"...but I'm working in an area where domain knowledge is extremely important..." If you had a design/marketing/seo cofounder that was willing to hunt for sales

"...but I'm working in an area where domain knowledge is extremely important..." If you had a design/marketing/seo cofounder that was willing to hunt for sales/bizdev opportunities, domain knowledge for that person doesn't have to be THAT deep and would bring huge benefits. "The vision behind tarsnap, from 2.5 years ago -- an online snapshotted backup service with a tar front-end, a heavy emphasis on security, and a linear pricing model -- hasn't changed at all." Is that a good thing, do you think? I'm not saying it isn't, but I think founders who don't experiment/explore generally succeed more than those that don't. (See the 17 out of 26 stat here) http://www.unionsquareventures.com/2007/11/why_early_stage.html http://www.unionsquareventures.com/2007/11/why_early_stage.h... I think your rule #0 is dead on-- there are lots of exceptions and there's no formula. But I'm pretty convinced that your startup would be more successful if you hadn't broken the "rules" that you did.