Have you ever worked directly with investors? Perhaps you got a bad experience.

A lot of investors are very helpful and provide great mentorship. Interests are generally aligned and allow early platforms (which challenge incumbents) to survive 

I'll have both investors **and** collaborators. It's not black and white, and imo shouldn't be for me/sn.

k00b

Hey so SN raised a seed round

I sure hope you are right.  My experience is that outside investors bring with them a whole new level of stress.  If what you want are collaborators, how about bringing in a technical partner?  Someone who will actually work side by side with you, every day.  Give them some ownership instead of a VC.