Gabor is looking for a technical cofounder | Hacker News Reader

Gabor is looking for a technical cofounder

gaborcselle.com

56 pointsimmad20 comments

Gabor, it would be helpful if you could outline what stack/technologies you have in mind for hacking to give people a better idea of their suitability.

bk -

This is mostly up for discussion with my cofounder. I'm currently looking at implementing a large part in Python. I have some UI ideas for which I've been looking to use Silverlight or Flex.

But overall, I'm open to suggestions and would like to work with someone for whom learning a new language or framework is not a hurdle.

Gabor

Thanks, Gabor. I think the email field is huge and it baffles me how many people can't see it. But when they eventually see a better way of dealing with it, they'll be blown away.

I have a whole UI prototype on the shelf that I can't implement currently due to my life circumstances (living in Germany instead of the US/valley, and other projects I have committed to).

I would bet money on that we have very similar visions for what problems to solve. Anyway, best of luck, I might join the email party in 6-9 months depending on how my other projects go.

I'm glad to see someone who "gets it" (based on your papers and posts so far) take on email.

Cheers. Ben.

Quick point, he's looking for a co-founder rather than an employee - which means that if (Gabor really means it) you'll have both the freedom and burden of choosing the right tool for the job.

Freedom as in you'll be able to make your case for it; burden as in the right tool for the job may not be tool you've liked using or have the experience using (in this case joining, as an employee, a company that uses the stack you'd like to work with may be a better idea).

Example: a big enterprise co may force you to use Java to parse text files (because they're by decision a Java shop) even if Java isn't the framework you like for this test. On the other hand, as a co-founder doing a mobile app you may have no choice but to use Java. If you're very determined to only work with certain tools or avoid certain tools altogether (or would like more experience with specific tools) you'd be better being an employee at a company which makes use of these tools (or doing a project of your own with those tools).

Of course I've also seen posts that say "I am looking for a co-founder with Python/Rails/MySQL/Oracle/etc... experience" - which seem to be more of "I want the first employee". Founders should be the ones making the decision which stack to use (and using a heuristic other than familiarity or personal like/dislike) - not following a decision that's already been made.

Great point. This is the case, and a major reason why I'm not listing specific technologies. Cofounder, not employee.

A superstar cofounder + myself should together have the technical judgement to choose the right stack to work with.

Gabor, am I right to think that you're going for the Integrated Communication System?

If you want a name, call it gics (read geeks) - global integrated communication system. It will even fit if Google buys it. :p

I'd like to chat, hang out, and work with potential cofounders for four days to a week. That should give us enough time to see if we gel.

That's a less than ideal, but a fairly decent way of recruiting co-founders.

Good luck, Gabor!

Thanks, prakash!

In a couple of week, you can usually pretty easily tell if there's a fit, and if the person has technical ability, but I have no illusions of being able to predict the future based on just that. :-)

This is exactly what I did when I met my co-founders. I actually flew out to London (from Portland) to work with them for a week. We worked on some random projects and did one all nighter. I think its a great way of quickly testing whether someone is a fit or not.

Actually, some of my friends do this at their company for potential employees as well. After deciding they probably want to hire a candidate, they fly them out (if they are not local), pay them consulting fees to work for a week, and if it works out then they hire them.

Do you really want to end up interviewing a co-founder? Like, they show up, you spend a few hours / days with them and then you know if you want to live and work and spend most of your time every day with them for the next few years?

Have you really tried to think though everyone you've known for longer?

Make sure you discuss with this person what happens when and if you start not getting along a couple months in. I've made analogies between co-founding and marriage before. I wouldn't get married with somebody after a good week. ;-)

I have no illusions about knowing someone down to the bone after a week. Yet, I think that you can get a good feel for people after a week, if you do the right things and ask the right questions, get references.

This is a pretty good related post: http://onstartups.com/home/tabid/3339/bid/99/Important-Quest...

Have you tried living with a co-founder before? It doesn't seem like a good idea at all to me. You A friend of a friend tried it and reportedly they all got sick of each other six months in and quit.

4. Enthusiastic about email and messaging.

Ah, you had me until #4.

Actually, I imagine quite a few of us have our own ideas that we have to work on.

I love the idea of this post and I'm wondering if I'll ever end up doing one of my own. I wish you the best of luck, Gabor.

For those of us interested in this process, please keep us posted and let us know how it works out. If you can find the ideal co-founder like this, maybe others can too.

I encourage you to write that post - this community is full of smart, technically competent people. And connecting them is what it's all about. :-)

Will definitely keep you posted.

I hope Gabor is not going to compete with Xobni.

I am sure he won't for multiple reasons:

1. There are multiple interesting, challenging, lucrative problems to be solved in the email field. Why would he want to try & solve what Xobni is doing?

2^. He probably had to sign some sort of document that says he can't compete directly with Xobni for X no of years

3^. He seems like a nice guy, and probably left the company on great terms with the co-founders

^ 2, 3 are pure speculation excluding the nice guy part

Thanks man ...

I think the most important thing is to solve relevant problems for real users.

There are lots of email problems out there, and lots of people suffer from them. Most people I talk to can relate to this and can rattle off their top 5 frustrations with email. Plus, there are billions of people using email. Thus, there are many profitable companies to be built here.

Good to hear Gabor, I raised the issue because it is unfortunately a common problem among startups. I can tell that you mean no harm. Good luck on your new projects.

I thought the documents described in point 2, while common, never have any legal force.

Not in CA, anyway. Other states I believe they still do.

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