People say that the most important decision you will make when starting a companyis choosing a cofounder. It bears repeating. The commitment you should have toyour cofounder is not unlike the commitment you make when you get married.Today, while we were sitting at Arlington Diner eating our 3pm breakfast, we cameup with five questions you should ask yourself before getting married. Thesequestions are also relevant when starting a company with someone.1. Are you great at things your cofounder isn’t?It is important that cofounders exhibit complementary skills and commonobjectives. Identify your weaknesses and make sure those are your cofounder’sstrengths. I want to spend most of our effort on perfecting the presentation layerof our first product, but Adam makes sure we invest in our backend code so it iseasily expandable to future product lines. Adam is good at Adam stuff; I’m good atMatt stuff; together we are good at Xobni stuff.2. Can you commit to a 2 year cell phone contract with a “family plan?”Sorry Mom, but Adam and I just signed up for a family plan. There is somethingvery permanent about signing a 2 year contract with someone you are not relatedto. The funny thing is Adam and I didn’t even hesitate because Xobni has manyyears ahead of it.Side Note: We signed up for Sprint with the EVDO data plan. It is awesome. We eachgot a Treo 700wx which runs Windows Mobile. There were two motivations behindgetting these smart phones. First, it is much more relaxing being away from yourdesk for an hour when you know you have access to all of your email anywhere yougo. Second, many of our users are adopting these devices; it is important for usto understand this trend.3. Can you share a bedroom?If you can’t share a bedroom with your cofounder for a month, you probably aren’tright for each other.Adam and I are currently sharing a room. Adam remarked the other day that it feelslike summer camp. It reminds me of our first week back in the MIT dorms. This isnot our permanent living situation and we appreciate that a degree of separationis healthy. However, we are temporarily living with our friends until we decide ona permanent location for our growing company. Sharing a bedroom is a temporarysacrifice for ultimately making the best decision for the company.4. Do you trust them with a joint bank account?Adam and I aren’t taking individual salaries. We put enough money into a jointpersonal account to pay for things like rent, food, and Adam’s voracious appetitefor Edy’s ice cream and Chips Ahoy Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies. My personalindulgence is the recently discovered bliss of Bustello coffee. If you can’t trustyour cofounder with your opulent salary of $1,200 per month, you are going to havetrouble when the company bank account has more than three zeros.5. Will you make dinner AND clean up afterwards if your cofounder is drowningin serialization code?I don’t plan on marrying someone that even knows what serialization code is, butthe analogy is valid. You are both going to encounter difficult challenges and ithelps to have someone to lean on when stressful times arise.