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Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

blog.coinbase.com

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Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#161

Post by my_username_is_ »

redisman wrote: post #126
BurningFrog wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or people start traveling all the time, and WFH starts meaning "Working From Hotels". It's hard to predict the post lockdown world is what I'm saying.

I don’t know about that. Most people won’t enjoy being on the road. Even I who has done a lot of long form travel for fun got sick of it once I had to constantly travel for work.

Like most conversations with WFH, this wouldn't need to be an all-or-nothing proposition. I wouldn't want to live on the road forever. But I'd love to take three or four weeks a year and live somewhere entirely new and learn about a new culture. I'm sure there are some people that would want to travel more than that, and some that would want to travel less. The key is providing flexibility to allow people to live the life that they want for themselves.

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#162

Post by nostrademons »

azinman2 wrote: post #150
nostrademons wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also jumped the shark in 2007, 2000, 1989, and 1972. Bay Area has always had boom & bust cycles, and the busts can last for 5+ years. They also seem to precede the recession by about 2-ish years. I'd agree that 2016 was effectively the end of the last boom, 2016-2018 we were coasting, and the crisis was COVID in 2020. So we'll probably see the next boom start around mid-2022, and really get going through 2023.

That doesn't mean that 'this time is different' is wrong. Unfortunately without true oracles, only time will tell.

It's possible that this is the end of the Bay Area's tech ascendancy - there's no guarantee that whatever wave comes next will take off in the Bay first. But the region still has most of the ingredients that slant the odds in its favor: an educated and very hard-working population; a dense, diverse population to support chance encounters; lots of rich people to provide funding; and plenty of active research being conducted by the major corporations and universities in the region.

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#163

Post by gamblor956 »

caseyf7 wrote: post #116
gamblor956 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is paperwork, but you don't need to establish a new entity in every state/country where you have an office or employee. You can simply register your existing company as a "foreign" business in all of the jurisdictions where it is not legally incorporated (and this is what most businesses do). Generally, you only have a location-specific business created if there are location-specific benefits acquired, or benef…

This greatly oversimplifies how it actually works to be a foreign Corp in many states. You might be able to get away with this for a year or two but you will eventually be in a world of hurt. Once you have an employee in a state and you are making sales on that state, the tax and regulatory bodies will come after you. Your customers and partners will be reporting you, your payroll provider will make mistakes, and dis…

??? This is literally how most multi-state businesses operate: 1 company, registered as a "foreign business" in other states, with a single multistate payroll provider like ADP handling the payroll function. (Yes, the company will be subject to tax and legal service in any state in which it has an employee, which is why generally when I was still at a firm I generally advised clients against remote employee arrangements.)

Note that a "foreign business" is a technical term in this context, simply meaning that a business operating in one state that is incorporated in another state. (See for example https://www.californiaregisteredagents.net/incorporation/for...) For example, almost every YC company is incorporated in Delaware, but is registered as a "foreign business" in CA where they are physically headquartered.

At the international level you usually form subsidiaries, due to the vast differences between laws at the national level, but some companies will simply register a "branch office" in other countries in which they have small operations. In fact, many countries, like the U.S., have tax forms specifically for these companies: the Form 1120F...

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#164

Post by gamblor956 »

boring_twenties wrote: post #65
gamblor956 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Employees don't realize that taxes are the reason companies generally don't allow for remote positions. It's not just payroll taxes at stake. In a nutshell, having an employee in a tax jurisdiction creates a taxable nexus for the company, meaning that they can be subject to income taxes, commercial taxes, sales taxes/VAT, etc., in that jurisdiction. (And note: this has been part of domestic and international tax law…

Does it work the other way around, too? E.g., if live in New Hampshire and work remotely for a New York company, do I have to pay the NY income tax?

In some states...yes. Like New York, and especially NYC, which has its own income tax scheme. (See for example https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/23/new-jersey-latest-state-to-j...)

Otherwise, no. Most places in the U.S., you are treated as earning the income where you are actually physically located (i.e., your home residence).

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#165

Post by rorykoehler »

dmode wrote: post #148
mac01021 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No HQ need not mean no office.

I have worked in a mostly remote company. Eventually everyone just stops going to the office as they are not sure if anyone will be there. Eventually the real estate sits empty and the employer exits it

Doesn't happen in our company.

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#166

Post by gamblor956 »

redisman wrote: post #143
gamblor956 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tech isn't CA's only industry... CA's large GDP is the result of the diversification of its industries. CA has the largest agricultural industry in the U.S., the largest manufacturing industry (yes, people still make things in the U.S.), the largest entertainment industry, and the largest tourism industry. And that doesn't even take into account the purely local-market GDP in the Bay Area, LA/OC metro area, or San Di…

> the largest... Shouldn’t you at least divide these by population to get any meaningful metrics? Otherwise you’re just saying it’s the largest state in different ways

If you divide by per capita, CA is still the largest in these industries per capita, and even where it isn't, it is still close to being the largest.

Everyone thinks CA is just tech and entertainment, but CA is a very diversified state, which is why it has been able to weather COVID19 so well despite essentially no tourism in 2020.

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#167

Post by warkdarrior »

beachy wrote: post #141
missedthecue wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how business travel goes away. You just can't effectively build relationships over zoom, phone calls, and email. It's just not possible. Ask anyone who's been in a long distance relationship.

> Ask anyone who's been in a long distance relationship. Hardly a fair comparison. You don't have to love, or even have any real feelings towards business colleagues, customers etc. The opposite to a long distance relationship.

In business at a minimum you need trust and empathy, both of which are easier built in person.

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#168

Post by warkdarrior »

elietoubi wrote: post #139

This is such a bad title for a crypto company. How can Brian Amstrong really think that Coinbase is decentralized?!?

I know, they did not even put their employees on the blockchain! /s

There are many kinds of decentralization, and in this blog post it refers to decentralization of location -- there is not one place that is "Coinbase headquarters".

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#169

Post by warkdarrior »

throwawaysea wrote: post #11

I am really looking forward to a future where we can all spread out to the locations we want and live the way we want. The trends of the past few decades towards big urban destinations means that people come to cities and encounter political strife trying to each make it how they want it, and no one is ever really happy. We already have a fix for that in our political system, which is to limit the amount of governanc…

This is probably the final blow to unions. Without sharing a physical place and with many distinct jurisdictions, employees will not get a chance to unionize. Enjoy your serfdom!

Re: Coinbase is a decentralized company, with no headquarters

#170

Post by bulek »

owenmarshall wrote: post #159
bulek wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Important to note that Gabe gave the product rights that the fired team were developing. Said team went on to have a successful Kickstarter (250% successful!), and then failed in actually delivering results. In hindsight, seems smart to pull the plug so far in advance. I'm sure the complaints about informal power groups, careful politicking being required and gaurded groups are true... if only because that's true in…

> In hindsight, seems smart to pull the plug so far in advance. Not knowing the product, this looks like it may be a valid interpretation; could another be that the project would be more likely to succeed with the commercial backing of a company like Valve?

Absolutely, let me walk back my language so that its clear I'm extrapolating from very limited data.

Edit: I can't edit it anymore. Was going to change it to "Based on this limited insight, it may have been the best option for both parties to part ways given the project teams complaints and valves lack of interest in the product"

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