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Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

anonfriendly.com

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Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#201

Post by throwaway81523 »

pilsetnieks wrote: post #194
gnulinux wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On the other end of the spectrum are organizations that offer "full anon friendly" where they don't request any information about your legal identity. I don't think that'd be legal in the US. Employer has to at least verify that the person is allowed to work in the US (i.e. a citizen, permanent resident, or a legal alien with some work visa) which requires revealing employee's true identity to HR. Or do you think t…

Shell corporation and contracts instead of employment.

I think in the past decade there has been some crackdown on shell corporations in the US. It is still very easy and cheap to start a corporation in some states but there has to be ownership disclosure. OTOH, money moves around without a lot of prior documentation and it's the recipient's responsibility to report the income.

I can say I was nervous enough about the whole picture to decline some work some years back, because the person wanted to pay in crypto and I felt like it would get me in for tax complications even though I was willing to do all necessary reporting. The person was outside the US, so some parts of US employment rules wouldn't have applied. I didn't know the other person's name and I don't think he knew mine. Neither one of us was being cloak and dagger afaict, but we had met online and the question simply didn't come up.

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#202

Post by bee_rider »

shortstuffsushi wrote: post #183
bee_rider wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't it still be possible to do contracts for $599, but like... one for each jira ticket/github issue or something? You could hypothetically set things up to not know who was resolving tickets, right? I mean it seems like a ridiculous way of getting work done, but fundamentally possible.

No, if you (as a contractor or employee) make more than $600 from the same person/business, you'd be obligated to report it, which would in turn make them obligated to report it, even if they didn't realize you had done more than a single contract for them. For this to work, you'd have to have independent shell corps make each chunk of work as well, which .. is probably also illegal. What could work is a middle man (…

That makes sense -- I'm assuming the company is going to follow the letter of the law, because they are a known entity, but the anonymous/pseudonymous individual is trying to break it.

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#203

Post by vel0city »

Canada wrote: post #170
vel0city wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a lot of people I associate with that I've never paid >$600 to do labor for me. Being able to associate != hiring someone for a job If you need to pay your friends >$600 to hang out with you, you should probably re-evaluate your life.

I'm not suggesting it's necessary to pay any person you associate with. It just seems a really intrusive restriction to legally report on anyone you pay. To me, it seems as absurd as having to file a report with the government on anyone you meet. I can see justification in narrow cases, but requiring it universally seems ridiculous to me.

> you really have a right to free association if you have to file a report if you pay someone $600 to do something for you?

> I'm not suggesting it's necessary to pay any person you associate with.

So you agree the right to free association is orthogonal to the idea of hiring people to do a paid job then, right? In which case, how is having labor hiring laws a violation of free association, when you agree you can still freely associate with people? In which case, arguing "free association" in terms of arguing that labor hiring laws being unjust isn't really a valid argument then, huh?

Like, I can go down to a park with a group of friends and not have to tell the government about it. I can attend a church and practice and not have to tell the government about it. I can have a dinner party at my home with my friends and not have to tell the government about it. I can freely associate with whoever I want, that's not a crime.

I can't hire a bunch of people who are not legally allowed to work in this country, as currently the government wants to disincentive unrestricted immigration and have made this action of paying people for labor they deem improper illegal. This is an immigration policy, not a free association policy. FWIW, I'm one to argue we should relax some hiring practices and reduce barriers to immigration in many ways, but this really isn't a "free association" kind of issue.

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#204

Post by FastMonkey »

vasco wrote: post #24

> soon most work will be done pseudonymously Eyebrow raised very high 81 days this article was discussed in HN: https://www.sofuckingagile.com/blog/mourning-loss-as-a-remot... In it, among other things, we learn a team member who was not even anonymous passed away, and the company only found out when the person's wife created a support ticket because they didn't know basic facts about them. If after reading that arti…

I wonder what the correlation is between people who think this is a good idea, and people who feel anxious and lonely. Not saying this is the only cause, but if you make decisions like this you'll end up isolating yourself from some pretty great support networks. Isolation and separateness is not a great long term environment for mental health.

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#205

Post by blablabla123 »

pessimizer wrote: post #82
vasco wrote: post #24

> soon most work will be done pseudonymously Eyebrow raised very high 81 days this article was discussed in HN: https://www.sofuckingagile.com/blog/mourning-loss-as-a-remot... In it, among other things, we learn a team member who was not even anonymous passed away, and the company only found out when the person's wife created a support ticket because they didn't know basic facts about them. If after reading that arti…

I think it's a great setup. I don't understand why I'm supposed to think it's a bad setup other than that Pete's wife didn't have enough information to pick up his pay without going through support, but that's Pete's fault. Any story about a friendly person dying is sad. His employer not having documentation on him is the least sad thing about the story.

At first sight it is a great setup. And yet to take the argument to the extreme and considering unregistered work, at first it seems a good deal for workers, less paperwork and less taxes etc. But it only works until workers try to make use of their rights, get sick or similar, then it can turn out to be really bad.

I think overall it's fixing the right problem (complex paperwork, privacy issues) but not in a sustainable way.

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#206

Post by titanomachy »

rootusrootus wrote: post #176
cs137 wrote: post #129

This sounds like a good thing, but I'm not sure it is. Capital wins under the current system because the bad guys control your reputation and career, but capital will win under a pseudonymous work system too because careers will cease to exist (or, in any case, will be difficult to assemble) and the commoditization of labor will be complete. I'm a very "out" antifascist, and I've lost jobs due to my public not-liking…

> I'm a very "out" antifascist, and I've lost jobs due to my public not-liking-fascists That kind of statement makes me curious. What kind of behavior do you exhibit that has cost you jobs?

I'm also interested.

If I'm running a company that has to do business with ordinary people, I want to avoid hiring someone who vocally and publicly espouses radical political views that many people would react to negatively. Even if they are "pseudonymous", since it could still become known later on that they are associated with the company.

Different people define "fascism" so differently that being "antifascist" could mean anything from protesting against the KKK, to actively working to bring down the capitalist world order (which happens to be the framework in which most companies have to operate.)

If I have radical political views, that's the part of my life that I'm keeping pseudonymous.

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#207

Post by michaelt »

gnulinux wrote: post #164
0xPersona wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes! And I think that's an important point to consider. Personally I think of "anon friendly" as existing on a spectrum. Organizations offer various degrees of it. Some "anon friendly lite" organizations will allow you to work pseudonymously, the entire organization doesn't need to know your legal identity, but certain personnel (like execs/HR) will. On the other end of the spectrum are organizations that offer "full…

> On the other end of the spectrum are organizations that offer "full anon friendly" where they don't request any information about your legal identity. I don't think that'd be legal in the US. Employer has to at least verify that the person is allowed to work in the US (i.e. a citizen, permanent resident, or a legal alien with some work visa) which requires revealing employee's true identity to HR. Or do you think t…

If you were a normal business then sure, you might well be officially incorporated in America.

But what if you were intending to build something more like Silk Road - a business, but with no identifiable legal entities involved? And avoiding prosecution not by following the law, but by being unidentifiable?

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#208

Post by sbarbarian »

I can see wanting to keep my job secret from my peers, but not from my employer. How can you build trust with whomever you're working with? I can't imagine feeling comfortable sending anything in writing in a work environment to a colleague who has no reputational accountability (both within / outside the firm).

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#209

Post by woodruffw »

Canada wrote: post #145
chias wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also have some more questions, such as: * how do you provide me with health insurance and other governmental benefits? * for the purposes of anything official, am I as an individual technically unemployed? * how do you provide me with retirement options such as a 401k? * how do you report on my earnings to the IRS?

The buyer of your labor could pay your health insurance directly, or reimburse you for it. For the purposes of anything official, you are unemployed. You would not get any retirement options. Your earnings would not be reported to the IRS. Your government could say it's illegal to receive money under these circumstances, and they basically do. But think about what that means.

> For the purposes of anything official, you are unemployed. You would not get any retirement options. Your earnings would not be reported to the IRS.

That's called "job fraud," and it's a crime in most countries.

Re: Show HN: I made a site that shows jobs where you can work pseudonymously

#210

Post by ghaff »

francisofascii wrote: post #69

Anyone know if security firms already do this by default? For example, if you work for the NSA, do your co-workers even know what your real name is?

Sample size of one. Bay back when I had an offer from a three-letter agency, I wouldn't have been pseudonymous but I would have been officially working for some other government organization. I also had to book my own travel and they paid my expenses in cash on the spot.
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