Alex and I were talking about our recruiting strategy over the weekend, which obviously will only happen if we raise our next round of financing. He sent me these two e-mails...
"I'm thinking longer term though, we're going to raise this money, it's not an option or a question, this company is too good to not continue, I will do whatever it fucking takes."
Then...
"heh, got a little worked up there. ahem. I am prepared to assist, sir, to ensure that this company remains viable, by whatever means necessary, as I believe in it strongly ;) "
This is why I think it's a bit silly when people post on message boards looking for a partner without much information at all. You gotta get someone totally psyched about what you're up to, and to me, that means a lot of transparency. Without insight into why what you're doing is so special, how is anyone going to get this crazy psyched about the company?
In Alex's case, he's psyched because not only is the company just as much mine financially as it is his, but so's the product. I didn't come to him after all the wireframes were done and say, "Here, build this." He joined when all I knew I wanted to do was help people figure out what they wanted to do--to solve one of the biggest problems people have in life. We whiteboarded and explored and built the feature set together, collaboratively.
Don't expect someone else to get really psyched about building your product.