Ask HN: We dreamed, we shipped, we are stuck

It is important to note that the points 1,2 and 4 are not necessarily disjoint. You can do them in the same order.

Evolve it to something else. I 'm sure you got lots of ideas and little energy, but hey this is the internet.

I went through a similar situation earlier this year. I think it's pretty much always better to cut your losses, especially for your mental health. Most of the time, it's just not the right idea and you'll drive yourself crazy trying to make it work. In rare cases, you need to give it some time and put more effort to make it work - but only you will know in your heart if more time and effort will really help.

I myself prefer not to open source the code because I may wind up using it for my next project. For the same reason I prefer not to sell my code either. Instead, take the lessons you've learned and the site you've built, and try something new, either another startup or joining someone else's startup. If you're joining someone else's startup, leave it up temporarily as a testament to your ability, you'll get a job in no time.

1. Open sourcing is a fine idea, if there is demand for it. There are a million forum apps out there, though-- be honest-- do people REALLY love yours?

2. Are there any/many companies making money doing this? I'd go narrower and perhaps aim at Support Forums (something companies pay money for).

3. Worth a shot. I think you need a design/marketeer/evangelist more than you need another dev. Keep it 1-developer simple until you nail a narrow use case that has users/customers excited to keep coming back. Who on your team loves distribution problems? SEO? SEM? Bizdev? Blogging and tweeting?

4. Almost impossible. Very few people want someone else's (failed) codebase.

In general, the current market you're attacking (a place for entrepreneurs to discuss) seems like a pretty crappy one. Can you name 5 high-margin companies that are positioned directly at the same audience? Pre-startup people are a penny-pinching bunch. Hard to charge them money, and few advertisers want access to that audience unless you've got pretty amazing scale/brand.

Whatever you do, have a marketing plan. 99.9% of businesses hit the "wow, our sales aren't growing fast enough" wall. Don't count on word-of-mouth-- be happily surprised by it if it happens. If you're going to go with the pure-engineer team, try to think of a business that either solves a REALLY ACUTE pain or can capitalize on existing channels (app stores, SEO, Adwords, etc).

So I have to make an account just to get some sense of what it actually does for me? Re think that.