The problem of starting

In early 2013 I decided to start a company.

In the previous 4 years I have developed and launched several software products tied around the popular service. I started in 2008 with the site hosting the images, which quickly grew to 2 million unique users per month. Continued in 2011, Android-app that has been downloaded and installed more than 200 thousand times. But the user agreement popular service put an end to it.

For a long time I had to work alone. I was a system administrator, PHP, Perl and Android developer at the same time, designed and managed databases. I worked on marketing, customer support and resolve legal issues. Did everything from deleting photos erotic content manually to the configuration of Bind servers.

When you work alone, you have to solve too many problems and you rarely find the time to do it as well. This constant state of stress leads many to implement even minor improvements with appalling inefficiency. Overly dependent on other companies, they are lower on the food chain. For my next project, the team has become a prerequisite, but when I tried to collect it, it was easy.

I started to search among friends. Having worked alone for so many years and generally being an introvert, I had not so many options for engaging in team. Three potential party, a friend who studied information technology, another one studying physics and a friend who once made a website. The study came to an end, so do not delay the meeting, I talked to first, and offered him a partnership. He found my ideas very compelling, but has already participated in the program strong, the company was not able to take risks. The second was in the same position. With the third I did not even bother to contact.

Perhaps the presence of such a small circle of acquaintances — it's my fault. In General, I avoid anyone who asked me about my classes. I seldom professed his love to AWS in public places (except for their drunken parties). Communication for links was always out of my comfort zone.

The next attempt was the profile on MeetUp.com. I found a group on web design and after an exchange of photos and pleasantries, signed up for a couple of meetings. In each room there was a group of people nernychova, recruiter and passers-by anxious only about the pizza. When the conversations ended, I walked around the room and talked to people. Became clear pretty quickly that most beginners and never programmed. Excluding the organizers, there were very few professional programmers. And some of them were quite elderly people who have lost their passion and ambition.

The main drawback was that I was in the Dallas (Texas). The concentration of technical talent here is extremely small and it can take several months to find and convince the one person to cooperate. For a second I thought about moving to San Francisco to participate in conferences, to acquire a Dating, and then work on what you want. But I quickly became clear how absurd this idea is.

In an era when people are starting the revolution via Twitter, I was going to walk from one door to another, only to start a startup. The Internet is the best communication system ever created. It's cheap, fast and allows everyone to participate. However, projects that build it, are formed from closed, inefficient networks. Many projects survive only on the willingness of investors to absorb huge amounts of risk.

The problem of communication was real. I ran into her and started working on a solution. I imagined a place where people could spontaneously come together and create prototypes of ideas without venture capital. A place where everyone in their free time can participate in the formation of companies. A place where you can find as many like-minded people and employees.
About 6 months I worked alone on the game alpha. In the end, I stopped to return to the search partners. Being a beginner in Python and Django, I often had questions on StackOverflow. I pointed at the bookmark profiles of people whose responses were found useful. In an effort to improve the Internet, I started to contact with them by sending a letter describing the idea and a proposal for a chat on Skype. Out of approximately 100 people, I said 15 and ten turned to talk. Some understood the idea instantly. Some asked many questions before to understand. In the interviews I've seen changing facial expression of the interlocutor, when he understood the problem and the decision that I was going to suggest.

This process took a month and a half. Most did not answer the letter. Many of those whom I interviewed on Skype said that they want to contribute, but in reality nobody did. It was incredibly demoralizing. May need to communicate with thousands of people to find one partner. I fell into the usual trap. I got too carried away with their idea. Too little has been done and I was suffocating her.

There was only one way out: to talk about the project around the world. Had to open the door. Publish the idea and source code. Need feedback and public access development project.

So there joltem.com, short for "jolt them" (shake them). I call it "open incubator". Based on the idea that at least in the early stages of projects can be open and get the benefits. It is built on the idea of attraction and the dynamic workforce.

The project uses the usual scheme of pull & fork development, popularized by Git and enabling many participants to work with one code repository. Normal run the command git fetch already provides you with changes from all participants. No need to connect each participant, and you only need to follow the main branches of the project to focus on developing.

To achieve the goal of developed model-based controls problems and solutions bound to the git server, which manages permissions at the level of branches. Trusted members are able to manage all branches of the project, at the same time as the rest are only allowed to upgrade to branches tied to their decisions.

Encouragements for the participants using the standard system options. In some companies, for each round of funding, a certain amount of shares distributed among the employees if they have worked a sufficient amount of time. joltem.com, in the project creation process, the main part of "stock" is distributed among the participants.

For razrabotcheskogo cycle of the project, each participant earns "influence". At the time when the participant contributes to the design, it specifies the number of "influence" which in his view adequately the work done. Other participants evaluate the compliance of the work done, the requested amount of influence. In case of disagreement with the evaluation, starts trading, the purpose of which is to obtain satisfactory results. Starting from the experience of developing Joltem it can be argued that disagreements are very rare. Participants quickly begin to navigate the complexity of a particular functionality. Periodically earned influence will be exchanged for shares (share) in construction company (the project). Now Joltem open to all.

Using Joltem you can create a project. Make it private by sending invites to developers or open to the world. You can participate in the development of the Joltem. Sign for updates in our Twitter, Google+ or Facebook. If you have any questions or comments, you can write me a mail emil@joltem.com (approx. building: the author doesn't speak Russian).

Article based on information from habrahabr.ru