Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

kalzumeus.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 342 posts

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#41

Post by davidw »

chvid wrote: post #34
davidw wrote: post #2

Sorry to hear about starfighter, but it looks like you've more than landed on your feet. Good luck! I think with a big company at your back, you may be able to leverage that to do some great things. People in the US have no idea how easy they have it with creating a company, something I helped to fix a little tiny bit in Italy: https://blog.therealitaly.com/2015/04/16/fixing-italy-a-litt... One of the key points: > A…

In Denmark you log in using your national identity card (a card with some one-off passcodes) on the following webpage; limited liability companies carries a fee of approx 100 USD, other forms of companies are free. The process takes a few minutes in the simplest case: https://indberet.virk.dk/myndigheder/stat/ERST/Start_virksom...

It's not for nothing that .dk is #3 on this list:

http://www.doingbusiness.org/rankings

But their reported procedures/costs differ from what you wrote:

http://www.doingbusiness.org/data/exploreeconomies/denmark/#...

Something that's nice in the US as compared to most continental European countries is that no 'initial capital' is required.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#42

Post by simonswords82 »

kbody wrote: post #11
simonswords82 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not wanting to do the concept for Starfighter any injustice but I get the feeling it's as simple as they spent too much time on the tech and not enough on the business. A very easy mistake when the co-founders are technically minded.

That too, but personally I think that it was targeting way to limited subset, required practically non-existant time if you already have a job, so it was mainly targeting capable people between jobs or college students. Even though I loved the subject of algotrading, there was no time for me due to work etc.

Totally - the business model just didn't hold up unfortunately.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#44

Post by edwinwee »

benmanns wrote: post #25

I applied to the Stripe Atlas beta but haven't heard any communication after doing so. Does anyone have insight as to how long the beta queue is?

We're still in beta, so we don't have an exact timeline for adding new users. Mind shooting me an email at edwin.wee@stripe.com with the email address you applied with?

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#45

Post by dfabulich »

mendelk wrote: post #9

Is there any official communication re Starfighter? All I can find is this: > Starfighter is not only not hiring, but also closing its doors. We are 'pivoting.' https://twitter.com/boboTjones/status/774303916464930816

There's also this from Sep 1:

> We’re winding down Starfighter. I’ll have more to say tomorrow. Long story short: still doing challenges. Just not as Starfighter.

https://twitter.com/tqbf/status/771533037666390017

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#46

Post by uola »

patio11 wrote: post #22
aeden wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slightly OT, but countries tend to dislike this brave new world where they cannot obviously and clearly collect taxes on business owners that reside in their country. It is going to be a tough day if the other shoe drops on this. No idea what it will look like if it happens though.

There exist some ways to abusively structure international tax affairs. That isn't what Atlas is about -- we help honest businesspeople get on a sound and legally compliant footing. You would not even believe how many weeks of my life I've spent the last ten years paying every cent I owe in Japan and the United States. Like every other business owner, I kvetch a bit about the rates, but I pay my taxes on time and in…

I just have a hard time seeing how "going international" is going to be easier. Suddenly you have to deal with a completely foreign tax system and people who are well versed in international tax laws in your own jurisdiction. A lot of people can't start companies abroad without considering controlled foreign company rules, double taxation agreements, permanent establishment etc.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#47

Post by engi_nerd »

kbody wrote: post #11
simonswords82 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not wanting to do the concept for Starfighter any injustice but I get the feeling it's as simple as they spent too much time on the tech and not enough on the business. A very easy mistake when the co-founders are technically minded.

That too, but personally I think that it was targeting way to limited subset, required practically non-existant time if you already have a job, so it was mainly targeting capable people between jobs or college students. Even though I loved the subject of algotrading, there was no time for me due to work etc.

> required practically non-existant time if you already have a job

This. I had Starfighter bookmarked to dive into this Christmas during my holiday break. No time before then.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#48

Post by basisword »

First time I've seen Atlas. I'm immediately worried. If someone starts a company using this I presume it's subject to US laws? What does this mean:

1. For taxes? If I live in the UK and start my business with Atlas does the US get the corporation tax revenue or the UK (or a split of the two)?

2. For data security/privacy? Is the data I store now subject to access by the US government through National Security letters and the like? I believe that if I was storing EU citizen data I'm subject to privacy shield but all data would be more susceptible to US government requests. Is this accurate?

Edit: Quite shocked at the number of downvotes a completely legitimate question is getting...

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#50

Post by kspaans »

aeden wrote: post #13
chatmasta wrote: post #8

What I like most about the long term vision for Atlas is that, if it's truly "as easy as spinning up an EC2 instance" to form a new corporation, then it will be possible for a single entrepreneur to create complex global corporate structures previously limited only to multinational corporations. How nice would it be, as say, a digital nomad, to be able to have a single "holding company" based in HK, and dynamically c…

Slightly OT, but countries tend to dislike this brave new world where they cannot obviously and clearly collect taxes on business owners that reside in their country. It is going to be a tough day if the other shoe drops on this. No idea what it will look like if it happens though.

How does making it easier to incorporate a business make it easier to evade taxes than, say, it is for an individual to do under-the-table services/consulting and not pay income tax?
Post reply on HN