Ask HN: deferred compensation structures, pre-funded startup

I am in the pre-funded prototype development stage of my product and have been making some very useful connections with people who are interested in contributing to the effort (UX, design, code, biz dev) for deferred compensation. The part I want to think through carefully is how to protect both myself and the collaborators in this equation -- without writing formal legal contracts etc. It seems that getting into legal costs would put the cart before the horse at this stage. We're building the proof of concept. My thoughts have been to write a brief statement of understanding that simply gets iterated/emailed/signed back and forth describing the timings, expectations and compensations. Not a formal legal doc, but at least concretizes and marks the basic understandings. But I am trying to think through the compensation part. How does one structure something before one has an established biz structure? .... * Equity. * Placing a monetary value on hours spent to be compensated at time of