Dropping out is probably not for you
<i>The simplest test of whether or not you should drop out is this one: If you have to ask someone if you should then you shouldn't.</i><p>I think I have a simpler test: Do you have a customer?<p>Of all the things that you need to do to start a successful business, I think that getting someone to pay you for your work is the hardest. Deceptively hard.<p>I've seen it all too often: Good technical skills. Check. Good design skills. Check. Work well together. Check. Building cool stuff. Check. Have passion and in the groove. Check. Sell something. Oh shit.<p>Let's not overlook the single biggest common thread to all those successful startups founded by college dropouts: they already had huge demand, often accompanied by people with checkbooks.<p>Don't forget the story of Bill Gates' parents telling him that if he dropped out of Harvard, he was on his own. By this point Micro-soft already had several $100K CDs in the bank and he said, "I don't think that'll be a problem."<p>That would be about the only way I would want to do it.