

Technical co-founder needed for Studeous - jwest

We're looking for a co-founder for Studeous, a web start-up.<p>Studeous is the SalesForce.com of the e-learning industry--we provide an easy way for teachers to manage their classes online on our web platform, as opposed to typical enterprise e-learning systems. We're looking to commodify e-learning.<p>We have users, we've already made sales, and we're in the process of raising capital.<p>We're looking for a super hacker who is an expert at:<p><i>MySQL<p></i>System/Server Administration<p><i>Scaling/Optimization<p></i>CSS<p><i>Coldfusion experience would be preferred, but is not completely necessary<p></i>Overall great product dev skills<p>We launched in private beta last March, and we need more hands on deck.<p>We are located in the Dallas/Austin, Texas area.<p>You can contact Jeff West at jwest@studeous.com for more information.
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swombat
When looking for your technical co-founder, don't specify the technologies.
This is not a job ad. Your start-up will be shaped around your co-founder's
skills, not the other way around. You want the best co-founder you can get -
technologies are irrelevant.

Also, if you're in beta since march, it's a bit late to find a technical
cofounder don't you think? You're looking for an early employee, perhaps?

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hbien
I think it's fine to specify the technologies, it's kind of like online
dating. You specify your "interests" to find other people with common
interests.

In this case, one cofounder already likes Cold Fusion and developed in it, so
it makes sense that he's looking for another cofounder with the same taste in
programming.

~~~
DaniFong
Online dating kinda sucks. Are you sure that's a metaphor you'd like to build
your cofounder relationship on?

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bprater
From a marketing perspective:

What is the fire burning in the pants of your market? (And who is your target
market -- you've got teachers and students and school admins, please pick
one.)

The first thing I see what I visit your site: "You've never seen elearning
like this before." As a teacher, how does that help me?

I can tell what you're doing. You are trying to position yourself as a
competitor in the marketplace. You are coming from a position of weakness when
you do this.

Features page: "Just go ahead and try to outfeature us." WTF are you even
talking to? How does that apply to me as a teacher? When did more features
make a project better?

Forget your competition and get yourself into the boots of a teacher. Feel the
pain a teacher feels when they aren't using your software.

Where are the testimonials from teachers that are raving about your software?
"Last year, I couldn't get my students to stop chatting with each other during
class. This year, I signed up for Studeous, set everything up and 95% of my
class is logging in each day and 85% are actually talking to each other on the
message boards. I'm absolutely giddy!"

~~~
yummyfajitas
>What is the fire burning in the pants of your market? (And who is your target
market -- you've got teachers and students and school admins, please pick
one.)

WebCT and blackboard (the competition) are utterly unusable from a teacher and
student perspective. I'd love to use something different if I ever have the
need for more than just HTML. The main thing I'd like is a grade management
system when I deal with large courses.

However, I'm almost certainly not permitted to use a grade management system
besides the one my university provides, certainly not a third party one. That
would violate student privacy.

Another problem is that commercial software can't (legally) add all the
features of blackboard:

<http://www.blackboard.com/patent/FAQ_013107.htm>

~~~
echair
_I'm almost certainly not permitted to use a grade management system besides
the one my university provides, certainly not a third party one. That would
violate student privacy._

Are you allowed to use a notebook?

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andr
IMHO the ColdFusion requirement is more likely to get you a failed enterprise
guy instead of a hacker that actually enjoys the work.

~~~
jmtame
Yeahh.. probably true. I don't know of a single decent hacker who enjoys
working with ColdFusion

~~~
bprater
Don't be too hasty in judgment.

My brother is a very good ColdFusion programmer. He got his start in the
language because it was what I was programming with at the time. (Don't
forget, around '99 when I got my start, there was Perl, ASP and Coldfusion as
serious contenders.)

I ask him, "Why don't you give PHP or Rails a whirl?" "No interest." And so he
focuses his effort in refining his ColdFusion skillset. He does Ajax and does
CSS design with the best of them.

~~~
jamongkad
I personally don't use ColdFusion but I guess there are some CF haters around
these parts. I guess that why you were downmodded. But please as hackers we
love certain bits of technology and swear by them or perhaps swear at them
lol(PHP comes to mind). I understand you as my brother also loves the
ActionScript family of languages. And does not have any interest learning
anything else.

~~~
scorpioxy
It was probably downmodded because of the "no interest" in learning anything
else.

Any programmer worth his/her salt should be always learning newer technologies
that might be useful to him/her. Having a favorite is different than not
wanting to learn anything else.

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gamble
Interesting product. I worked on a web-based LMS (not Blackboard) for several
years.

The trick with this market is finding a way to squeeze out a profit. There's a
very limited amount individual teachers are willing to spend, but selling to
districts is a major undertaking - think dedicated salespeople working for a
year or more on each account. They don't much like small companies either.

The other big issue is legacy system support. Districts won't buy a LMS that
doesn't integrate with their student information system, which is unfortunate
since the SIS vendors jealously guard access to their walled garden. (They all
have their own LMS products now and don't want their customers buying yours.)
We poured man-years into this problem and only covered a tiny subset of the
products out there. It's a huge potential morass.

Pretty much everyone working in this field recognizes how bad the products
are, but not always the reasons. The users - teachers and students - don't
have much input into the decision-making process. Endless sales cycles ensure
high prices, and that means the decisions are made by administrators at the
district office who never come anywhere near the software. It takes years to
make a dent in this market.

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jwest
ColdFusion experience is not a requirement, only preferred and not absolutely
necessary. If you've got the skills and you're interested, let us know.

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vaksel
at that stage you need to start looking for employees, not co-founders. Just
call it a CTO position and give the person stock options.

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mevdev
Wow, asking for coldfusion? You might as well build it with classic ASP. In a
matter of years you will not find any host but your own to support your end-
of-life legacy product.

I'd go with COBOL and RPG. They represent the most solid UI kits available
with many users (i.e. Banks).

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epall
How do you plan to compete with Blackboard? Do you have a plan for dealing
with their patents on eLearning?

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emmett
There's little evidence their patents are meaningful at all. Almost always,
the best course is to ignore patents entirely and forge ahead. Most software
patents are unenforceable.

