Proposal for new forum category

Startups and Associations

I am trying to think of a good and nonintrusive way of finding peers to work with on certain things or full partners for different projects.

Example cases:

  1. Develop a feature that someone else also needs and split the effort.
  2. Move a project cross-border and find partners to operate in another country. The typical problem here is that when you export a project to a new country you need to establish a commercial presence there in order to process your local compliancies and financials. If a project is good and a Meteor developer wants to join it should be a lot easier to localize the project while you get a new pair of eyes and hands on the project.

We have a Meteor jobs platform but I feel we are missing the equity kind of association. In general those with financial endorsement from VCs, angels or institutions are looking to hire. As more founders have turned into “VC employees” in recent times or even lost their projects to bad VC decisions or pressure, there is a shift towards bootstrapping companies and I think in our community there might be a good number of people looking for business partners/co-founders. I am one of these people for sure.

Ideas?!

In lack of a better idea, I am throwing this poll here but I am ready to dedicate some time to a dedicated website for this, such as the Meteor Jobs thing.

  • Would love to have a category for startups/partners.
  • After the US elections result I couldn’t care less.
0 voters
4 Likes

Paul,
I like the idea and think a name that captures the idea of “working together” or “opportunities” would fit this sentiment. Do you have a suggestion for a category name that would also include this, or do you think it should be more confined?

I think a small meteor project is necessary. Similar to the Meteor Jobs, I could come to the forum, state my case, post a link to the dedicated page. A dedicated page my have the following components:

  1. Description with tech (select from predefined options for JS//TS, Apollo/Grapher/Mongoose/plain, CSS/SCSS/LESS, MUI/ANT/Bootstrap, React/Vue/Svelt etc.) Would prefer to filter offers based on my skill set.
  2. Geography
  3. For co-authoring of a feature, detail the type of mutual benefit (write for OS, write for private co-ownership and co-maintenance, pay someone to write something for you)
  4. For “doing business together” - options to offer equity
  5. Sample NDA
  6. Sample contract of association
  7. Pitch Video
  8. Timeline (Gantt or something else)
  9. Sample business canvas

I could try to write a sample (in fact real) offers for each, full business partnership project and co-working on a feature for the higher good or just mutual benefit of 2 or more parties.

My 2 cents: for the forum category name, I think startups / partnering up would help clearly delineate it from jobs / opportunities etc.

A dedicated app for this in addition the forum category would be nice.

founders or partnering up would get my vote, but startups is self-limiting. And working together and opportunities is already going on, or already thought about, but mostly as “employment”

There seem to be >5 and >10-year success-stories here, which is more interesting than startups ( for the one who would need to believe in the direction but did not have the idea ) … and refactoring huge systems, changing design, strategy on next steps, etc… all that is more solid and motivating. Adding features, updating entire conventions, seizing a market opening, creating a new trend, etc… all more valuable than standard “new things” and novel concepts. There is seriousness even in the “sample NDA” there, which changes the category on its own, to more serious.

Comments I see from @paulishca seem focused and would get to a good process, which carry over a lot of “incubator” and “accelerator” and “business network” or even “toast masters” type models, into this ecosystem.

1 Like

Thinking forward to balance the community if there is a founders area, here. Since the current forum seems mostly all “down the middle” … talking about a melting pot … across from founders being given space, there is also mentorship for novices and pre-ninjas. That is long-tail and not as UDP in relationship. It is a much more TCP dynamic, and also excellent for observers to see and learn from, as with founders … both are educing courage. One is low-touch, more async. One is high-touch, more sync. We prefer low-touch and async, but it is made from high-touch and sync. That category would become a feeder league for the one proposed.

I generally ran squads of 5-9 apprentices at all times and expect to do that, but I would not dump them into a melting pot to drown, or dilute general momentum. I took a bit of time off from that while I switched languages and rewrote my foundations after refactoring design in an updated landscape.

A lot of the questions here seem pretty low-level and having nothing to do with Meteor but are toward general knowledge, and prerequisites. I would bet it is about as much as founder oriented concerns ( whether said out loud or not ) and there is already a good spread. And if one looks into StackOverflow it is a hellscape this forum next door to. It is very high in juniors, and for good reason.

For there to be a long-term future that works, there is both founder and student; those who climbed the mountain selectively mentor newcomers. Not just “middle” but both extremes on either side of center field.

This was recently brought up talking about the end of juniors as an industry trend, which matters to founders more than anyone else. That is, if we plan not only to have one code ecosystem but also plan to have the art and science of code endure. In the 5-year to 10-year future that seems not to be continuing right now.

This is about balance, not really about another idea. It is across from the idea raised.

This parallel recommendation comes from more of a “farmer” outlook since we know the state of the land, and not just the crops we want. There is a lot of “hunter” here and a lot of “gatherer” here, but not much “farmer” that I see, except for Meteor Software itself, which is the root issue of other discussions. The only ones being actual adults with their pants fully on yet are those connected with Tiny which is just plain lazy in manners in my opinion, then also precarious and built with one point of failure. Right? What control over destiny do we have other than separate engagements without direct influence on what it all stands on.

If we want a thriving founder culture, we need a thriving student culture, or we outsource that. When people show up ruined in their thinking already it is worse than having no one coming up behind you, so it is wise to feed the soil whenever we can.

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This is key, to acknowledge that. Sorry @jam

The design pattern shift I am doing, and the domain-block I am deploying this Winter ( North ) for that, I would contribute in some way. The goal ( mentioned elsewhere ) is to have a reference implementation which is not theoretical but live fire and real transactions, but more so real dependents since my direction is to remove all “necessary evils” to allow one beloved essential to show through. It is an entirely partitioned yet integrated ( or not, might decide to disconnect one day and keep going ) ecosystem of true momentum, not just emoji reactions to things. And not just serious help with code. Movement forward for individual and mesh, 60x60x24.

Being that one beloved essential without any “necessary evils” is working for me and is the true design target right now. Otherwise we are making our way forward on a certain level of compromise everyone silently agrees is normal, but I disagree. I hold myself to a different standard, at the design and strategy level(s). This is the mark of enduring cultures.

That is what apprentices connect with: values and principles in this wasteland. Imagine coming up right now in this landscape. I would immediately respect someone who thought ahead and then did the work of making sure I was legitimate, but then included me.

Include me and I will understand

Pardon the double post but this was more than an edit. I hesitated to chime in on this point because people here seem mentally tired more than most. Perhaps it is heavy with responsibility. But this was the salient point in reality. The medium ought be the message.

Thanks @jam and my apologies.

To formally engage the good idea, I second the motion, with particularity and amendment;

I move there be two new categories for the long-term, which is always at stake right now:

  1. founders
  2. mentorship

I also move in alternate that there be a new conversation regarding a reference implementation, which is held in association by the most awesome here, as a performance art, but with live activity and no theoretical examples, despite the drab world, scientifically demonstrating the true power of this ecosystem.

[ And always self-testing whether this approach is the actual best in the field or if we ought go another direction to the desired outcome, which might not be sticking with Meteor one day, if honest with self. ]