[chadboyda]

a) "It's business", move on.

b) Don't let it! Move on, worst thing you could do is drag this on and not be up front and clear cut about it, because then it will drag the life out of the project and you.

c) Talk to your lawyer! IANAL, but -- Have you signed anything? If it's pre-incorporation, and you haven't agreed to anything, it's kind of a non-issue. As for ConnectU, I bet the case gets thrown out anyways, they don't have a very strong case and the judge is already annoyed with them.

d) You answered it yourself, plus you've learned a valuable lesson about getting the legalities out of the way before engaging in any part of the business. A good part of incorporating is so that you have a clear way of dealing with dispute resolutions such as this when they arise (and believe me they will!)

[chengmi]

For part c), I suspect he's thinking he's going to be ConnectU trying to prove that the idea was his to begin with.

My suggestion is to try to find something that he's good at, and let him work on that. Otherwise, before you incorporate, sit him down and ask him flat out if he's committed to the project and share your concerns.

Very few projects I've worked on have succeeded without good communication. Sometimes it's just a matter of realizing that you're going to be the one carrying most of the weight (and varying equity to reflect this may be something you want to consider).

[SwellJoe]

"I suspect he's thinking he's going to be ConnectU trying to prove that the idea was his to begin with."

Then he'd be the one in the team that wasn't delivering. We're taking OP at face value and assuming he is the one that can deliver a product that the world likes and that the other person is lacking in that area.

[chengmi]

As I understand it, ConnectU brought Mark Zuckerberg onto the existing project. From there, Zuckerberg allegedly forked the code into what is now known as Facebook. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Facebook)

So assuming OP=ConnectU, the legal issues the OP's afraid of is that his partner will fork the existing code into something successful, even though OP has done most of the work thus far.

At least this is how I interpret it. Please correct me if I'm wrong!

[SwellJoe]

We agree in our interpretation, but disagree in whether this is a cause for concern.

If his partner can fork it and build something successful faster than OP, then the OP isn't the productive one and his current deadbeat partner is, the premise of OP is invalid.

Based on the original post, the OP thinks he is the one that can deliver and that his partner can't. If OP can't deliver a product that people want, none of this matters.

That's all I'm saying. You're assuming that ConnectU would have been successful if Facebook hadn't happened. I don't believe that to be the case.

[chengmi]

I agree that we agree in our interpretation... =)

I thought of this analogy in terms of existing code (rather than being able to deliver, because OP's partner could take the idea and find someone else to do the code). The OP wrote the existing code, which is allegedly what happened to ConnectU. Of course, if you discount the allegations and assume that Zuckerberg wrote the code himself, then the existing code argument is irrelevant.

This is an interesting debate that can actually be answered if the OP chimed in to explain what he meant!

Re ConnectU: I never assumed that ConnectU would have been successful if Facebook hadn't happened. In fact, I believe that the only way ConnectU would have been successful is if Mark Zuckerberg stayed on that project (or _maybe_ if ConnectU made him sign a NCA).