[P2P-F] couchsurfing becoming for-profit

[Dante-Gabryell Monson]

Thanks Robin,

the point you make about couchsurfing being a "corporation" - albeit with a
B "certification" - and not a "benefit corporation", does make a big
difference indeed,
so much so I feel like underlining it - quoting from the article you mention
:
*
*
*
http://charitylawyerblog.com/2011/01/15/b-corps-is-not-a-new-legal-form-by-keren-g-raz/#ixzz1XCmd10l9
*
*
*
*"The key difference is that the law requires a third party assessment** (
for a "Benefit Corporation"),*
*whereas B Corps is - only - *
*a certification." *

...

"Why the difference is significant:

• One can be a B Corps and yet be incorporated legally as a C corporation,
an LLC, even a sole proprietorship. In other words, *a company can be
certified as a B Corps without ever incorporating as a benefit corporation*

• One can be a benefit corporation under Maryland law without being a B
Corps. The Maryland law does not require that benefit corporations be
certified as B Corps. Rather, it requires that benefit corporations’ social
and environmental performance be assessed by an independent third party that
makes publicly available or accessible the following information:

1. The factors considered when measuring the performance of a business;
2. The relative weightings of those factors; and
3. The identity of the persons who developed and control changes to the
standard and the process by which those changes were made."


On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 7:28 PM, robin <robokow at gmail.com> wrote:

> >> On Thu, Sep 1, 2011 at 6:01 PM, Michel Bauwens <
> michel at p2pfoundation.net> wrote:
> >>> thanks Robin ...
> >>>
> >>> in theory, a B Corporation is not such a bad thing, no, as it is and
> remains
> >>> dedicated to a social good?
> >>>
> >>
> >> I don't know. I haven't researched much into this B-corp thing.
> >
> > Though there is something interesting here in my opinion, which is
> > that CS will be employee-owned. But how this will relate to
> > voting-power we don't know yet.
> >
> > The employees will have more voting power than the two investors, but
> > how the division will be and how much they can vote for (if it is only
> > the board or example) is publicly unkown.
> >
> > And we don't know either how the shares are distributed among the
> > employees (equally among employees or not, etc).
> >
> > As always has been the case with Couchsurfing, there is more we don't
> > know than what we do know :s
>
> The 5-year sage of Couchsurfing purposely misinforming the community
> continues:
> Couchsurfing: "This structure legally allows us to put our ideals
> before our profits."
> (try to read that sentence again).
>
> And yet Couchsurfing is not even a registered Benefit Corp
> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bcorp), but still a normal C-corporation
>
> http://www.bcorporation.net/index.cfm/fuseaction/company.report/ID/5e086197-f44e-4448-9519-5e35d5bde1e2
>
> Corporate Structure: C Corporation
> Ownership: Private
>
> See als: B Corps is Not a New Legal Form
>
> http://charitylawyerblog.com/2011/01/15/b-corps-is-not-a-new-legal-form-by-keren-g-raz/
>
> See also the discussion on the CS-group
> http://www.couchsurfing.org/group_read.html?gid=45507&post=10059584
>
> Robin.
>
>
> --
> Life happens at the level of events, not of words
>
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