While I wouldn't say that you have to be a programmer to have good tech startup ideas, I wouldn't say that it's completely false either. Empirically there's a clear trend: most of the most successful startups were led initially by hackers. (And the most notorious flameouts mostly weren't.) It makes sense that people who understand a medium will have the best ideas for what to do with it.
I'd bet that the vast majority of successful companies start with a problem, and then ask "how can technology help me solve this problem?" Sure, there are notable exceptions that worked backward, e.g. eBay, Amazon, Viaweb. They saw the inherent potential in a technology and asked "what problem can this technology help me solve?" And, no doubt, if you can pull that off, you're probably more likely to hit one out of the park rather than "merely" build a sustainable business. But most of the stuff that programmers build these days are solutions for non-existent problems.
I'd go so far as to say that, often, those who best understand the medium have the worst ideas of what to do with it. The more time they spend on the nuts and bolts of the technology, the less time they spend exploring other domains, where they might find more interesting and mainstream problems.
Interesting point. I never thought of it that way. When a company is run by hackers, they usually only get publicity once they've created a product worthy of it. By that time, they're most of the way to success. Whereas when you have marketing guys at the top, the publicity comes when the company is less mature. So the perception that companies run by marketers flame out more often might be partially a result of selection bias.
I think it makes sense to differentiate between ideas and style. For example, many of the most famous guitar players / trumpet players / musicians in general were self taught. I heard an interview with James Taylor where he said he doesn't even know how to read music. And Miles Davis only played like he did because he learned on a broken trumpet.
(This isn't meant to be a metaphor for hacking, but rather to point out that there is something called style that exists outside of the cognitive layer.)
It makes sense that the guys with the most interesting styles were the ones who were mostly self-taught.
At the cognitive level, it makes sense that the guys with the best ideas are those are
A) most familiar with the medium.
B) Familiar with other similar mediums they can draw from.
But a lot of people don't make their money through novel ideas so much as taking other people's ideas and adding the sex. Which seems to be more of a style thing than a cognitive thing.
That being said, I think that businesses started by hackers have a greater chance for spectacular success (which is the empirical evidence that I think you're talking about-- and that kind of success is the only kind most VCs (or press outlets or bloggers) really care about or want to talk about.
In other words, business people are more equipped to solve the problems that assail most businesses-- and slog through to some sort of success/profit. Hackers, on the other hand, are more apt to ignore these problems or attempt do something revolutionary.
When biz people try to emulate hackers and aim for these revolutionary victories, that's where you often see the flameouts that you're talking about.
Non-technical founders tend to overvalue:
- their lovely snowflake of an idea
- their business plan (that it will magically cause investors to beat a path to their door)
Things imho that can be hard for a hacker:
- sales
- finding and/or dealing with investors (getting into Y Combinator definitely seems to help here, but what if you don't make the cut?)
If I could find a non-tech guy who can successfully raise angel and/or venture capital money, I would totally partner with as a co-founder in a second. (given a good fit, etc)
These people tend to be hard to find though (the Steve Jobs' of the world) -- if they can raise money, why don't they just raise a round and hire a talented hacker at 1% equity instead of 30%? =)
digg.com would be the most obvious. Kevin Rose studied CS at college, but it had been a while and he didn't really have the skills to execute his vision quickly and simply. So he paid a developer he'd met through elance 200 buchs to write the first beta of digg. digg is now the most popular social news website.
Outside the world of startups, there's a bunch of established companies that weren't led by programmers.
Microsoft's success is largely based on business acumen - their OS monopoly came from Bill Gates' ability to purchase QDOS and sell it to IBM.
Steve Job's is also a non-programmer - the success of Apple is his vision and the ability to direct people to achieve that goal.
Well, that and Wozniak's 1337 skills at hacking.
The real benefit of having a great hacker cofounder isn't the work they do themselves. It's that they can recognize and attract other great hackers to work for them, and that they're respected enough that those other hackers will give their best effort and not cynically slack off. You think that Jobs could have attracted Burrell Smith and Bud Tribble and Andy Hertzfeld alone if they weren't working with Woz? Or that he could've hired John Lasseter at Pixar without Ed Catmull and Alvy Ray?
I'm not familiar with the other developers you've mentioned.
I think a co-founder who puts as much effort in learning the industry and what goes on in the scene is still a valuable asset to have in a startup. Friends or people who just through out armchair ideas and can't match their ideas with whats going on in the industry don't add much value. But when a person knows his idea and knows the industry he can continually add value (beyond the technical level), and when your idea starts to change course from the original (which it often does with startups) he'll be able to adjust quickly with it.
But like trekker said, enjoying and being passionate about the industry will show to your co-founder programmer that you add value especially when you can continually surprise him by showing your still a step or two ahead of him about whats going on in the industry.
Ideas are also a dime a dozen and everyone has great ideas. Execution is the hard part. And if you don't learn how to do it yourself, you will always have to rely on someone else.
Do you think if you gave programming an honest shot, you'd sincerely like it? If the answer is "no", then forget it... don't learn how to program. Instead, find a programmer who likes your ideas and is willing to implement them for you, as an equal partner. This may be tough to find, but that's what you have to do.
Ideas have tons of value. In my opinion, ideas are insanely important. The best-engineered, slickest, cutting-edge application isn't going to make a flipping cent unless the user-facing features add value. And these features can be formed from ideas that ANYONE has - not just programmers. Don't think that you have to be a programmer to have great ideas; that's utter bullshit.
That being said, I think you do need to know your way around technology, because as a lot of people say you need to know the options; what is feasible, what is not feasible; what powers and raw functionalities you have at your disposal. Read Wikipedia articles about things like AJAX, server-side computing, search algorithms, social computing, etc. Watch Google Tech Talks about whatever sounds cool to you. Try to figure out what the current state of technology is - in terms of functionality and capabilities - across the CS/software board. You don't need to be a programmer to do this. But don't struggle through concepts that you find boring; read about stuff that seems cool and interesting.
The bottom line is, do what you love, period. Yeah it's cliche. But if you take up an activity because you care about the end result, and not about the journey, you're going to end up frustrated and will probably just give up. Whatever you're passionate about, do just that, and find someone else who's passionate about the rest to work with you.
But you should give programming an honest shot anyway, to find out if you like it. It's cool stuff.