throwaway164023

I'm honestly glad that we're going to start doing this - it'll be great to have accountability within eng orgs

Thank you for your honesty - yeah, it sounds like either I decide to become his PM and give him strict guidance or let him go.

that's great perspective - how did you grow into working without those guard rails?

yep, got 5 LoIs that represent $10m ARR with a defined product scope.

sorry to clarify - I meant im always passionate because I've been a founder at a couple of couples that have exited for low $$ms, so always felt a sense of ownership.

founding engineer - we gave him a lot of equity; c. 8%

obviously, the split should be 50 / 50. I'm trying counteract this narrative on hacker news that if you're technical, you're the star of the show. The fact is both the technical and non-technical founders are equally important. Don't have the hubris that you can do it all, unless you are truly exceptional.

as an engineer who actually launched a YC company, I can say that this is not true and prevents engineers from being good cofounders. The fact is, unless you are the 0.1% of engineers who can create truly novel products, our skills are largely commoditized. I was doing well as an engineer at google, but the product I was building could be replicated by engineers out of India / China etc. Having a co-founder who could actually build relationships, have good product vision, and most importantly SELL were crucial. Don't have the hubris that OP mentioned above - it's a surefire way to fail.

Chris is an absolute grifter - I read his book on web 3 and was so underwhelmed by his depth of thought.

Better to ignore folks who have no experience in building cutting edge product - he's just a average philosopher turned VC because it pays more.