How technical does a start-up founder have to be?

For a tech startup, that is, a startup that wins by technology, and not, say, location, connections, or a powerful sales force, one should be at least technical enough to inspire and befriend a highly technical person. In other words, one should be 'hacker compatible'.

"How could I, a non-hacker, possibly play an equal contributory role has my hacker cofounder?"

As the hacker co-founder in a shop of two people, let me tell you, you can play an equal role. Okay, so my partner doesn't setup the servers or write the code or design the site; I do all of that. So what does he do? _Everything else_. Ask most any hacker and they'll give you a laundry list of things they hate doing when it comes to starting/running a business or working on a project of any kind. In fact, it's usually easier just to ask them what they _do_ want to do; the answer will almost always be "code." In my case I add design and a couple other items to the list, but I digress.

You're the one out there networking and making deals, finding advertisers, building a list of beta testers, writing up details on the competition, handling the finances and the ho-hum paperwork, handling the customers/visitors/whoever, and _much_ more. My co-founder has been invaluable to the business (I hope he stays invaluable, too, so he never gets paid ;). He describes his job as essentially making sure I am never bothered. I'll take that over another hacker any day of the week because with another hacker I'd end up getting stuck doing at least half of all that stuff that is no fun, very time consuming and highly distracting (in a job where small distractions can cost huge time).

And (briefly!) on the subject of conveying ideas: Hackers may have different mindsets, but unless your idea involves conveying something in code, you're not going to notice too many issues. My co-founder has come up with a lot of ideas and not once did I not understand him... unless he started talking about differences between LLCs and C corps and crazy talk like that.

So, in summary, if you are "just a business guy," don't give up. Sooner or later most of those one-man-band hacker founders are going to realize turning you down wasn't such a great idea; they needed you after all and now _they_ have to search for a CEO.

EDIT: And I'd like to point out that we got into YC this summer, too. I'll leave you to guess who wrote most of the application, did 99% of the talking in the interview and who had the market knowledge to pitch the idea in the first place. (hint: it wasn't this guy!)

When we talk about startups on this forum, we are only referring to the kind of startups done by hackers, it is fundamentally different from the arrogant MBA school.

Basically, hackers can learn business pretty easily. I'd like to see you hack.

Try http://hacketyhack.net

Here on the east coast and the events and circles I hang in, developers are a rare thing and hard to come by!

For instance Startup Camp in NYC had one or two hackers/developers not involved in a startup already. The remaining 70 people in the room were creative/business people. Same goes for the DC startup community. Business/creative people population is higher then available developers!

As for me I taught myself web design(html, css, photoshop) and hired a developer from India. He does good work and is inexpensive.

I don't think it matters either way. Rather how focused and driven you are!!!

I don't think that being a hacker in PS is necessary as long as you can provide the designer(s) links/jpegs of things you do like. I think adding PS as a req't/suggestion is completely a waste of time for a lot of people. Bottom line: you want people to be in a position to succeed and taking someone who may not be a visual thinker and telling them they must learn+use PS is a real easy way to lose a lot of great people.