EVE New Citizens Q&A

Create a corporation with the intent of becoming a full time CEO.

Benefits.
A sense of community.
A challenge trying to run a full scale corporation in EVE.
Easier to set goals and have like minded people that can help you archive said goals.
When things go well you can feel a sense of pride that you are the reason it happened,
The game becomes "more" then follow orders and press F1.
The corp will truly feel like its "yours".
People will look up to you (unless your a really bad CEO of course!)
Joining alliances and getting allies will be easier.
Full control of all corp assets
Your corporation's reputation and your personal reputation become intertwined. Note that this can be a disadvantage as well.
You can create a Reverse Safari corporation (recruit people with the intent of awoxing them) (thanks goes to "anonymous").

Disadvantages.
Drama, don't be fooled, in any group there will be drama.
War decs are much more likely to happen, especially if/when you advertise your self as a new corporation.
When things go bad it's your job to fix it.
Your corp members are your responsibilty, it's your job to keep them safe.
Awoxers and thieves are something that will happen, and it will feel bad when it does.
If things fall apart you might have trouble joining a different corporation, not wanting to let go of what you had.
Its difficult to adjust to not being in a leadership position once you have done it.
Your amount of free time will go down, a lot.
People expect that you have a magic wand that can fix everything.
Members will leave, sometimes just one at a time, sometimes half the active players. It's your job to keep morale up.
You have to take on roles that you have no interest in (recruiting being a prime example).
You will get enemies, and the more members you have, the more your list of enemies grow. Either because you recruited someone who is universally hated, or because someone got pissed and rage quit the corporation, because your members happened to win a fight, and in some cases just because your members are at the wrong place at the wrong time
You have to wonder who is being friendly because they are kissing your ass, and who is being friendly because they respect you as their CEO and fellow player?
Without the knowledge and experience, decisions will be more difficult, and are more likely to fail and put both the corporation and its members in harms way.
Have to spend time (and often money) to set up ways to gain proper communication between you, your directors, and corp members (examples would be things like forums and voice communication).
What you want to do is second priority, since your corp members become your first priority.
You have to be able to delegate responsibilities and make sure people do what they are supposed to (thanks goes to Petrus Blackshell)
There are expenses involved with running a corporation, and especially for younger players the ISK needed to support projects or other expenses can be difficult to obtain.

Becoming an official corp thief

Benefits
It can be a pretty lucrative profession once you know what your doing.
The excitement once you know your going to pull it off.
You might get your own headlines.
Your victims "tears" are transfered into a nice bounty you can show off.
Social groups. Even the "bad guys" have friends, and you can gain a close network of fellow thief's, scammers, awoxers and similar you can share your stories with.
People will know your name, some will fear you, some will hate you, some will love you, and thus legends get started.
Pick the right target, and its fairly easy to gain access to their assets (thanks goes to Hells Pleasure).


Disadvantages
Time consuming, expect to spend weeks or sometimes even months planning and preparing for a heist.
Ruined reputation (unless you use alts).
Everyone will try to kill you (thanks goes to "anonymous").
Requires extensive knowledge about game mechanics and social skills (thanks goes to "anonymous").
Can be a very lonely experience until you find a social group you can interact with on a regular basis (thanks goes to "anonymous").
A lot of trial and error, most professionals wont give away their trade secrets (thanks goes to "anonymous").
Even if you have good advice to give, some people will reject any advice from you out of spite for your profession.

-EDIT-

oooh shiny!

So this is what you've been doing.

Good (wo)man.

True and false...

It really depends on how you play when you are solo

There is plenty of "solo" activity, as in you don't need a lot of members in your corp to do it.
There are public incursion fleets, there are public PvP roams.

Just because you don't have actual members doesn't mean you have to play alone.

As Nightcrawler listed, the added benefit of it, you don't have annoying corp member nor do you have improper leadership to deal with.

Like you i also dont approve of new players trying to create a corporation without the experience and knowledge needed.
However, new players will do it regardless of how many vets tell them its a bad idea, and while some succeed most fail and will continue to do so.
My hopes with this "guide", lacking a better word for it, will help those new players realize exactly what their decision entails, and maybe encourage them to take the time to do more research, think about it twice, read the linked CEO guide, talk to people in the CEO channel and not just jump into it blindly.
Maybe if some of the new players choose to do one of these things, it can help that person and their corporation to actually survive and not end on the list of "just another noob corp that will fold within 2 months".

I like this thread. It's not an easy thing to leave the newbie NPC corps for some people. My first corp adventure sure was short and facepalm worthy, all I can say to other upcoming capsuleers, if you are not going to join some of the well known "newbie corporations" - figure out the general idea of what you want, and then do some research. Just dont join the first corporation that asks you in because you feel you are in a hurry to join a corporation

Petrus Blackshell

Thank you for the additions! They are now included in the OP

DMC
I'm not at a computer at the moment but I will include that as soon as I can (later today most likely)

This option will be included soon, but since its a subject i dont have much knowledge about give me some time (hopefully within the end of the day) and the new section is completed and added.
I will admit tho, pretty interesting reading this stuff, learning a lot reading guides and similar at the moment