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My friends outside of work aren't really technical, nor do they have any interest in startups. I've tried a handful of those founder dating sites, gone to meet

My friends outside of work aren't really technical, nor do they have any interest in startups. I've tried a handful of those founder dating sites, gone to meetups, user groups, met for coffee/beers, and even travelled to meet up with other like minded folks and try to get a feel about who would be a good fit. With the importance of getting the cofounder right, I almost always left feeling like it was too much of a leap to take with someone I just met from some website or meetup. But when I look at my own friends, there aren't any of them I would conceivably work on something significant with. Maybe I need to find some new friends, or maybe its a volume game.

yr1337 7y ago
I'm in the same boat as you except I haven't started this dating game yet. I know no one in my (admittedly small) network of friends and acquaintances, who is willing to drop everything and create a startup with me. I'm not in the SV so that doesn't help. I'm trying to come up with a strategy including meetups. But how likely is it that single founders going to these meetings with an idea of their own, are going to give up on it and join someone else? And if someone is going to these meetings without a strongly held idea, then what does that tell me about their intention (free ride?). The only way I can see this working is if 2 founders meet that have an idea so close that they can see merging them. How likely is that considering constraints of time and location... I'm starting to find that the hardest part of my startup is going to be the people factor, which I will say is my biggest weakness. I guess it's good that I'm aware of it at least.
- lam 7y ago
  To find cofounders, may I suggest that you add in your profile your interests and some ways to reach out to you (e.g., email)?
danenania 7y ago
If you're technical, I think anything where you actually get to work on projects with people is going to have a lot more potential than just talking. So hackathons, open source, and other things in that vein. The difficulty here is given you find another technical co-founder, at least one of you needs to be willing to jump hard into sales, marketing, and administrative stuff. But assuming you have that, two strong devs who enjoy working together can make for a formidable team, and it doesn't really take that big of a project to know whether you like working with someone.

yr1337 7y ago

I'm in the same boat as you except I haven't started this dating game yet. I know no one in my (admittedly small) network of friends and acquaintances, who is willing to drop everything and create a startup with me. I'm not in the SV so that doesn't help. I'm trying to come up with a strategy including meetups. But how likely is it that single founders going to these meetings with an idea of their own, are going to give up on it and join someone else? And if someone is going to these meetings without a strongly held idea, then what does that tell me about their intention (free ride?). The only way I can see this working is if 2 founders meet that have an idea so close that they can see merging them. How likely is that considering constraints of time and location... I'm starting to find that the hardest part of my startup is going to be the people factor, which I will say is my biggest weakness. I guess it's good that I'm aware of it at least.

lam 7y ago
To find cofounders, may I suggest that you add in your profile your interests and some ways to reach out to you (e.g., email)?

danenania 7y ago

If you're technical, I think anything where you actually get to work on projects with people is going to have a lot more potential than just talking. So hackathons, open source, and other things in that vein. The difficulty here is given you find another technical co-founder, at least one of you needs to be willing to jump hard into sales, marketing, and administrative stuff. But assuming you have that, two strong devs who enjoy working together can make for a formidable team, and it doesn't really take that big of a project to know whether you like working with someone.