

Looking to start a partnership with a programmer - nmccutcheon

I have a really good idea for an app that I have been playing around with for awhile. I am just in search of a programmer who would like to take on a project for 50&#x2F;50 ownership in the company. Please email me if you are interested for more information.
nathan.k.mccutcheon@gmail.com<p>Thanks!
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ninavizz
Hi Nate: I'm somewhat in the same boat. To get my business moving, I will need
a CTO partner to drive the ship forward. Getting a minimum-viable-product
built though, is all on me. Which I'd gone-out, assuming I could find friends
to help me out with. Nope. No time, summer taveling, and everyone's loaded-up
with paying work.

I'm a UX'er by trade, a self-taught mechanic/builder by hobby, and languages
are my achilles heel with learning. So, I've taken A LOT of flack for many
years, for not learning how to code, beyond my basic understanding of how
things all fit together, need to support each other, and being able to edit
other peoples HTML/CSS.

As a solo-founder however, it's all on me to deliver. Advisors and investors
have (as gently as possible) told me that.

[https://generalassemb.ly/](https://generalassemb.ly/) is expensive, but it's
done a great job in a classroom setting, teaching app frameworks basics to
n00bs. When I have the money and the bandwidth, I'm looking forward to taking
it. Then there's also
[https://www.hackerschool.com/about](https://www.hackerschool.com/about),
which is a paid retreat, so expensive on many levels.

I was really impressed with the codeacademy.com experience, and it filled-in
many blanks for me that made me feel competent in CSS and HTML, for the first
time ever. Using Javascript with JQuery is going to be a much more daunting
challenge, because its entire mental model I still don't grok.

But, I'm trying, anyway. I managed to get one critical JQuery piece to work,
and the other—I gave-up on but am coding the page, anyway with a static stand-
in. I figure that once I've gotten all of the HTML and CSS and what of the
JQuery I could do, done, at that point it will be easier to get friends to
help me patch the holes. If not, then I will just pay a freelance Javascript
person, to spend a day patching holes (and I honestly don't see what holes
there will be, taking a day). Remember: Minimum Viable Product, doesn't' need
to be fancy. :)

From, a gal who's gone-in kicking and screaming with every bit of learning
code... but will probably be a more well rounded CEO, for it.

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damian2000
You should consider that many app developers won't take kindly to suggestions
like this - its often seen just as a way to get some work done for free, with
no risk on your side. There was a discussion on reddit the other day about
exactly this subject ...

[http://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/2h0uy1/whats_a_p...](http://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/2h0uy1/whats_a_polite_way_to_say_your_idea_is_shit_even/)

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nmccutcheon
Okay so as recommended. I am 28 years old. I am starting business school next
year and really hoping to get a couple more projects under my belt. Recently a
team of us developed an algorithm which predicts stock market movement. We are
still developing the algorithm and automation behind the scenes but are seeing
some very good returns over the last several weeks.

I can always provide more about myself, but my idea is an app that hopes to
improve the customer experience, by connecting local business and customers in
a way that has not been done.

Hope this help, I think 50/50 can work and I am willing to learn or do what it
takes. I have been told I am an extremely resourceful person and not afraid to
put myself out there to make a project succeed.

~~~
yoloswagins
Thanks for providing more details.

Your start market prediction algorithm sounds really neat. Let me know when I
can invest :)

Often times, 50/50 partnerships fail because of differing expectations. What
are you expecting from the other half of the partnership? What will you be
able to contribute?

Many ideas can be validated by with manually, before software is written.

The CEO of [Treatings]([http://treatings.co](http://treatings.co)) used a
spreadsheet to keep track of users, and sent all the emails by hand until he
validated the idea. Off the top of my head, AirPair, ZeroCater, and WuFoo were
all founded similarly.

Programmers are more amenable to partnerships where you've got a manual
process that can automated, than an idea.

How are you going to improve the customer experience?

~~~
nmccutcheon
Just to clarify the manual concept..

The owners of the above companies began with say their website, and then
started to build a customer base before adopting an app or further
development?

~~~
yoloswagins
Groupon started as a wordpress site.
[http://tomloverro.com/2010/08/19/groupon-1-0-started-on-a-
wo...](http://tomloverro.com/2010/08/19/groupon-1-0-started-on-a-wordpress-
blog)

For your idea there is a, 'secret sauce' that you fake until you have
traction.

Say for example, your app improves the customer experience by drawing a smiley
face on every receipt. You think that customers love seeing a smiley face so
much that they'll come back the next day.

Rather than build a complex point of sale system that prints smiley faces on
receipts, you do something simpler.

You hide under the counter, and draw a smiley face on each receipt yourself.

If people come back(validate your idea) then you can start signing up store
owners.

Having several pre-sales, plus some stats about how your system demonstrably
improves the customer experience will help you find an engineer to build out
your idea.

If you share your USP, we can tell you how to manually validate your idea.

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yoloswagins
Hey Nate, welcome to Hacker News!

Ideas are a lot of fun to think about, but it's work to bring them to
fruition.

When it comes to a partnership, people want to know about you, and what you
bring to the table.

Add a comment about your personal background, or your idea. Everyone here is
working on their own idea, so your idea is safe :)

You'll find that people are more likely to ignore you, than steal your idea.

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ozuvedi
I'm sick of working as a slave programmer where no one values good ideas and
writing good code, thinking of scalability solutions. If you have respect for
programmers, I promise you hard work and honesty !!

------
styles
50/50 never works.

~~~
nmccutcheon
Why do you think that?

~~~
alain94040
50/50 especially does not work in that situation, where the split has been
decided already by one side before any developer shows any interest.

Find a developer first who is interested. They'll tell you their motivation.
Maybe they believe in the idea like crazy and want to build this. If so, maybe
50/50 could work. Maybe they are just looking for an item on their empty
resume and can commit only about a month on this project. If so, 50/50
definitely is a recipe for disaster.

