He’s like if a weatherman and a used car salesman had a baby somehow

Do you prefer the idea of new owners gaining their voting rights gradually during the “Provisional Period” (1 share / 1 vote) or should new owners have full voting rights on day 1 (1 person / 1 vote)?

• How would you capitalize?

There are two primary ways to raise funds for startup:

1. Pre-incorporation dues: During the “club phase,” owners will contribute funds periodically to establish the governance and initial systems. Volunteer efforts only during the club phase.

2. Post-incorporation labor contracts: Similar to a hiring agency, the CEO can negotiate labor contracts with other businesses with the goal of hiring out owner labor to bring in initial capital. The owner gets a paycheck and the margin goes toward capitalization of the business plan, a win/win. The percentage of the labor contract value that is paid to the owners doing the labor should be fixed by vote, and all bonus pay must be suspended while labor contracts are active since they are a funding mechanism, not a business model.

This plan is helpful because it no longer requires workers to have the same employer just to organize a union, you can simply create your corporation independently and with whomever you like. Additionally, the larger and more specialized your co-op is, the greater your bargaining power will be.

The startup sequence becomes:

Server Setup >> Recruitment >> Elections >> Dues >> Incorporation (C-Corp) >> Labor Contracts >> Business Plan Implementation

Read the Master Staffing Agreement template.

• How would you actually become a business?

Integral to this plan is the Articles of Incorporation template that is intended to be filed with the co-op’s state as the “constitution” defining what the company is and why it exists. In the AoI I specify equity controls and governance, as well as additional protections from oligarchical takeovers. Here’s an outline:

• Anti-Oligarchy: Altruistic mission statement, individual contributors only, limits on stock purchases, no speculation
• Democratic Governance: General Conference elects officers to the Board of Directors
• Opposing Incentives: President’s bonus based on payroll/equity, CEO’s bonus based on business surplus

This is intended to be used to create a C-Corporation in the US, and it must be reviewed by a licensed lawyer in your state before it can be used. The ideas, however, are universally applicable.

Read the Articles of Incorporation template.

• How would you initially get started?

The first step for a group that wants to organize will be to get the ERP software running.

For maximum privacy, the group could obtain a desktop computer to run the software on initially with the intention to move to server hardware after capitalization. A technically inclined member of the group would reprogram the computer to turn it into the ERP server and then host it through a Dynamic DNS service.

Alternatively, they could use a hosting service and pay a monthly fee.

Once the software is running with logins established, the group will be able to start writing documents, electing officers, and capitalizing.

Techno robber barons pushing us toward ecological disaster? Why would anyone be afraid of that? /s

Although on a serious note, I don’t despair; I’m taking action, and I hope plenty of others are as well.

Dilution should require a vote from owners.

Would it be helpful if that had been written into the company’s AoI and server software?

Yeah I wouldn’t mind an experienced dev taking over the architecture, but I will proceed myself if that person doesn’t come along. If you were worried about it not being applicable outside the US, stuff like the eligible_1099 field could be converted into a “country_config” object or something like that. I’m already planning on supporting all currencies so it would make sense.

In terms of modularity, I’ll have to think about it some more. I’ll spend some time looking into those projects and consulting about it with the LLM today.

Now about that spreadsheet and reddit post. That’s not just something to consider, that’s a person to contact. I would love to see how their ideas have developed in the past 4 years. I’ll have to grab a burner today. Thank you!

To the office, to fight the corpos!

Why not use existing projects? A combination of my specific design requirements not existing anywhere else and my lack of software architecture experience. My background is in systems and organizational theory, and while I have experience in mathematics related programming, this is my first server architecture. So that being said, I’m certainly open to ideas as long as that doesn’t stop it from working right. I am planning on integrating different tools like messaging, and I’ll certainly use something like Continuwuity for that. It’s just that for the core database design it really needs to have a specific integrated schema, at least that’s my opinion. Like I said I’m open to ideas, my goal is to get the project done.

I’m not familiar with ERPNext but it looks interesting. As you pointed out this is US based, so it looks like I would have to take that into account as well.

In terms of sensitive information, the US does have laws about Personal Identifying Information, so the “Party” table has a corresponding “PartyPii” table with information that isn’t subject to audit and can be deleted. Home address, email, phone, etc. It is also stored encrypted, so while I’m sure I don’t have it all figured out yet, these things are on my radar.

In terms of MVP, I will certainly be testing out front-end funtionality as I build it. Start with a login page that accepts a default user and brings you to a dashboard page. Get the accounting going so you can make Journal Entries, etc. Prettymuch going by the “Core Design” section at the start of the README and testing in chunks. But in terms of actually seeing if it meets it’s intended function, unfortunately that comes down to an actual beta version I think. I will need to host it and invite people to participate with “points” instead of money.

Someone over on beehaw suggested Svelte for front-end mock-up so I’ve been playing around with the tutorial. It’s certainly neat. I should be able to get demo pages going without too much trouble, they just won’t look too special.

And yes, I have begun thinking about the day to day. I think non-management members need to have a pretty significant capability with just a mobile version of the pages, since not everyone has an actual computer. But either way I want the information to flow smoothly through the organization.

Thanks for your input!

Yeah I’m a big fan of that instant render. I’m sure I’ll have questions, thanks again

Looks extremely useful I’ll play around with it tonight. Thanks

Hey thanks for your thoughtful analysis, I didn’t know I needed a gimp suit for business! Sounds like those grocery workers certainly had them on! I don’t know how people are supposed to live like that.

You certainly make a fair point about capping pay. There should probably be a max ratio for the hourly rate (or monthly/yearly as the case may be). Assuming the officers get an hourly rate like everyone else (which is the way I want it to work), you would want that max pay ratio to be defined explicitly. The bonuses are also voted on so if that gets to be too much the voters can knock it down.

I started a public matrix room for the development of the server software. I’m pretty far along on the database schema now and you can even check out the new and improved Articles of Incorporation I drafted, including an analysis of it after I ran it through an LLM for an objective take. Message me if you can’t get it through matrix.

There will also be a set of Bylaws and it’s an open question if max pay ratios and bonus rates should go in there or in the AoI. If it goes in the AoI you have to file an amendment with the state, but the Bylaws are just internal votes.

In terms of the software, I’m going to make it so you can do things like anonymously submit or endorse your boss’s expulsion from the company, then send it to an anonymous vote. Pretty extreme to be sure but I’ve had bosses who deserved it. On the technical side I’m confident in my plan for secret votes and other challenges, but I would certainly welcome any input on it.

https://matrix.to/#%2F!dVwyUzAwiuIflwnpEF%3Amatrix.org%3Fvia=matrix.org

EDIT: And here’s the repo if you’re interested: https://codeberg.org/Brachylophus/Apoidea

Obviously everything is off, we’re falling into tyranny. Anybody wants to take action, look in my post history or PM me.

Thanks for all the great solutions, I’ll be looking into your advice. Like you said it is definitely a massive project for a beginner, I’m going to take it a step at a time, and maybe do a smaller experimental app first to get my bearings. The good thing is I’m not in too much of a rush so I have time to learn.

My current thinking is that the vote is electronic but you get a paper receipt with a bar code or something. Not sure how it will turn out, like many of these apps it’s a whole project in itself

I was thinking lemmy because of the voting structure. Since it’s internal discussion it could be used by the management to gauge sentiment in the company. It wouldn’t be for federation.

You’re probably right about it being too complex though, just not sure if there’s a lightweight option that’s a closer match than discord discourse (does discourse having voting?). Something to consider.

Sorry I know that’s a bit unclear. The “staff roles” and “managers” are roles that the CEO is able to assign to staff through the software. In other words, it’s the mechanism the CEO uses to construct their hierarchy. Same with performance metrics, those are written expectations that would be entered into the system for each person’s role.

Hmmm, doing some research on containers now, and it does seem like the right way to do this. I’m still learning about server architecture but I didn’t mean to imply it had to be a monolith, the key is it having the capabilities I need.

I’m going to look into Docker and see what I can deploy on it. Seems like a good first step.

Thanks

Yes definitely a beginner with anything networking or web design.

Modular is good though, ideally I would like to bring them all together as one package to share as open-source. I don’t know how that would work with permissions for the applications, but I imagine it would be OK with most (foss) licenses.

There are also some things that might need customization. For example, the value of someone’s vote is determined by the equity recorded in the accounting books, so those two applications will need to share information.

In any case you have given me some direction and I appreciate it, thanks.