Ask HN: Go all in on startup idea, or stay W2

2 points by Mnexium 1 day ago | 33 comments

I want to ask HN because it feels this community is more tech oriented then most out there. I have been building an idea for the past couple of months, I think it is a good idea, if not for fear I'd dive head first full time into the idea. Personally, leaving stable W2 is scary, diving into the unknown start-up land is equally scary. Putting in all the effort for an unknown pay off, if any.

I don't really have the network to vet my idea, to tell me wether it is good or bad, something worth building or not? Something worth diving into or not.

My idea is https://mnexium.com - it is a LLM infrastructure layer. All the things you need to do to get an LLM up an running Mnexium would handle.

The reason I want to jump into this start-up is mainly because I'd use this app, and I build it because I needed something like it. Is that enough signal to continue to build?

I would really love to hear others opinions on what they would do? If they've navigated something similar?

I think the last bit I'd add to the above is I have this nagging feeling that I want to build something, from scratch. Build it to the best of my limited ability - but I don't want to fail.

Appreciate it

leros 7 hours ago |

I haven't even looked at your idea because it doesn't impact my answer. Starting something is harder than having a good product. You also need marketing, growth, etc which I have no idea if you're capable of doing.

Zooming out a bit. How do you feel about the possibility of quitting your job, spending 1-2 years working on this, failing, and looking for another job? You'd lose income but also have a very interesting life experience. I'm doing something similar and I legitimately don't mind failing because I'm glad I get to have the experience regardless of whether the startup works or not.

nullfern 1 day ago |

The market has quite a bit of competition which isn't a bad thing, in fact it is good validation of the idea.

The issue is that you are quite late to the party and I don't see a differentiator in your product.

Regardless, I would focus on getting a few paying customers first to validate the idea while still working a job so you can eat.

Mnexium 1 day ago | |

I agree and good advice. Being so new to this and not having a network to bounce ideas off of or even try the app makes that part difficult to go from 0 to 1 for me personally.

While I agree that competition exists and it is validating that the labs and others are working on solving this problem. I am trying to focus on a broader solution. Competitors will focus only on memory - but not so much on the other infrastructure requirements to create an AI app (chat history, etc).

I am also trying to create a moat around the difference in how we validate and create memories. Most will have a single pipeline, I want to have multiple and compare - this does increase my COGS however.

Appreciate the message -

simantel 1 day ago | | |

> not having a network to bounce ideas off of or even try the app makes that part difficult to go from 0 to 1

This wouldn't change if you quit your job.

Keep your job, stop building, and start talking to potential customers.

didgetmaster 1 day ago |

Almost everyone comes up with an idea during their career, where they think 'this could be really big'.

The idea of abandoning the 9 to 5 job to strike out on your own can be strong. There are many stories where a solo entrepreneur or small startup team did just that, and are now well off, if not insanely rich.

But the other 90% you never hear about. They work hard to try and get their idea to market, but it never pans out. A myriad of reasons can cause a project to fail, long before it replaces your salary today.

Your personal circumstances along with talent and drive, should play a pivotal role in deciding to make the jump. Unless you have a comfortable amount to savings, I would recommend keeping your day job and working on the side project in your spare time. Don't quit your W2 until you get some real traction on it.

Mnexium 12 hours ago | |

I am naturally extremely conservative. Part of the dilemma is maybe seek promotions at work or stay at same level and build side project.

I think doing something like this is very much high risk/high reward. Part of the challenge (albeit a good one) is the salaries are fairly good - so this approaching that is not an overnight thing. From a personal circumstance side of things there is also that opportunity cost.

"Don't quit your W2 until you get some real traction on it." I think this is probably the best path.

apollyx_jojo 1 day ago |

The "stay W2 and build on the side" path gets a bad rap, but it's actually the more rational choice for most people.

I went the part-time route. What I learned:

1. Constraints breed creativity. Having only 10-15 hours/week forces you to ruthlessly prioritize what actually moves the needle vs. what feels productive.

2. Revenue validation before quitting is underrated. If you can get even $500/mo while working full-time, you've proven something real. Most people who quit to "go all in" spend months building before discovering nobody wants what they're making.

3. The emotional rollercoaster is easier to handle when your rent isn't tied to your MRR. Bad months don't become existential crises.

The one caveat: if your startup requires intense sales cycles, enterprise deals, or you're in a winner-take-all market with funded competitors, then speed matters more than sustainability. But for most B2B SaaS or tools businesses, the tortoise approach works fine.

Mnexium 12 hours ago | |

Appreciate the message. I think this is the most practical advice to follow until there is an event/time to fully disconnect from the W2.

I'd love to hear/learn more about your journey. From a 0-1 build mindset but also going from 1 or 0.75-to-first customer and beyond.

I think we see a lot Zucks and AirBnB guys, and with AI 100M ARR in 2 months type stories, but not so much tortoise approach stories.

mirmor23 1 day ago |

(briefly looked at the website). If you find traction for this idea, that's great. I use claude, and its feedback memory mechanism is already too much for me -- it crams a lot of 'project related' but unimportant cruft, and it keeps growing, and purging it is a chore (its own lexicon, lack of why it is relevant etc). My preference is to front end lot of disciplined design work, so it's memory tends to be quite useless really. The difficulty of getting paid $20 per month is another challenge. Either way, I wish you the best!

Mnexium 12 hours ago | |

Appreciate the post and thank you!

I think for me and the idea I saw a fundamental shift in the experience chatGPT provided once it was able to remember cross/post chat things. The APIs do not have this offering and are pretty bare, so being able to put this on top of any LLM API I think is a value add.

I am curious how you are using Claude in your case? Web-ui? Co-Work? Does not seem like API, but would help me.

codingdave 1 day ago |

> I don't really have the network to vet my idea

Then do not do it. Without a network to vet the idea, you don't have the network to get your initial sales either. You are coding blind, hoping you land in a place the market actually would pay for.

Mnexium 12 hours ago | |

I agree - not having a network to vet the idea is possibly the easiest part to have. It means I dont have the network for sales like you said, the network to raise funding, the network to build upon what I already have.

Not wrong there.

maryamshafaqat 1 day ago |

If you are already building it and would actually use it yourself thats a strong signal. I did focus on getting real users first before making a full leap.

Mnexium 1 day ago | |

I agree that users (hell even 1 real user) would be motivating and validating from an idea perspective.

May I ask how long it took you to find your first user? and the path you took to find said user(s)?

maryamshafaqat 1 day ago | | |

For me it took a few weeks I mostly started by sharing in relevant online communities and just talking about the problem before pushing the product itself.

austin-cheney 1 day ago |

Honestly, getting VC cash does not look like the challenge it used to be.

Look attractive, be confident, and talk about reselling AI... boom cash.

The real question is: what do you want to be doing in 5 years? Do you want to be explaining to people why you are cleaning up some pitch deck mess that still doesn't make money or would you rather be slaving away for your current employer with next to no equity?

Look, I am sure your idea absolutely brilliant and fantastic, but weigh this decision on more practical terms. If you already have a family you will need either a war chest of cash (at least $35k ready to spend over the next year but $150k would be better) or the unlimited and unquestioning support of people who really should be doubting your ideas just a bit harder.

After all, some of the most successful startups started with singular boring ideas. If you are amazing at sales and execution then you can afford to go all in on your boring idea.

Mnexium 12 hours ago | |

> Honestly, getting VC cash does not look like the challenge it used to be. Having never jumped in this pool, don't know if I would sink or swim here - but it does seem to be the case that a good story will get funding. I do like to approach things from a practical angle, I don't necessarily need/want millions up front and a more conservative approach to find product-market-fit would be beneficial.

> 5 years - Cleaning pitch-deck vs slaving away? both sound pretty shitty to me :) I think there are pros/cons. Pitch deck route assume I can sustain myself for 5 years but it does come with an opportunity cost. It is ~1m earned w2 income. W2-slave route feels like a boring way to contribute to society/tech and maybe not reach full potential?

Appreciate the post - I do agree with your sentiment.

dbehera 1 day ago |

You can build this along with your w2 and once it hits a critical mass then you can quit W2.

jryan49 1 day ago |

I mean a lot depends on your life circumstances. Do you have a family to support? Do you have any money saved up? How old you are? It's tempting for me to quit and work on something I've wanted to work on for years but... The risk feels too high cause I feel like if I fail, it will be impossible to find a new job where either I made as much as I had before, or a job at all.

Mnexium 11 hours ago | |

I have been conservative forever from a financial perspective. I feel comfortable enough to be out of W2 for a year or two.

but there is a real opportunity cost to leaving a w2 and jumping into an idea like this. Plus the fears that you stated as well are things I think about also.

VirusNewbie 18 hours ago |

Not enough information. Are you making 400k in big tech or 300k at a stable job in a hot location?

Are you making peanuts in a remote location, and you'd be happier making slightly more if you were in charge of your destiny?

If you spend five years on your project to get acquihired by some mid level public company- is that success or would you be devestated?

Do you have the chops to build a business, raise money, find customers, recruit employees? Yes, do you think you'd enjoy it?

Mnexium 12 hours ago | |

Not in big tech, but comfortable 250k in mid-teir expense remote suburb. The opportunity cost is real and something to truly be factored in. Something I can probably replace after this endeavor but it would require a lifestyle change (moving etc).

I think i'd be happy with the challenge of building a business if there was constant progress and the end of the tunnel was possible (not necessarily guaranteed, but not 0% either).

I think being acquihired by mid-level would be a success. If my path is posting clueless HN to being acquihired in 3-5 - i'd personally love that outcome and it would validate a lot of things (my ability to acheive this, idea validation etc).

Chops question is difficult to answer - with constant progress I have tons of internal motivation, but one "no" and I tend to feel like shit (a character flaw for this line of work imo).

VirusNewbie 6 hours ago | | |

So just a couple anecdotes of friends of mine who have been in the industry a while:

1 Friend, started a consulting company, worked his absolute ass off, made many millions, but also maybe not a lot more than if he had worked his ass off in big tech and climbed the ranks.

Another friend started a product company, raised a seed round, worked on it for many many years paying himself peanuts, eventually had to take a job at a big tech company for a few years and his side business was part time, then quit big tech to focus on it again, acquihired after 8 years. Now he gets to work on his project and get paid a decent amount by some mid tier tech company, so he's happy.

Financially, not the optimal move, but he loves working on his own ideas, and I think he's happy about that.

brudgers 1 day ago |

I don't really have the network to vet my idea

Then the most important thing, from a business perspective, is building that network.

Customers are the best network, again from a business perspective.

Although network building in general is often hard, building a network of customers is usually really, really, really hard. Not only do you have to overcome fear of rejection by asking for money, but also you have to actually get money from someone before they actually are a customer.

And because writing an "Ask HN" is easy, it is probably not on the road to building a general network and certainly not on the road to building a network of customers because you aren't asking for money.

So my advice, start learning how to ask people for money (it is a skill developed through experience (and rejection). Talking to people is what selling is. Good luck.

Mnexium 12 hours ago | |

I agree and appreciate it.

I am starting to figure out having a network and going into an idea would move things 10x or 100x faster, both from a success or failure route. You'd want to get to both as quickly as possible. I think what posting on HN gets me is some kind of signal toward something that I don't already have. A lot of generic but valuable advice here. Still validating in its own way.

I do agree with you - asking people for time is especially difficult "can you give me some advice" ... and then asking people for money is 100x more difficult. Even if they get something for said money.

Blackstrat 1 day ago |

Another concern is how to weather the AI bubble. Right now, everyone going all in on "AI" reminds me of the 90s when companies like Exodus Communications, Level 3 Communications and others built out heavily only to see it all evaporate. Yes, eventually what these companies were doing became the cloud but none of them are active participants. I would argue that before jumping into reliance on current AI trends that one evaluate where on the Technology Adoption Curve that the industry is. I suspect we're still at the Early Adopter phase and the build out is based on a bit of irrational exuberance. Couple that with the growing backlash against new AI data centers and depending on current trends seems exceedingly risky. Everyone argued in the 90s that "it was different this time" as they are arguing today. It's not. It rarely is. Go back and read the history of the PC starting with Apple and moving into the 80s Compare that to today's market. Same with the emergence of the Internet. Where are companies like Prodigy, Compuserve, or the incubators such as CMGI. Sometimes people have ideas and can ride technology waves and make huge money. But at the end of the day, that's far rarer than "having a good idea".

https://www.computer.org/csdl/magazine/co/2026/05/11503360/2...