Finding a tech co-founder is like trying to get married

As compared with being a prospective tech co-founder, which is more like hanging out in a Vietnamese pool hall in a short dress. There's money to be made, but you know the chances of being mistreated are pretty high.

Your simile is right, but I think the problem is always in part these things:

1) Programming isn't impossible to learn. An outsourced MVP might be a sign that the non-tech founder is not fully committed (my grandpa owned a small factory, but stressed the importance of knowing how to work all the equipment even if he stayed in the office).

2) Technical people (of which I am one) frequently underestimate technical challenges. I'm a good developer but at times have have massively missed deadlines, released buggy/untested shite, and mis-predicted technologies (e.g. I once thought Flex would take over the world).

So if we have worked for years in a field and made these mistakes, we have a hard time trusting a non-technical person the even guess at the challenges/tradeoffs up ahead. And to tell when it's time to right the ship or pivot from an idea they are attached to.

So to flip it, you need to market yourself more than your project. I think the best non-technical cofounder is somebody who is a some-time developer. As a manager at Vanderlay Industries once said:

"If you think I'm looking for a guy to sit at a desk pushing around papers, forget about it. I got enough headaches trying to manufacture the stuff."

The other end of this would be that splitting up from a co-founder (especially on less than great terms) is pretty much the same thing as getting a divorce, in terms of stress, hassle and potential emotional toll...

Of course, coming from the other side of the coin - trying to find a proper business guy that you match well with is just as challenging. Unless you work well and it just feels right, well, it will just be a marriage that won't last.

It is surprising you are having a tough time finding a tech co-founder; of all the bullshit MBA types, you have traction, a site that seems fairly developed, and a decent idea. In theory, I for one, after a cold intro, would be interested in what you have to say, as opposed to my typical "I am too busy to build your idea for you" default. Honestly, I think your biggest problem is Java, it's just not going to hit a large enough cross section of 20/30 year olds, that want to take a risk, that are into tech.

The website referenced in the post, FounderDating, is unusable, unfortunately. They got in trouble recently for using dark patterns to spam the linkedin contacts of potential users' references, and when called out on it the CEO tried to debate the use of the word "spam" when referring to their behavior:

http://ilikestuffblog.com/2013/04/26/do-you-want-to-spam-you...

That you have to get approved and give references is also the biggest "f* you" to potential users. Why would any sensible person waste their references' time and goodwill with this nonsense?

Hopefully someone will make a worthwhile "founder dating" service that just lets users find others who want to work on something and gives them a way to make contact. Don't make users jump through hoops, and don't abuse users.

as the business guy in a tech startup, i feel your pain. everything you've said, i've gone through myself on a smaller scale. the difference between us is that i, fortunately or unfortunately, was blessed/cursed with a mildly successful startup exit which gave me a substantial amount of money to build my next startup. why unfortunately? i squandered almost all the money by trying to make too bold of a leap from my unsophisticated first startup to what i aspired to be a very technologically-driven and innovative startup. i too used a contractor, except it wasn't just one dude but i hired an indian software firm to build my product with a team. this was a terrible decision because the machine i wanted to build was too ambitious, and far too complex for the indians to understand.

anyway, i started seeking tech co-founders after the failure of that outsourcing attempt. it was too hard - the few talented people in my school (i was still in college at the time) who i befriended were either more interested in gainful employment with competitive salaries after graduation, or they wanted to do their own startups and not ride on mine. i believe i have successfully sold my vision to a few of them, and a few of them have informed me that when i described my ideas, it has changed the way they look at the industry i'm tackling (advertising). some has expressed interest, but without external funding and significant traction, they usually fizzle off after a short period.

so anyway, right now i'm at a stage where since i can't find a tech cofounder, i've decided to BECOME one myself. that's right - i'm returning to school for a computer science degree. i start school in january next year, and hopefully over the next 3-4 years i will build my skills up to a level where i'm either a successful founder, or i'm one of those engineers you mentioned in your article who are deluged with attractive offers.

good luck to you and your startup though, as a fellow entrepreneur i sincerely wish you the best. it's a hard road to tread.

While it's hard to find a tech co-founder, it's twice as hard to find a tech co-founder willing to work on an existing codebase. Techies love to create new things from scratch.

"You need to have someone in the team that can fix a crashed server at 3am, or burn the midnight oil to hit a new feature deadline."

Looks like this guy needs to write down the list of qualities his co-founder will need to have and which one he is prepared to discuss; I mean if he is in his late 20s, early 30s, it is likely he would choose someone around his age and that's probably around the time someone is starting to be concerned about settling down.

I have been looking for years. I have been applying to Ycombinator by myself. I live in El Paso Texas, which apparently, is the equivalent of the moon when it comes to finding like minded tech driven partners. This is a really frustrating topic for me. I hope to move to San Francisco soon so I can be around other developers.

personally as a Dev and entrepreneur with about 50 ideas for startups I would like a confounding team to simply bounce ideas off and share the load... my top idea is a CRM for rental property that - collect rent, schedule maintenance, list rentals, handled roommate splits, background checks, financials, and more... but would be nice to have another back end coder to help(laravel), and a designer for front end, a business developer.. monetization would be 6-7$ per month per unit. Building something great can be hard when you are a one person shop.

Dear Europe,

Stop trying to turn middle-manger types into tech startup CEOs.

Easy to do by accident while drunk in Vegas?

Do you really need a co-founder? I think co-founders are over-rated.

> You need to have someone in the team that can fix a crashed server at 3am, or burn the midnight oil to hit a new feature deadline.

Almost every contractor I've worked with on elance has been willing to work whatever hours were required. For $5 an hour. Why give up precious equity for something you could hire out for a few dollars an hour?

> To date I have been using a contractor to build Satago, and whilst he is very good (one of the best developers I’ve worked with to be honest, but sadly based very far away from me in Russia) the fear is that without the large chunk of equity that a co-founder would be working towards, he could just down tools, and then Satago would grind to a halt.

If I were you I would find a few other good developers to work with. Elance has them in abundance and they'll be more than happy to work for you at $5-$10/hr. (I prefer fixed-budget projects, personally.)

Here's how I get projects done: I take a few INDEPENDENT features from the product roadmap, set clear expectations with the developers, hand off the code, iterate, finalize, then pay my main developer to integrate their code into the main code-base. In my case I'm the lead developer so I do the code integration, in your case maybe it would be your contractor from Russia.

If the developers I've hired write good code and deliver as promised I keep them. If they don't I move on to someone else. In one year I've gone through 6 developers and kept 2 of them. 2 competent, hard working, reliable developers.

When I said "set clear expectations", some expectations I've found useful to establish with a contractor are: clearly define the project specifications (you need to be able to tell them exactly what needs to be done), clearly define the project deadlines (first iteration due in 2 weeks), clearly define the budget ($300 for features X, Y, and Z), and clearly define the communication requirements (respond to emails within 24 hours, provide constant work status updates). It's also a good idea to let them know that you're looking for developers with whom you can establish a long-term relationship and that this small project they're about to work on is a test. If they meet your expectations you will keep working with them, if they don't you won't be repeating business.

I also make sure to tell them that the code needs to be thoroughly documented. It helps the other developers who have to work with their code and it could help you get an idea of what's going on under the hood.

In summary, I think technical co-founders are over-rated. I see no reason to give up equity for something that can be easily contracted out. Ok, finding good contractors isn't "easy". It takes a lot of time -- it's taken me 9 months to find 2 solid ones. But the ones I've found can reliably get the job done, on time, within budget, guaranteed. I own 100% of my company.