I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas • Hacker News Board

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#201

Post by fecak » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 12:21 AM UTC

TulliusCicero wrote: post #199

fecak wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The outbound sourcing work is the worst part without doubt, but the game took care of that for you. That, and the fact that it was backed by people with good industry names, was the beauty of Starfighter. I told Patrick that you already had the two hardest parts covered - engaging with qualified candidates and establishing credibility. You also had cred with the hiring folks, so that was taken care of as well - hirin…

> If you ever want to discuss recruiting stuff, I'm easy to find. Yeah you are. Do you use this same username everywhere?

It's my last name, the name of one of my companies, and it's always available.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#202

Post by owathray123 » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 12:37 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #189

owathray123 wrote: post #119

I for one am more than faintly relieved that Starfighter has fallen. It looked to me like an attempt to find the most direct way possible to parlay the prominent position that Thomas and Patrick have in this community into cash - by literally selling its members. There's a line that's crossed here between being a member of HN buoyed up by the good wishes and advice of your fellows, and using the community as a resour…

You'll be happy to know that me and my cofounders are still diligently at work finding new ways to convert HN karma to cold hard cash.

Well, that's a relief. I look forward to seeing your comments sponsored by SquareSpace.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#203

Post by jakobegger » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 12:39 AM UTC

idlewords wrote: post #58

I don't see any advantage in incorporation if you want to run your own private business, but I'm willing to accept that I'm being the weirdo here.

I'm also weird!

In my opinion incorporating only makes sense if you have multiple cofounders and want shared ownership, or if you get investment etc.

If you are running your business alone, I don't see the point of incorporation.

Limited liability doesn't magically protect you from lawsuits. But it does cost a lot of money (obviously this depends on location, but even if it's cheap to register a business somewhere, all the accounting and minimum taxes and reporting etc sum up).

I run my company as a sole proprietorship, and I'm not planning to incorporate any time soon.

I've seen people waste thousands of euros on incorporating and setting up a company, only to close up again a year later... what a waste of time and money...

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#204

Post by angelbob » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 12:45 AM UTC

chuamo wrote: post #188

Why would someone making 30k a week as a consultant take a job[1]? [1] https://www.kalzumeus.com/2015/05/01/talking-about-money/

Patrick had already spun down his consulting business before this happened -- I think before Starfighter started, even.

It was lucrative, but not pleasant, and he made more enjoyable money working for himself.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#205

Post by robryan » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 12:54 AM UTC

basisword wrote: post #48

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…

There is also transfer transfer pricing to contend with. You lose the some of the ability to have funds wherever you need them in your group without also having a plausible reason why your US entity is making no profit and all its funds are disappearing offshore.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#206

Post by robryan » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 1:13 AM UTC

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…

I think we are a long way from this, over time our company has incorporated in a bunch of countries in order to get access to rates and services that otherwise would have been hard for a foreign company.

I think often the hidden costs in lawyers fees for complex advice on how various tax laws interact and accountants fees to meet various account requirement in these juristictions may eat up a lot of the benefit until you are a much larger company.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#207

Post by jessaustin » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 1:18 AM UTC

rev_bird wrote: post #177

idlewords wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has to sit within the company. You can use it to buy an ice sculpture for the office lobby, but not for your own palazzo. As you can imagine, there is a ton of bookkeeping and bureaucratic pain associated with having an S-corp (like pretending to have annual meetings, and having to write minutes for them).

>It has to sit within the company. I don't think this is true. If you buy an ice sculpture for the office lobby, it's totally tax deductible (it's a business expense), but you can use money for whatever you want if you take it out of the bank as a "distribution" instead of a "paycheck." In that situation, you still pay income tax on the money, but not the other taxes.

IANAL, but this might still cause trouble if the firm has cashflow issues. If there's a $10k distribution one quarter, and the next quarter a $10k bill can't be paid, suddenly you're pierced.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#208

Post by exclusiv » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 1:24 AM UTC

jakobegger wrote: post #196

chuamo wrote: post #188

Why would someone making 30k a week as a consultant take a job[1]? [1] https://www.kalzumeus.com/2015/05/01/talking-about-money/

Maybe because 1) 30k contracts don't line up, and you never know when the next opportunity arrives; steady income may be preferable even if it is lower. 2) Money isn't everything. Working on interesting problems with interrsting people is a lot more fulfilling than doing boring work that pays well.

Yes exactly. You can get 30k per week consulting but not on the regular, esp. if you're doing the consulting and the biz dev. The sales cycle for getting 30k/week is long.

It's very hard to do week in week out. Getting $30k per MONTH for a small business is generally a 3-6 month sales cycle. One-time projects can be shorter of course, esp. in network, but you're always on the biz dev grind if that's your model.

He wasn't 250k/yr salary for 2 consecutive years and a suspect accredited investor.

I think it's cool what he's done and what he's shared to the community, but I do think he gets glorified for his posts which are not always realistic for most people and the projection is that he's killing it when he really isn't.

Also, part of me read this and thought this was sad to see a fellow entrepreneur jump ship, even though I do like Stripe and Atlas.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#209

Post by edpichler » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 1:24 AM UTC

I am enrolling Stripe Atlas and, to me, incorporating in USA will give me access to modern banking services, and platforms, as Stripe, and it seems USA has very lower taxes than Brazil, my country. That's why I am interested.

It all seems fascinating, but I am afraid to continue and do the last step of the enrollment. I don't know how is the process to close the company, what the representative agent can do for me, how much is to have an account on SVB (after the 24 free months), if it's easy to legally hire a person to work remotely anywhere, and if for some reason I will need to eventually travel to USA.

If someone have a answer for one of questions, I will be thankful.

Re: I’m Joining Stripe to Work on Atlas

#210

Post by codethief » Sat, Sep 10, 2016, 1:27 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #181

There are lots of services to help you incorporate. Incorporate.com and LegalZoom are well known. What's new about Atlas, other than bundling other services and charging more?

Compared to incorporate.com they are actually cheaper if you're not a US citizen / reside outside the US. (If I remember correctly, incorporate.com charges about $700 for that.)

Other than that, I totally agree with your question.