

Ask HN: questions from a tech/start-up newb - dschmidt11

Good afternoon everyone,<p>I'm new to the game (I will not call myself a hacker), but my interest and self teachings have been giving me a lot of insight into the hacking world.<p>With that being said, I sprung this idea 6 months ago and have been working at it since. My efforts towards this project have been very time consuming and I feel like I've hit a few barriers. Being a full time student I have zero capital, and what I need done requires advanced programming (php).<p>I am hoping the following questions can be answered.<p>How do I find a good partner/co founder?<p>Should my programmer/designer be local?<p>Is crowdfunding a good source for raising capital?<p>Any advice will help as I am the only person working on this at the moment. Thanks all.<p>Dave
======
mchannon
How do you find a good cofounder?

Asked and answered many times, but I like this answer the best:

[http://www.humbledmba.com/please-please-please-stop-
asking-h...](http://www.humbledmba.com/please-please-please-stop-asking-how-
to-find)

Should your programmer/designer be local?

I think your programmer should be you, to begin with. Don't know PHP? I think
you can learn it in the next six months at minimal expense. You may groan and
discover you hate PHP, and end up moving to another medium because there's a
reason you hate it. If you're going to try and get a technical cofounder,
presumably with equity only, you'll significantly expand your available talent
pool if you can get the talent to take you seriously. That can be done by
either having money to throw at the project (ruled out already), or being able
to at least carry on a conversation on how to get things done in the medium
you've chosen.

You can often find programmers in far-flung regions of the world that work for
cheap, but probably not many work for equity. That leaves your immediate
surroundings or whoever you can travel to get an audience with.

Is crowdfunding a good source for raising capital? Yes. That's why it's
illegal.

Other than end-runs around the system (crowdfunding a loan you're personally
liable for like with prosper or lendingclub, or crowdfunding a project through
direct sales of finished product like kickstarter), you're stuck with friends,
family, and fools.

------
ohashi
Cofounders;
[http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/submissions&q=fin...](http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/submissions&q=find+cofounder&start=0)

programmer/designer: there is no real answer to this. It depends on what you
can manage. Local is easier for most people.

I am not sure where you are, but in the US I don't think the crowdfunding bill
has even passed yet.

