wavedynamics

Fortunately, he remained friends with the other guys on the team and continued playing on our company hockey team (hockey-tech startup), so even though he was mad at myself and the CEO, I don't think he wanted to sue us into submission. I think he understood the ~$2500 we owed him (2004) was double the salary of our other guys and potentially could have been the difference between company survival and lights out. He was wise to leave at the time, with a better job in hand. Our finances did get better and we did pay him + interest a few months later. It sucked (and like I said I am ashamed) but there are unfortunate ugly decisions you sometimes have to make at a startup for survival.

The article doesn't say, but I wonder if he ever got paid out for what he was owed after he walked away.

I once ran the tech side of a small startup where money was always tight and we were paying low wages in exchange for equity. But we always made sure to pay our employees first so they could eat and pay rent and keep working. One time one of our more expensive employees quit to take a better paying job. I'm ashamed to say it took us multiple months to finally pay him out his final paycheck - but once he left he was no longer the priority. I remember a few conversations with him where I stated that I was paying the office and server bills on my personal credit card and, no, I wouldn't take a cash advance to pay him his last 2 weeks in arrears. He did eventually get paid.

A decent Canadian-based smoke forecast that I've been using for the past year or two: http://firesmoke.ca

Having compared a bunch of different smoke forecasts over this time period, its hard to say which ones are better than the others.

"Sapiens vivit quantum debet, non quantum potest" - Seneca the younger

The wise man will live as long as he ought, not as long as he can

Angels Envy - port barrel finished - is one of my favorites.

http://myhosting.com/

I've used these guys for a few years for basic web and email hosting. Not as full featured as the major US brands, but decent, inexpensive, and based in Canada.

Application Engineer or Product Manager, perhaps? Or somthing similar more towards the tech/marketing boundary where you are interfacing with people as much as actual product.

I'm an Electrical Engineer/Entrepreneur who has done hardware design for small startups.

It sounds like with a working Arduino prototype, you are well on your way.

How is your idea/prototype being received? Are people interested and have you been able to get market research/feedback on what people would be willing to pay?

Redoing the circuit design for a non-Arduino second prototype and doing the mechanical casing/enclosure is not a trivial task, but doesn't have to be exceptionally costly or time consuming, either. Depending on what circuit you are designing and what sort of molded casing you need, you could have a self-designed prototype in a few weeks to a few months for perhaps as little as a few thousand dollars.

The real key in a hardware design is making sure that it is designed for easy manufacturability and low cost when you are ready to build in quantity.

You'll probably want to do you initial runs using a local or regional contract manufacturer, but down the line you may want to do mass production in China, etc. Setting up this pipeline and doing quality control with this is often the most difficult part of the hardware process (just ask the Wakemate guys), but can definitely lower the cost. You have to balance the numbers, though. If the quantities aren't there, I've found it best to fabricate locally.

Regardless, feel free to drop me a line if you are interested in talking more about the process, timelines, and costs involved.

I may be able to help you out with the circuit and meechanical design, as well, if you are interested.