<story><title>Autopsy: Lessons from Failed Startups</title><url>http://autopsy.io/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>feedjoelpie</author><text>I am 100% serious, by the way. People have the most ridiculous ideas about why things failed and how it will totally work next time. If they just follow these ego-comforting steps that don&amp;#x27;t even begin to address the problem.&lt;p&gt;My top at-a-glance eye-roller says &lt;i&gt;&amp;quot;technical co-founder quit &amp;amp; pulled the code out from under me&amp;quot;&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;So completely neglectful of basic business structuring that the tech co-founder could just walk away with the code, to which you don&amp;#x27;t have copyright claim? If a non-technical co-founder can&amp;#x27;t even bring responsible management to the table, why are they at the table?&lt;p&gt;Article goes on to suggest that if the non-technical co-founder had learned to code so as to not feel so helpless, things would have gone better. Just wow.</text></item><item><author>feedjoelpie</author><text>Can we vote on which ones accurately assess their failings and which ones still harbor serious delusions about them?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>nostrademons</author><text>At a startup (before traction, employees, etc.), you are pretty much doomed if your technical cofounder quits even if you&amp;#x27;ve structured the company with vesting, ownership of IP, etc.  All the domain knowledge, architectural knowledge, etc. goes out the window when the person who wrote all the code leaves.  It&amp;#x27;s very hard to drop someone else into an unfamiliar codebase and have them pick up where the original person left off, and you probably would&amp;#x27;ve made many different decisions (about product, platform, languages, architecture) with a different team.&lt;p&gt;The real fail there is poor relationship management.  &lt;i&gt;Why&lt;/i&gt; did the cofounder quit?  What was running through their head?  Did they not really want to commit to a startup in the first place, in which case the business founder should&amp;#x27;ve vetted them more thoroughly before starting the company?  Or did they lose trust in the business founder&amp;#x27;s leadership, market knowledge, and integrity?  Were their incentives never aligned to begin with?</text></comment>
<story><title>Autopsy: Lessons from Failed Startups</title><url>http://autopsy.io/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>feedjoelpie</author><text>I am 100% serious, by the way. People have the most ridiculous ideas about why things failed and how it will totally work next time. If they just follow these ego-comforting steps that don&amp;#x27;t even begin to address the problem.&lt;p&gt;My top at-a-glance eye-roller says &lt;i&gt;&amp;quot;technical co-founder quit &amp;amp; pulled the code out from under me&amp;quot;&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;So completely neglectful of basic business structuring that the tech co-founder could just walk away with the code, to which you don&amp;#x27;t have copyright claim? If a non-technical co-founder can&amp;#x27;t even bring responsible management to the table, why are they at the table?&lt;p&gt;Article goes on to suggest that if the non-technical co-founder had learned to code so as to not feel so helpless, things would have gone better. Just wow.</text></item><item><author>feedjoelpie</author><text>Can we vote on which ones accurately assess their failings and which ones still harbor serious delusions about them?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>chrismarlow9</author><text>Heh, yeah I would advise if you&amp;#x27;re the &amp;quot;find funding&amp;quot; type of serial entrepreneur to think long and hard about what you write there. It may come back to bite you.</text></comment>