"Ever heard of Paul Graham?" I asked. "Nope" There's your answer. Although it's easy to forget it after hanging around here for a while, doing a startup is no

"Ever heard of Paul Graham?" I asked. "Nope" There's your answer. Although it's easy to forget it after hanging around here for a while, doing a startup is not intuitively obvious. If you don't have a role model you're not going to get far. Hand the guy a copy of Founders at Work and see if something clicks. If not, perhaps it was never meant to be. The other factor, of course, is that technical skill is only a part of what you need as a startup founder. You need some Jobs to go with your Woz. If this guy doesn't have the marketing spark, and he realizes that ("No ideas, I guess"), he's acting quite rationally. Maybe he'll choose a different path if and when he meets the right business person.