On 8 February 2016 at 11:05, jdd <jdd@dodin.org> wrote:
Le 07/02/2016 22:54, Per Jessen a écrit :
I'd be happy to establish and run a "Friends of openSUSE Verein" here in Switzerland, but as long as there is no openSUSE entity to receive the sponsoring, it would be pointless.
opensuse already have sponsors
https://en.opensuse.org/Main_Page
https://static.opensuse.org/themes/bento/images/sponsors/sponsor_ip-exchange...
https://static.opensuse.org/themes/bento/images/sponsors/sponsor_b1-systems....
not speaking of SUSE :-)
Long time ago, when the Foundation was discussed it was abandoned because we couldn't grant the foundation could protect the openSUSE trade mark, but now it's not question of this.
The association I mean of wouldn't have any property on openSUSE. Depending of the amount of money collected, it could promote openSUSE on various ways (printed doc in various languages, sponsoring boots...), hiring a developer being one of the most expensive.
We could begin with a small membership fee, just to see if this project is popular.
The association should probably involve in his board most (all?) the openSUSE board to make people trust it.
Right now it's only an idea.
what do the readers of this thread think of it? Is it simply worth discussing? if yes we have to open an other thread on project-
jdd
I'm open to the idea, and I'd be interested to see how a discussion on -project goes That said, and returning to the point that triggered this conversation, I think it's important to have realistic expectations about what such an organisation could achieve If the goal is 'this organisation will be able to hire developers to work on the openSUSE project', I think it's worth pointing out that if you consider the salary, insurance, social services and other expenses of a single developer, it's very easy to reach costs in excess of €100,000 per person What difference will one developer make, when openSUSE already has hundreds? I believe this to be why many open source e.V.'s and other such associations don't hire developers. If the goal is to fix things, the problem that needs to be solved is 'more contributions' in the areas of interest to the people requesting them - and I am not convinced that the direct application of money for developers is the best way to secure those contributions. Better bug reports, more engagement between developers and users, more users turning themselves into contributors, are all far more sustainable ways of achieving that. And in that case if the goal of the proposed association is 'support the openSUSE Project financially in order to enable them to attend more events, have more marketing, etc' then I'm stuck with the simple fact that it has been years since the openSUSE project has found itself lacking for money in this area. If people stand up and do the work, we normally find a way to find the money to make it happen - SUSE have been remarkably supportive in this regards, as demonstrated by their sponsorship of several community run openSUSE Conferences, new merchandise, TSP, event sponsorship, etc etc So, hmm, my thought out of the gate that this is 'nice to have' if we can make it work, but I want to make sure people's expectations of such an endeavour are realistic from the outset Money may make the world go round, but openSUSE is an project powered by contributions first, not cash. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org To contact the owner, e-mail: opensuse+owner@opensuse.org