HN user
http://insomanic.me.uk
the value is the community - it's a bunch of low-ego high-motivation folk all building and sharing their own journeys. if you already have a large relevant community around you or don't value connecting with peers so much then it might not be for you (nothing wrong with either of those).
Soon! Want to drop me an email? ay@stripe.com
(I work at Stripe, based in the UK.)
Our pricing in EU countries where we've launched (UK + Ireland) starts at 2.4% + 20p (we've revised pricing for each country when we launch out of beta). We regularly give volume pricing well below 1.8% - so at both ends, considerably cheaper than the range quoted above.
Also, which country are you in? Stripe is available in full production-ready beta in France, Germany, Spain, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Sweden and Finland, with more countries in the coming weeks - keep an eye on https://stripe.com/global for updates.
You can sign up and start using Stripe to process live transactions instantly in all our beta countries - this is a key requirement for us as we expand globally.
(I work at Stripe, here in London)
Great write-up - I hadn't seen that graphic before but it's great - full credit to the original source http://startingandsustaining.com/.
As a Stripe-r, I can't complain about the OP's conclusion in any way :) As stated they are based in Denmark, and Stripe is not currently available for Danish businesses - that's on us to fix, and we're certainly working on it.
However, re: the title "How to choose a payment provider for your Europe-based SaaS startup" - the situation in Denmark is not representative of Europe as a whole.
Stripe has now launched here in the UK[1], and we now have betas available in Ireland, France, the Netherlands and Belgium - with the latest released in the past few weeks. So if you're based on one of those countries, please do give us a look. And if you're based elsewhere, well - I guess we need to keep up the pace and hurry to your country ;)
[1] https://stripe.com/blog/introducing-stripe-uk
As other commenters have mentioned, it's really easy to make mistakes comparing complex pricing across different providers. With Stripe and PAYMILL, the fees quoted are all you pay. With Braintree's interchange+ pricing, they actually state themselves that "Total costs are typically 1.8% to 2.6% of the transaction. There is a minimum cost of €100 per month"[2]
http://oneleap.to/ - social enterprise spin on the idea, you pay to charity to get your message through.
This made me laugh as I remembered my initial hourly quota for dial-up internet access :) But yes, similar story for me - programming my ZX spectrum to make my own games was where I started out.
Yes, really. That's an interesting link, thanks. But to be honest, I don't find the stat surprising. I spent a term studying CS at Surrey in 2004 - I couldn't immediately find the 2004 rankings but it ranked 8th for CS in 2008:
http://www.thecompleteuniversityguide.co.uk/league-tables/ra...
That first term consisted of multiple choice exams in C and HTML, where one of the questions didn't have a correct answer.
In short, I sadly don't think that any lines can be drawn between 17% unemployment of CS graduates and a supply of great available talent.
Speaking as someone who's processed 200+ applications and hired 7 engineers in London the past 2 years, sharing stories with my colleagues at other companies - great talent is very hard to find.
This is an issue I'm very passionate about, and I'm sure many others are too. I'd love to hear other's thoughts on how we educate the next generation and the best way to teach coding in 2012.
We're working on improving this - in particular reply-all listserv in the pipeline ;) -- Andy @ GroupSpaces
Thanks, we saw Tender - but they don't have a way of disabling the other parts of the system (forum etc) apparently.
Look handy - thanks! I'll check these out.
well, for the penny or so that it cost us to display our GroupSpaces ads to you, we've received coverage in a blog post that's hit Hacker News. so I guess I'm not feeling too unhappy with that. ;)
Sure it would be nice for some users if FB had a "don't show me this ad again" button. But I guess it's fair to allow them some control over their monetization..
When I first read it quickly I thought it sounded a fair complaint, then I saw this comment and figured I should think again. On 2nd read I picked up the subtleties re: undocumented behaviour, reason behind the change & effect reverting it would have and yes, I think I agree after all.
Different 'bug', similar theme: I'd be v. interested to hear what HN folks think about http://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=47494. I explained the problem here: http://insomanic.me.uk/post/191397106/php-htmlspecialchars-h...
Summary: PHP 5.3 introduces a scenario where:
display_errors=off, log_errors=on => warning msg is logged (but not displayed, of course..)
display_errors=on => NO warning is logged OR displayed(?!)
yes, but how much would have been paid for the right to broadcast 100 times on a radio station with 10,000 listeners?
it's easy to see artists don't get the same returns from radio as CD sales. spotify and the like are a new medium again - but with more similarities to radio than CDs imho.
Say Apple hosted an online "poll" asking "Are our laptops the best? Yes/No/Probably" with a "see results so far" link. Would that be "publicity"? Or would it land them in the poo legally?
P.s. I don't mean this to be focused on religion. The interesting question to me is "is it legit to host an online poll backed by a significant ad campaign and present fake results?" If it helps, try imagining that this is a poll by some other brand asking "Do you think our product is the best?" and presenting you with what they make out to be what other people think.
Seems to me like this is deceiving the public. How do poll results (or not) relate to advertising standards laws?
did anyone else get the irony of "flipping is good" as the title to an post full of alternative f-words..?
I think the biggest way this is escalating is the telling "download google's new browser" link that tellingly found it's way onto the (famously traditionally sparse) google homepage.
For many non-tech-savvy people, Google is the internet. Just like people type URLs into the google search box, if they see a message saying "download new browser from Google" they're likely to interpret it as "download the new internet"..!
Fair to say that never before have so many "mainstream"/consumer computer users been exposed to such a simple call to switch browser..?
"Scribd has seen the number of searches double (the number of uploads increased by 70% as well"
aye.. might be worth going with the notion that chances of different sites existing at www.domain and http://domain (in particular those different sites being used as the identities of two different people) is probably 0.00somethingverysmall.. sure google etc do their funky duplicate content detection but y'know, i reckon you guys could just add a "this aint right" button in the same style as your ones to flag fakes etc, and then just wait for the day anyone actually uses it before worrying what to do about this.
Cool. Possible to do anything to solve the www-vs-no-www (essentially duplicate content) issues?
(entered my websites then immediately wondered if I should enter them with/without the www as I may sometimes leave that out when commenting.. also searched for a friend and his blog came up twice in the people search results)
agree about failing loudly when bad stuff happens - but exceptions are best reserved for truly exceptional circumstances. in webdev everything arrives from the browser as a string so implicit casting is more of the norm. if your user enters something dumb into the quantity field of your shopping cart it doesn't really warrant abandoning the rest of their input and leaping back up the call stack to a "misson failed"-level error handler.
functions like is_numeric('string') exist for the rarer situations where things like this actually matter, but php's default way is simply reflective of it's nature as a loosely-typed language.
in PHP "foo" == 0 due to how php handles type juggling - the string is converted to an integer before the comparison, with strings that don't contain numbers converted to 0. so "foo" == 0 and "0" == 0 but "1" != 0.
no way..you actually did just register it.. :D well happy to help, glad noone beat you to it!
plus points for not naming it ticketstumblr..
"How much will my startup be worth in 3 years?"
"Definately."
Hmm.. should really repeat and average..
"Will my startup be worth megabucks in 3 years?"
"Yes."
Sweet - I like this one.
the same thing occurred to me after reading the first half of your comment..
This reads particularly well to me. Are his sources valid? Can anyone with more knowledge on the subject suggest whether this guy's talking sense?
I've studied @ Oxford, have friends at Imperial and Cambridge. Not sure how to say where's "best".. however there's big differences in approach/material studied.
Oxford is small (~20 undergrads/year doing straight CS) and the courses are extremely academic/theoretical in nature - both could be a +/- depending on what you're looking for. The tutorial system at Oxbridge (where you get a few hours personal time with a professor each week) is definately the big bonus that defines what makes it a great education. It's definately not a way that works for everyone though.
For me, choosing where I wanted to study was less about the course and more about the experience I'd have while there - it's a personal thing but I find I learn best by teaching myself, so for me priorities were whether I liked the city, atmosphere, plus the overall perception/reputation of the university since it's obviously nice to come out with a certificate from a "brand name" that people will respect.
The best things about Oxford are the people you meet and wide range of other things to get involved in alongside your course - wherever your friend's looking, I'd definately suggest they use this as part of the comparision.
Let me know if you've got any more specific questions/want follow-ups.
I'd find it very interesting to find out about anyone else's experiences linking home-schooling and startups (or, what makes for an entrepreneurial mindset..)
I was home-schooled till 11, when I entered school in a class a year ahead of my age. that was 12 years ago, now i'm running a startup (our 2nd employee starts next week)
I've been thankful to my mum ever since for spending the time with me when I was younger - it definately gave me a head-start with learning and a different perspective from many people. Anyone else have home-schooling experiences they relate to entrepreneurship?