
Show HN: Creators selling files from their own host, Dropbox etc. - latteperday
https://filesprout.com/l/
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davb
How does it handle VAT MOSS on digital goods in the EU?

The new rules state that sellers must charge VAT at the rate of the buyer's
country and must record evidence of the buyer's location. Even businesses
under the VAT threshold must register for VAT just to comply, unless you're
selling through a third party who handles it for you - like Google Play.

~~~
BrentOzar
> How does it handle VAT MOSS on digital goods in the EU?

They don't. See: [https://filesprout.com/support/what-do-i-
need.html](https://filesprout.com/support/what-do-i-need.html)

"If after talking with a professional you are responsible for paying sales tax
for your items, you'll have to add this into your pricing manually."

~~~
calgoo
IF someone provides the service with the VAT support i think it could actually
work quite well for a lot of small vendors.

~~~
bizifyme
We also provide the service to help you with the EU VAT (and Norwegian VAT)
and we also provides payment by SMS (mobile phone) for a lot of countries and
a lot more.

[https://www.bizify.me](https://www.bizify.me)

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nitrogen
Sounds like what [https://gumroad.com/](https://gumroad.com/) used to be when
it started (am I remembering correctly?).

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gavreh
Still is - you upload your files to Gumroad though - not a big difference.

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adzicg
how are you handling redownloads later?

I used to offer my books through my web site directly, but I moved everything
to leanpub because I didn't want to respond to 'bought six months ago, want to
download again' emails any more.

~~~
asadlionpk
this is probably one reason why gumroad switched to hosting files themselves.

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izzydata
How do I link to the file without it being public in the first place? I'd want
it to not be publicly accessible, but only accessible through the purchase.

If the link is just hidden that doesn't really solve the security risk of
someone downloading the file from the public dropbox url or wherever else.

Perhaps they store the file on their server and you can unlink the file from
your own server? I doubt that is the case though.

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ousta
taking 5% for doing what exactly? I assume this does not include the paypal
fee right? so those guys are basically charging at least 1,5% more than paypal
for handling what a wordpress+paypal does? what about the analytics of the
sale? do they even provide some service around that?

~~~
matt_morgan
If there are thousands of people for whom it would make more sense to set up
Wordpress to do this, there are millions for whom it wouldn't.

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an4rchy
So quickly checked out Gumroad's fees and it's 5% + 25 cents per transaction.

This is a similar a similar service but you can just store the files locally,
minus the 25 cents transaction fee.

Does it matter if files are hosted on their server or yours(3rd party) if they
can access them via links anyway?

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snehesht
How do they solve the problem of "sharing dropbox links after purchase" ?

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flabbyrabbit
"the purchaser can then download the file from your storage via our website,
so the file's location is never exposed." It looks like their site acts as a
proxy to the dropbox link which only allows those who have paid to access the
file

~~~
hasenj
They need to put that info in a more prominent location

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mjnaus
SnappyCheckout has been rocking this functionality for several years now...
and they're cheaper as well.

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amelius
Interesting. Can I also sell access to my blog? Or do I have to write my blog
in a different format first?

~~~
giancarlostoro
This is likely not the problem they're trying to solve. This is more of a
solution for selling files / access to files, and they provide (assuming) a
proxy to that file so people don't just paste the link to the file everywhere
on the internet. What you're looking for is to make your blog accessible only
by certain registered users, and sell access for accounts. Unless you sell PDF
files of the things you blog, then you could use this service that way.

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deedubaya
Memberful already does this really well, and provides a number of other
features.

Memberful.com

~~~
ddoscampaign
Maybe they focus on different niches?

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et2o
5% seems a little steep on top of what Paypal or Stripe take.

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sitkack
Hidden != Secure

Punting on this is kinda ridiculous.

