Ask HN: Lean Legal for SaaS Side Project
What's the minimum legal shield advisable for a sole proprietor to sell a SaaS product whose only goal is a small stream of side revenue? There are so many Startup Weekend / 7 Day Startup programs out there and they focus 100% on getting you to release an MVP quickly to generate revenue, with no advice about how to avoid getting sued for shipping bugs in your software. (I get that the biggest blocker for most entrepreneurs is actually building a product, but it's borderline criminal to encourage people to sell something without the legal foundation to protect yourself from liability and undue taxation.)
There have been several HN threads about this, but they cover more elaborate situations:
* Incorporation outside the US [1]
* Startups with multiple founders or employees [2] [3] [4]
* Advice that is 5+ years old and posts have gone missing [5] [6]
What's the minimum legal incorporation necessary to limit liability and taxation for small-revenue side projects by a single developer?
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8870593
[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2925222
[3] http://startupclass.samaltman.com/courses/lec18/
[4] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8735793
[5] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1924719
[6] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2399139
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Clerky looks like a lightweight way to get incorporated, which is likely a helpful first step towards a minimum legal shield by making you not personally liable: https://www.clerky.com
An important second step in your minimum legal shield is having a good terms of service agreement for your product, which should further clarify to your users what they are getting, and what you are responsible for. You might look at Snapterms http://snapterms.com