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Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

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Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#11

Post by Apreche »

OafTobark wrote: post #4

Should note that another major issue not mentioned in this post (of which I am sure there are more) is what the idea guy brings to the table beyond the idea. Majority over estimate their abilities, skills, knowledge, background, and even work ethics to such a shameful degree...

Not only do some overestimate their ethics, but developers typically very principled. I've had people tell me straight up their business model is to leech out a database of personal information from Facebook with crappy apps and such. Even if you offer money good luck finding someone who is both skilled and evil.

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#12

Post by venomsnake »

I was approached with an idea it was by a guy that had years experience in the industry, connections to sell the thing and solid ideas how to market and fund the enterprise.

So far it is going fine. I think that this approach will see a lot of interested developers.

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#13

Post by sek »

kephra wrote: post #2

I always call it the programmers curse: infinite ideas vs. limited time

Yeah I just realized that when Seth Godin mentioned it in a talk.

There is an unlimited amount of ideas out there, so these are not the scarcity at all. So they are pretty cheap.

Being able to execute them is the big thing. The ideas that sound really worth something, like patents are created by the Engineers themselves with an incredible amount of work.

Why should anybody care about your shower idea?

This also annoys me about the "idea guys", they are often incredibly simple. They didn't do any market research to validate anything, or thought about all the possible risks.

When somebody comes to me and says: "I had an idea and spent the last 2 months doing research about it. So I modified it and now have something where I am pretty confident there is demand for it."

This is something I would take serious.

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#14

Post by cs02rm0 »

StavrosK wrote: post #7
marklit wrote: post #5

Lots of contracts in London are paying £350 a day. £350 / day * 48 working weeks of the year * 5 days a week = £84,000 / year. £55,498.64 in your pocket after tax. Compare this to ~5 - 10 years of working for peanuts in a startup hoping for an exit. Keep your eye on the clients who agree to short payment terms, forget the dreamers.

In my experience, 350 was the low end. When recruiting, we couldn't get any decent people for under 400 (and I mean decent; 350 got us a Web front end developer who didn't know CSS). 400-450 did get us amazingly knowledgeable people, though, so that extra 50 was a small price to pay.

And if you want a reasonable back end developer then, well, even 450 is low end for a Java developer where I am a couple of hours outside London.

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#15

Post by mgkimsal »

kami8845 wrote: post #9
marklit wrote: post #5

Lots of contracts in London are paying £350 a day. £350 / day * 48 working weeks of the year * 5 days a week = £84,000 / year. £55,498.64 in your pocket after tax. Compare this to ~5 - 10 years of working for peanuts in a startup hoping for an exit. Keep your eye on the clients who agree to short payment terms, forget the dreamers.

blah blah blah. Same contracting comparison that gets thrown into seemingly every thread. As an employee you get work guaranteed, as a freelancer you have to work for every hour of work twice (once to get it, once to actually do it). You also have to do your own taxes, basically run your own business, but with only the shitty parts of it (no potential for growth, bureaucracy, scheduling, negotiating your pay all the…

"meet interesting people and learn lots of new stuff. Freelancing is almost never that."

Not my experience. Freelancing is what you make of it. To get some experience you may do some boring stuff early on, but if you've got no or little experience your 'startup' will likely fail.

90% of the freelancing work I've done over the last few years has generally been 'learning new stuff' and 'meeting interesting people' in somewhat challenging problem domains (trucking logistics, education, etc).

"Working at a startup is, provided you pick the right one."

Freelancing is what you make of it. Find interesting projects.

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#16

Post by werner34 »

marklit wrote: post #5

Lots of contracts in London are paying £350 a day. £350 / day * 48 working weeks of the year * 5 days a week = £84,000 / year. £55,498.64 in your pocket after tax. Compare this to ~5 - 10 years of working for peanuts in a startup hoping for an exit. Keep your eye on the clients who agree to short payment terms, forget the dreamers.

I've been freelancing in London and always calculate my yearly expected income by multiplying it with 200 to account for holiday, sick leave and general overhead.

£350 * 200 = £70000 before taxes, I think £84000 is overly optimistic here.

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#17

Post by eps »

venomsnake wrote: post #12

I was approached with an idea it was by a guy that had years experience in the industry, connections to sell the thing and solid ideas how to market and fund the enterprise. So far it is going fine. I think that this approach will see a lot of interested developers.

Did you know him before that?

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#18

Post by mmahemoff »

OafTobark wrote: post #4

Should note that another major issue not mentioned in this post (of which I am sure there are more) is what the idea guy brings to the table beyond the idea. Majority over estimate their abilities, skills, knowledge, background, and even work ethics to such a shameful degree...

This is the crux of it. In other industries, the "idea guy" would usually be an investor bringing $$$ to the table. A random hustler can't just approach a civil engineer with "an idea" to partner on a new bridge and expect the engineer to quit working and give up the next few years. They have to offer major value.

I think the best thing a non-technical founder can do is follow lean principles and bring actual data to the table. Show they've actually done the research - MVPs, letters of intent, etc - and make it clear they have a vision they can execute on. All of that is in the realm of possibility for someone who's not a programmer, and would help to make the case they're serious and capable.

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#19

Post by chrisbennet »

"You'd be crazy to have me work on this for a few months for 50% equity when you could just spend 6-12 months yourself learning to code and doing it yourself and have 100% equity. Of course, if you don't think it is worth spending a few months of your own time why should I take a chance on it?"

Re: Why Developers Don't Want to Work on Your Idea (2011)

#20

Post by venomsnake »

eps wrote: post #17
venomsnake wrote: post #12

I was approached with an idea it was by a guy that had years experience in the industry, connections to sell the thing and solid ideas how to market and fund the enterprise. So far it is going fine. I think that this approach will see a lot of interested developers.

Did you know him before that?

We were introduced by a friend.
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