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I don’t know how to deal with legal things. I spoke with my local SBA advisor who said I need to get a lawyer since I will be collecting PII. The quotes from la

I don’t know how to deal with legal things. I spoke with my local SBA advisor who said I need to get a lawyer since I will be collecting PII. The quotes from lawyers are pretty expensive and I’m not exactly from a socioeconomic background that I’ve been around lawyers or used their services. However, do you know of any services or specific people who can help (cookie cutter service for people getting started/noobs)? Thanks

kingnothing 5y ago
Every single web app and internet-connected mobile app handles PII (IP address, geolocation data, and email address all qualify). Unless it's particularly protected, like health info or storing banking info, you'll probably be OK to learn how to handle it on your own to get a product to market. You also need to understand the impact GDPR, CCPA, and app store requirements have on what you're building. Then there's the legal side of actually creating the company itself, plus concerns around copyright, trademark, and patents if applicable. At the end of the day, you're going to have to learn some legal stuff to succeed as a founder.
- coward123 5y ago
  I'm in full agreement with kingnothing here...and in fact if your industry / niche is such that you need to do these things, you need to gain domain knowledge even more than you need to talk to a lawyer.
coward123 5y ago
Can the SBA advisor point you at a lawyer? Are there lawyers in your area that partner with the SBA? In my state, there are law firms that everybody knows has focus on early-stage companies, and surprisingly their fees are reasonable (though they may put you with a junior lawyer). Often people are scared to talk to other professionals - accountants, lawyers, etc - because they think it will be crazy expensive. I've been really pleased with how affordable their services can be for basic consult, documents. It's only when you are in litigation that it gets crazy (don't ask me how I know). So - it might be just a couple hours (let's say $600 or so) for some of their time to get all your questions answered. In fact, I've found a brief coffee with a lawyer will often answer all my questions and that only if we have to do something with them after that point does the meter start running. Point being: Get comfortable talking to these people, they are your allies.
dasil003 5y ago
> I spoke with my local SBA advisor who said I need to get a lawyer since I will be collecting PII. IMHO this is really putting the cart before the horse. When you are bootstrapping, the first thing to understand is that you can only do 0.1% of all the things people will tell you that you "need" to do. That means what you really need to do is apply your own judgement identifying the critical work that will move the needle like understanding what people are willing to pay for and building it. Of course you should use some minimal measures to protect yourself from legal risk (eg. start an LLC), but generally speaking your biggest risk is no one knowing or caring about what you are doing. Don't start by asking a bunch of experts as that will lead you down the path of "playing house" as PG describes in his Before the Startup essay (http://www.paulgraham.com/before.html http://www.paulgraham.com/before.html)
csomar 5y ago
Forget about GDPR, PII, Incorporation, Taxes, etc... No one is going to care about you/what you are doing unless you are making real money or disrupting something. Once you start making real money, start spending some of it on regulation/legal.

kingnothing 5y ago

Every single web app and internet-connected mobile app handles PII (IP address, geolocation data, and email address all qualify). Unless it's particularly protected, like health info or storing banking info, you'll probably be OK to learn how to handle it on your own to get a product to market. You also need to understand the impact GDPR, CCPA, and app store requirements have on what you're building. Then there's the legal side of actually creating the company itself, plus concerns around copyright, trademark, and patents if applicable. At the end of the day, you're going to have to learn some legal stuff to succeed as a founder.

coward123 5y ago
I'm in full agreement with kingnothing here...and in fact if your industry / niche is such that you need to do these things, you need to gain domain knowledge even more than you need to talk to a lawyer.

coward123 5y ago

Can the SBA advisor point you at a lawyer? Are there lawyers in your area that partner with the SBA? In my state, there are law firms that everybody knows has focus on early-stage companies, and surprisingly their fees are reasonable (though they may put you with a junior lawyer). Often people are scared to talk to other professionals - accountants, lawyers, etc - because they think it will be crazy expensive. I've been really pleased with how affordable their services can be for basic consult, documents. It's only when you are in litigation that it gets crazy (don't ask me how I know). So - it might be just a couple hours (let's say $600 or so) for some of their time to get all your questions answered. In fact, I've found a brief coffee with a lawyer will often answer all my questions and that only if we have to do something with them after that point does the meter start running. Point being: Get comfortable talking to these people, they are your allies.

dasil003 5y ago

> I spoke with my local SBA advisor who said I need to get a lawyer since I will be collecting PII. IMHO this is really putting the cart before the horse. When you are bootstrapping, the first thing to understand is that you can only do 0.1% of all the things people will tell you that you "need" to do. That means what you really need to do is apply your own judgement identifying the critical work that will move the needle like understanding what people are willing to pay for and building it. Of course you should use some minimal measures to protect yourself from legal risk (eg. start an LLC), but generally speaking your biggest risk is no one knowing or caring about what you are doing. Don't start by asking a bunch of experts as that will lead you down the path of "playing house" as PG describes in his Before the Startup essay (http://www.paulgraham.com/before.html http://www.paulgraham.com/before.html)

csomar 5y ago

Forget about GDPR, PII, Incorporation, Taxes, etc... No one is going to care about you/what you are doing unless you are making real money or disrupting something. Once you start making real money, start spending some of it on regulation/legal.