JimWillTri

I was in your position financially and career-wise - just hated what I was doing. Gave a little thought to coding but decided I had plenty of money to just hire people to complete the project. Went to every dev firm in the US who I thought had the skills. Most quoted around $25k - which would be great but I dint believe they could do it.

Instead went to a firm in SV that wanted $54k. They had worked on a large prior project so I thought they could get it done. They couldn't even get the first milestone complete after giving then two times the allotted time. Fired them.

Finally found my own people and launched 5 months ago and going great. I would suggest finding some good people on HN.

It would be nice to see the HN members step forward and substantiate this - no need to give away your idea.

I got pulled into a similar situation when I had a how it works video produced on Odesk. Learned real fast that you have to make them meet the milestones in a timely manner and not to pay anything up-front on a fixed price job.

Whether its Freelancer or Odesk, you will almost always get burned a little on your first job. Number one rule is never pay anything up front on a fixed priced job. I do think that Odesk handles feedback in a better way. The buyer should have been able to give negative feedback to the provider.

Spam really doesnt bother me that much. My co-founder also received an unsolicited email too. We both clicked unsubscribe on each of ours and both received the same original email about 15 minutes later.

They sent me, a non-customer, an email too.

You guys definitely gave it a good run. What are your plans now?

If you can get someone to pay you $10 for an application you may or may not build in a year then you are either a hell of a salesman or you found someone truly gullible.

It's a good thing I always used alias' with Facebook.

Not sure why you would use Dwolla to pay state taxes. Most states allow ACH transfers.

This happens all the time with devs I hire whether in the US or outsourced (the outsourcers outsource too). We started requiring web cams and IP log ins.

Thanks, I did see that site. I was looking for something that would allow involved interaction for testing/using rather than aesthetics.

How about the possibility that every batch of new admissions is a learning experience. No one has all the answers to what makes a great startup. You live and learn every day.