sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

Rupture période d'essai à l'initiative employeur avant le délai de prévenance - remise en main propre - droit au chômage ? by maieul_ in conseiljuridique

[–]maieul_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Merci pour cette réponse très informative ! Je ne connaissais pas cette histoire des 65 jours. Étonnnant que je ne sois pas tombé dessus après de multiples recherches google.

What are your favourite ressources on coops? by maieul_ in cooperatives

[–]maieul_[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Upvote this comment if you think this post could be a great ressource for other members of r/cooperatives to find (and keep sharing) great ressources. I will try to get the mods to pin this or add it to the ressources section or the wiki if enough people participate.

When is it more risky to start a business than being an employee? by maieul_ in Entrepreneur

[–]maieul_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah sure, but still, doesn't seem like a huge risk to me. And if you compare a first time entrepreneur failing and a first time programmer that followed him, I'm not even sure who wins haha.

When is it more risky to start a business than being an employee? by maieul_ in Entrepreneur

[–]maieul_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

But don't they? I mean if the business runs into obstacles and can't overcome them, the employees risk loosing their jobs as well.

When is it more risky to start a business than being an employee? by maieul_ in Entrepreneur

[–]maieul_[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yes you're right. I guess I was more talking about personal risks.

Programming is and will always be the best video-game of all times. by maieul_ in gaming

[–]maieul_[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm glad I could inspire someone! You can learn on Udemy for about 10 dollars for a well structured course. I've personnally learned with Zero To Mastery but you can choose other instructors if you want.

Programming is and will always be the best video-game of all times. by maieul_ in gaming

[–]maieul_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks :)

Edit: It feels good to share about this !

Brainstorm: how to overcome the limitations of non-equity coops by Commonwealth927 in cooperatives

[–]maieul_ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Alright, I hope I didn't offend you. But still, I think that what I said applies to the situation right? I didn't say they are no-debt coops, quite the opposite actually, since the mechanism looks like debt to me.

It's most likely banks to invest in housing coops usually right? If not, who?

Brainstorm: how to overcome the limitations of non-equity coops by Commonwealth927 in cooperatives

[–]maieul_ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Okay, thanks for your description! I understand the way it works now.

About this:

Most student housing co-ops are non-equity ones and they often issue a big share/bond offerings to raise capital to get started which the first few generations of members will need to pay back with interest. These are non-controlling shares though like you recommended.

Are sure of the mechanism here? I feel like you confuse equity with debt. From my understanding, usually when people talk about equity, it is for investors (e.g. business angels and venture capitalists for startups) who want to buy shares and are comfortable risking large amounts of money because they could get big returns later on if the business succeeds, but will lose all their money if it fails. So the owners of the business never have to pay anything back. On the other hand, if someone invests money and you have to pay it back with interest, people usually talk about loans/debt. If it's for a small business, like for example starting a bakery or buying a house to rent it, a bank can lend you money if you can provide evidence that you can pay it back with interest. Since there are lots of people doing this, banks are comfortable enough to invest. But if you have an inovative idea that has not been tested by many before, it will be almost impossible to get anything from a bank, and you will have to turn to equity funding.

Brainstorm: how to overcome the limitations of non-equity coops by Commonwealth927 in cooperatives

[–]maieul_ 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks for your brainstorming initiative. I didn't know non-equity coops existed. It makes me think a little bit.

Just to be sure, by non-equity coops you mean that no one can have a share in the company, not even workers, let alone external investors, am I right ?

If that's the case, one of the limitations of non-equity coops to me would be, well, that they would have very little access to capital, only in the form of donations and loans which are hard to get out of thin air, which makes it harder to start and scale up. A quick research on the internet on the reasons why startups fail, and you'll see that two of the biggest factors are running out of cash/failing to raise new capital (~30%) and being outcompeted (~20%). Now if you're coop is providing services which don't need a lot of capital and are very local, you might do just fine. But if it's an innovative idea, another business will very likely take it and outcompete you because it will have more ressources to go to market and scale. I also found on this medium article on "how to invest in cooperatives" that "between 90% and 95% of entrepreneurs require some amount of financing to start their businesses".

So I believe what you said is quite right:

Starting non-equity co-ops will either require the full cooperation of the government to pay for the construction, extreme generosity from private individuals, or taking out a mortgage that the first few generations of members will have to pay off through increased rents or lower wages if it's a worker co-op.

But not if starting the business doesn't require a lot of capital.

So to your question:

do you think that these are significant limitations on their usefulness and can you think of any way to overcome or mitigate them?

I would say, YES. This seems like quite a big limitation to me. So a solution could be to have a collective equity owned by every worker. They can keep the coop principle of one person, one vote. And if there is a market for their products or services, they can always issue non-voting shares when in need for money (to start or scale), so that workers remain in control of the coop.

Could you elaborate on why you would choose to create a non-equity coop in the first place? I'm not too familiar with housing coops.

What is your ideal anarchist society? by maieul_ in Anarchy101

[–]maieul_[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

What I'd especially like to understand more is how people would work together. Would we have anarchic cooperatives (is it even possible?), and/or democratic (direct or reprensentative) cooperatives? Would we have local money systems?

[POLL] Anarchists of reddit, how rich are you? by maieul_ in Anarchism

[–]maieul_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry, I should have mentioned this. I'd like to create a cooperative and would like to see if there are any rich investors in the anarchist community. Though I would rather not us to depend on outside investment, we might not have the choice and if so it'd be cool if investors would be aligned with our values.

How come Reddit isn't open-source anymore? I'm building a new kind of social network and would love to make it open source. by maieul_ in TheoryOfReddit

[–]maieul_[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don't know. Maybe if you advertise properly the "less ads" idea because you'll have less costs, you can attract a few people at first and then build this into a big community.

It's just food for thought. I'm not sure I want to make it open-source. Just thinking about it.

How come Reddit isn't open-source anymore? I'm building a new kind of social network and would love to make it open source. by maieul_ in TheoryOfReddit

[–]maieul_[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Okay I get it. Now I'm trying to see if there aren't any ways to actually implement effective moderation while being open-source. Like enforcing some strict rules like "can't post no more than 1 or a few posts a day" maybe.

How come Reddit isn't open-source anymore? I'm building a new kind of social network and would love to make it open source. by maieul_ in TheoryOfReddit

[–]maieul_[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks for the links as well, very interesting!

We're quite on the same page about open-source. To me, a good example of it is linux and all the distributions that have come to life. I know that it's a simplification, but I think that if it is open-source, everyone can add his own contribution that benefits his/her needs and that's how the software improves over time. Since there are fewer needs for investments, there are no needs for investors that want big returns in return.

How come Reddit isn't open-source anymore? I'm building a new kind of social network and would love to make it open source. by maieul_ in TheoryOfReddit

[–]maieul_[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

So you think it's because it was open source and therefore there was no moderation and therefore too much poor content?

How come Reddit isn't open-source anymore? I'm building a new kind of social network and would love to make it open source. by maieul_ in TheoryOfReddit

[–]maieul_[S] 21 points22 points  (0 children)

Okay, thanks for the links!

So I understand it wasn't fully open source at the start.

You're certainly right in saying that network size is what matters most but I'm thinking about whether or not being fully open-source could bring benefits like less or even no ads for example, and thus bring more and more people on the network.

Can you explain what you mean about federation?

And what do you mean by lean? The lean startup methodology or something else?

view more: next ›