300 karma · joined February 10, 2011
The quality of startups sucks and I'm not sure I can agree there were a lot of press there BUT to be fair, this is not an area I can really comment on since I wasn't paying attention to this are much (regarding press).
Most of the people in the demo area didn't really have anyone else to talk to except other startups that were there. It was dead. And while I have nothing against Launch personally, I'd probably never attend again if this is how it'd always end up. BUT to be fair to Jason and Launch, it is their first "Launch" event so I'm hoping this will vastly improve.
That said, just because adding something makes the product better, does NOT mean it always make sense. There was a story about another company who, because of customer feedback, ended up building a bunch of features into one of their products. Turns out, only a small minority of their userbase even cared to use those features and that the mass majority were fine with the features that were already there. In hindsight, they said it was wasted time and resources and really didn't add much to the bottom line.
Also, rather than believe what you're doing is "better" or an "improvement", things should be split tested and verified as to whether you should spend time and resources. While I don't disagree that you can do more with any given product, the question you really should be asking is are you wasting your own time and that of your employers with these things you want to improve or add. Remember, opinions don't mean shit. Hard data does.
2. A lot of times, for higher level positions, it'll catch on fast and it's not uncommon for people to be let go.
3. As to whether or not you should let the company no, this part is tricky. The right thing to do is obviously tell the company whether or not she could perform the tasks. The problem though is it may ruin your relationship. It would have been better to prevent it from happening but what's done is done.
In reality it's not really your place to interfere but you're going to have to make a judgement call on whether or not you want to step in on this.
2. He thinks wrong. A good business cofounder, even if he doesn't know something, would strive to figure it out and get things moving. Not wait till you should have something to do.
3. You should do this part asap. You'll regret it later if things go sour. Look up vesting if you're not sure what that is.
1. No one wants to partners with a guy that can't code and hope he can learn to become a technical cofounder from scratch. Typically speaking, you find someone with coding chops. The same is true of business cofounders BUT unfortunately most idiots don't realize they don't have the business knowledge needed to be a good business cofounder.
2. Your cofounder should NOT be waiting around for the product to finish to do his part. There is a SHIT TON of stuff a business cofounder can do while waiting for the prototype to finish. In my honest opinion, if he doesn't know what to do, he should be hauling ass to figure this out or he's not pulling his weight. I'd argue that in the long haul, while the technical guy mostly codes and do some of the other stuff, the business guy got a lot on his plate. If he sucks now, he'll do even worse as time progresses.
3. I hope to god you guys formed a business, have vesting in place, and so that if things don't work out, you're not going to run into more issues than necessary to make this separate clean. And no, just because you guys agree to separate on good terms does not make it clean. There is a process for this.
3. Most offer just salary and possibly equity. It's common until the company grows bigger.
2. If the above is true, I would highly recommend against using services such as LegalZoom. Nothing against them, but to get stocks issued, all the paperwork done correctly, bylaws written, etc etc etc... Is not something I would rely on LegalZoom to get done. You need a proper attorney for that. Again, depends on what exactly he's trying to do.
2. Risk depends on the individual. You have to access the company, the vision, any funding they've received, etc... among several other factors, and determine whether or not this is a fit for you.
3. To answer this part, why part of a startup if you just want a perm job?
Also merchant accounts often have a separate gateway but some banks own their own gateways which saves you money on top of the rates you negotiates. Factor this into the equation when you're shopping around.
Rather, it just makes it easier to see the average time people spend building something and getting it to market instead. The data may not be very useful to others but it gives me a good understanding of what I'm looking for.