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Similar position, but here's the thing: How long have the founders known one another and how did you meet? Have any of the founders not met in person? I t

Similar position, but here's the thing: How long have the founders known one another and how did you meet? Have any of the founders not met in person? I think "cofounder" is in the same zone as "wife" in terms of trust required. Would someone with experience in the area comment on the merits of "marriages of convenience" in the cofounding of startups? When I asked jl at startupschool where most people met their cofounders, she said friends at school.

staticshock 18y ago
yeah, don't take me to say, "let's join forces." i meant to say, "let's talk." no commitment, no guarantees, no certain outcomes. but, based on the fact that we're all here, i hope we just might have enough in common to make something interesting happen. (raise your hand if you don't like it when interesting things happen.)
SwellJoe 18y ago
I think "cofounder" is in the same zone as "wife" in terms of trust required. Now would be the time to start building the relationship for the next funding cycle. It'll give you time to try out working together and build a prototype to show off. Maybe you'll click immediately, and maybe you'll have a kickass weekend of coding together (remotely together is fine, too...Open Source projects often exist for years with the developers never meeting in person--my co-founder and I had worked together for about five years before meeting) and produce some sort of prototype. Sometimes things Just Work. Would someone with experience in the area comment on the merits of "marriages of convenience" in the cofounding of startups? It's happened, but nobody is going to recommend you start a business with a total stranger. But, if the choice is "start working with a stranger today to find out if we click as a team, or wait indefinitely until I know someone well enough to start a company with them" the answer is, obviously, try working together. If it works, great! If it doesn't, you're out a couple of months, and you've found out that this person isn't right for you. Make sure you establish some ground rules when code begins showing up, so you can divide or give up on the spoils and move on without animosity, but otherwise, digging in and working is the only way to know if you'll work well with someone. You'll never know until you try, and if you can build a working demo and get along great, having a "wrong" answer to that one question will not prevent you from getting into YC.

staticshock 18y ago

yeah, don't take me to say, "let's join forces." i meant to say, "let's talk." no commitment, no guarantees, no certain outcomes. but, based on the fact that we're all here, i hope we just might have enough in common to make something interesting happen. (raise your hand if you don't like it when interesting things happen.)

SwellJoe 18y ago

I think "cofounder" is in the same zone as "wife" in terms of trust required. Now would be the time to start building the relationship for the next funding cycle. It'll give you time to try out working together and build a prototype to show off. Maybe you'll click immediately, and maybe you'll have a kickass weekend of coding together (remotely together is fine, too...Open Source projects often exist for years with the developers never meeting in person--my co-founder and I had worked together for about five years before meeting) and produce some sort of prototype. Sometimes things Just Work. Would someone with experience in the area comment on the merits of "marriages of convenience" in the cofounding of startups? It's happened, but nobody is going to recommend you start a business with a total stranger. But, if the choice is "start working with a stranger today to find out if we click as a team, or wait indefinitely until I know someone well enough to start a company with them" the answer is, obviously, try working together. If it works, great! If it doesn't, you're out a couple of months, and you've found out that this person isn't right for you. Make sure you establish some ground rules when code begins showing up, so you can divide or give up on the spoils and move on without animosity, but otherwise, digging in and working is the only way to know if you'll work well with someone. You'll never know until you try, and if you can build a working demo and get along great, having a "wrong" answer to that one question will not prevent you from getting into YC.