/userbase and will almost certainly involve at least one complete/major rewrite (due to change of direction/platform) as it develops as it is hard/impossible to get it right straight away and their perception of what people want and what people actually do want may not be the same. I have also suggested the stack/path to follow in alignment with thier goals and which scales well yet allows rapid dev. but honestly think until they start building seriously they won't appreciate these issues. This advice has been from my own experiences and that of others, many of whom have failed as well as succeeded, but is contrary to what some consultant friends are saying. I am not an expert in building large scale web apps by any means, but have worked on enough to know good practice/paths from bad, atleast at the early stages. They do have software dev experience themselves (e.g. CEO, who is doing PhD at Oxford, has ~2yrs commercial software exp in electronics company) and have done some research into those areas (the MBA guy did most of it). Anyway Sumon I will try and get them to attend the talk on Tuesday and ask you/panel questions during the Q&A as I am sure talking to more people who are doing this will help them no end.