Confessions of a solo founder | Hacker News Reader

Confessions of a solo founder

cleverkoala.com

72 pointsconesus33 comments

First they tell you it can't be done, then they laugh at you, then it is a nice little hobby project, then you might be able to go full-time but so what you couldn't pay rent in San Francisco, then $100k isn't really that much anyway, then you're the exception that proves the rule.

Gandhi: First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

2 months is not that long dude. I am a single founder and have been going hard for over 3 years. The key to it IMHO is to really love what you are doing so much that it does not seem like work. I dont launch either. Just iterate. See article: http://www.marketing.fm/2009/11/17/never-launch-just-iterate...

Out of interest, full-time or part-time? And what's your startup (couldn't find it in your about page)?

All were fulltime

NetWinner - started as 1 grew to 15 (2 yrs)

Social Ad Manager (appox 1yr) currently Ramen Profitable.

Local Strange (Launching in Nov.)

Awesome dude. I've been going full-time for 2 years on my startups as a single founder: 2 failed, the 3rd one I've now got a co-founder.

Good to hear that there's others out there who never give in.

Thanks to everyone giving me the "Just 2 months? That's nothing" comments.

I don't mean that facetiously. It's actually pretty inspiring that you guys made it through that honeymoon phase and into something real. Hopefully this venture will be around a year from now, and I'll be able to dish out the same kind of inspiration.

Nice post, but 2 months?? Try 2 years! Try 60 hour coding sessions! Try getting your first paying customer! Then we can talk!

I agree. 2 months is a vacation. I've been solo for 27 months (i do have a team though).

My confession? Get a great co-founder/partner, and do more hard time.

What do you mean by "hard time"? Thanks.

So, are you trying to be unhelpful, or...?

This guy had the guts to do what people dream of. And you're here admonishing him for writing about it?

I actually liked his post. It just sounded a bit over the top the way he described his commitment, when he wrote he had been at it for 2 months. But I admit my (and others) reply was a little bit self gloating.

Solo founder here as well. I think the biggest problem is scope creep when there are no other opinions. My solution to this is making sure most features are responses to clients paying for said feature.

But the best part is that you do not need to compromise on your technical decisions. And if you do make a mistake, you can back out of it with a limited amount of fanfare/humiliation.

Also, since we're tech guys we really need a Steve Ballmer (or Alexis Ohanian) to handle the non-technical stuff so we can code in a bubble. They don't need to be founders, or equity partners, but should have a large role.

Oh yeah, and 2 months really is nothing :).

While I appreciate the shoutout (thanks), did you have to put my name next to Ballmer? ;) le sigh.

Going solo is terribly hard. The worst part is that you don't know how much you're missing by not having a co-founder until you've seen what great collaboration is like (spoiler: it is really good).

Of all the great things to get out of doing Y Combinator three years ago, the best by a mile was teaming up with Sascha to work on BaseShield. We ended up shelving that product but it's incredible to look at BaseShield and now Ninite and realize how completely they were shaped and improved by our collaboration.

I'm not talking about the set-theory union of our ideas, it's more like a tug-of-war as we'd shape the concepts and features underlying our work. Ideas always improved through this process, often radically. This was especially true for core questions like what does it do, how does it work, and what will users see.

Briefly, if it seems OK to work alone I'd say it's because you don't know what you're missing.

The search for a co-founder has been on as a serious milestone for the last month. Solo is something I chose when I started because I didn't have a co, and didn't want to let that be a blocking issue. I'm fully aware what a great co could do for my biz.

If anybody knows of a rockstar Python dev in NYC, let me know.

I apologize in advance if it's spam, but I'm putting together two co-founders meetup in the coming weeks:

Silicon Valley on Nov 2nd: http://www.meetup.com/Co-Founders-Wanted-Meetup/calendar/148...

Austin on Dec 6th: http://www.meetup.com/Co-Founders-Austin/calendar/15251144/

If your city is not listed, you know what to do :-)

There's no reason you can't have great collaboration with close friends or mentors without giving away 55% of your company. I know the rebuttal will be "but the collaboration is more intimate and thorough, and the other person cares"....well, I bet you 10 people's opinion you trust is as valuable as a co-founder's.

5 years as a solo founder here. Would I do it again? Maybe, but definitely differently. What I do know is that coming out of the other side that there's very little in a small business I can't do.

I'm certainly prepared for my next project, whatever it may be. Keep it up, and best of luck.

my advice: dont be a solo founder. chances are that you get totally sucked into your idea without realizing that you're project is going to fail. if you're doing all the work yourself, make sure you release early and dont fail too hard (the longer you wait with the launch the harder the 'waking up' will be). if you got a cofounder chances are a lot higher that you might be building something substantial.

but kudos to you for sticking to your project, it takes a lot of dedication and that's ultimately what makes an entrepreneur.

How strange that people seems to accept an author writing a book for 10 years, or a screenwriter writing a movie for 5 years, yet when a web developer tries to make a simple web app people go "NO! you have to be in a team! It's TOO HARD!"

I was once trying hard to be a screenwriter, and we in the writing community never accepted any such thing. If someone is putting 10 years into their novel, or 5 years into their screenplay, that is cause for suspicion. The bars of Hollywood are awash with people who tinker with the same pet idea for years and never submit to the public. Writers form writers' groups and seek managers for the same reason founders seek cofounders: to keep themselves from strolling down an interesting but ultimately profitless rabbit hole. Writers have their own version of "artists ship". Writers publish.

Getting external feedback is not the same thing as having a co-founder. I would hope that any solo founder is still talking with people about his or her project.

Those are not good examples, since an author or screenwriter will have people at the end who can help make it work. An editor/publisher or director/actors are essential. A good screenplay could still result in a crappy movie in the end.

(I do believe that a good developer who can code, has people skills, good style, etc. can do it alone.)

I see your point but single founders aren't completely alone either. I think of hosting my Ruby app on Heroku and letting them do sysadmin, leveraging awesome open source code to get to a product faster, and having great advisors as my equivalents of having an agent, an editor, or a publisher.

I agree 2 months is nothing...you haven't even launched yet. The hardest part is still ahead of you...struggling to get users, 1 person at a time

I've been on mine for almost 3 years, pulling in 40 hours a week on top of a full time job. I haven't launched (I will in a few months), but I've built up a base of 1000 users, all through sweat and blood. It's hard, it has it's up and downs, but it's a thrilling ride no matter how it plays out.

hey mike,

i'm also a solo founder in hoboken (sorry i creeped your resume). nice post. hit me up if you ever want to do a knowledge share or something.

That sounds good man. Drop me an email.

Wow, got mini-digged for a few minutes there. Damn shared hosting...

2 months is nothing. Try a year or two.

I'd agree entirely on that sentiment. Just in the last month alone I can feel a lot changing in my mind regarding the whole thing.

I have a feeling that as it becomes more all-consuming that roller-coaster is going to come to bear in a stronger way. Once your ego becomes tied to the success of your venture, small fluctuations can have powerful mental impacts.

Yup I agree. I'm 1.5 years in to mine and I've had some amazing times, and also stayed up late fixing stuff I broke many more times than I wanted to or trying to meet some over-ambitious goal I had. The first time I added an extra server I screwed up quite badly so nobody could sign in (and stats weren't updating even if they could). And my biggest user emailed me to ask why it was so bad.

2 months is like a shiney new relationship - you're totally absorbed in each other and you're that couple that "never fights".... but you're going to.

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