Re: Perl 6 fundraising and related topics.

On Wed, Feb 20, 2008 at 11:55 PM, Conrad Schneiker <
conrad.schneiker@gmail.com> wrote:

> I've repeatedly encountered remarks about how much Perl 6
> development is constrained by the fairly severe time and
> energy constraints of its overwhelmingly volunteer
> development team.


Here is something to consider.  Unless we can afford to fund an individual
full time with enough money for them to pay for their own health coverage
and other benefits, the amount of time they are volunteering is already as
much as they can afford.  In other words, they still have to work a regular
job and make time for their family (or whatever substitutes for the real
world) and giving them money isn't going to equate to them being able to
devote to more time.  That isn't to say that these volunteers don't deserve
to get compensated but it is unrealistic to expect that money will equate to
more time in many of the cases.

The statement above does not apply to everyone and those who do freelance
and consulting work could likely devote a great deal more time if they would
be compensated in some way for their time.

I myself, with a few others, made a failed attempt at funding Audrey to work
on Pugs full time and her rate was ridiculously low - $100 USD/day.



>
> So over the next few months, I'm planning to learn about
> fundraising, and see what I can accomplish on behalf of Perl
> 6 development. To that end, I'm soliciting:
> (1) your suggestions for preparation,
> (2) your ideas for proposals, and
> (3) your reasons why the Perl 6 ecosystem (including Parrot
>    and CPAN6) is one of the world's greatest and and most
>    extremely leveraged causes (technically, economically,
>    and socially).
>

I am mostly ignoring the rest of what others have said in this thread
because I think it is detracting from your intention of getting money to
people to work more.  Here is one thing that has frustrated me about TPF.
They are a non-profit organization.  Yeah, kind of suprising that would be
the frustrating thing.  The issue is that they can't take money from Bob to
give to Sue to work on Bob's widget.  This is an extreme oversimplification
but in general, they have to abide by the rules that allow them to keep
their non-profit status.  Where am I going with this?

Regardless if we use TPF or not, I think what will get more people to
contribute is having some say as to where there money goes.  To that end, I
suggest having a list of projects currently being funded.  A donator can
choose which fund their money goes to or can choose a general fund if they
don't care.  I don't suggest these projects be generic and nebulous either
(though they could be for the same reason a general fund is).  In other
words, there might be a Rakudo fund - generic.  There might also be a fund
to fix RT # 31415 which is a Rakudo bug.

I am not suggesting this is the solution to all the problems.  It likely
will create more.  What I can tell you is the number one thing that has
prevented me from donating a lot more money is having little to no control
over where it went.  Actually, it has been years since I have contributed to
TPF.  Now, I just write a check to the individual(s) I want to help.  I
don't get the tax write off but I know where my money is going.

In closing, what we don't need is something to fight over.  Hopefully you
will find the sweet spot - I sure hope you do.

Cheers,
Joshua Gatcomb
a.k.a. Limbic~Region

In my $life, I raise money from sponsors.

It is not difficult to spend money, once you have it.
It is not difficult to raise money, once you know how to spend it wisely.

What's difficult is putting the two together.

Some donors know what to contribute to - they choose specific projects
and people.
Some donors want to help achieve a general aim - they give to a
foundation that will wisely spend the money for them (eg. Warren Buffet
giving gazillions to Bill Gate's foundation).
Any sponsorship program should enable both ear-marked and general
contributions (and I am certain if the paper-work's done right, this can
be achieved within TPF).

To be frank, the ONLY reasonable systematic way of managing a
sponsorship process is to have a Foundation, and the foundation should
have people who are trusted, who already have contributed to the
process, and who are prepared to report back on how the money has been
spent. The Perl Foundation meets these criteria.

If you spend time on administration, you are using resources, in just
the same way as programmers hacking on the code. So if the officers of
the Foundation are paid for their efforts, that is acceptible so long as
the payments are commensurate with resources spent in other directions.
It is not a mathematical formula, its a question of balance and fairness
and transparency.

No one likes bureacracy. But I feel much happier about handing over
money, or persuading someone else to hand over money, to a group of
people with established procedures and collective responsibility, than
to some enthusiatic individual who promises the earth and whose the
world-number-one genius at code writing, but might also go and blow the
whole lot on girls and booze cos his cat died.

Whilst debating issues like parrot vs pugs, or single-track vs parellel
track development, can be quite interesting, especially if it induces
Larry to compare straight lines to mountains and railroads, it is likely
to be more useful to have suggestions like chromatic's - 1month of
dedicated work for $5000.

How about adding a page to one of the web sites where offers of help,
time and expense, can be made?

The micro-grants idea is great. What I have seen of the results and
reporting is fine. More grants, more people, and more results are
needed. How about everyone reading this thread thinking about a
micro-project they can do.

Finally, there needs to be recognition for the sponsors, both those that
donate their talent resources such as volunteer designer, implementors,
& hackers, and those that donate just cash.

How about a mandatory section of text at the top of each core and
sponsored module that lists the sponsors? Just like license text. That
way all contributors are recognised when/if perl6 becomes the
predominant programming environment, those names become distributed
around the world.

Me too. $500. That's 3*500, so far.

Can I do this through the Perl Foundation as an earmark?

Conrad Schneiker wrote:
> On Thursday 21 February 2008 06:25:42 Joshua Gatcomb wrote:
>  =20 
sing 
y's 
and 
>
> Not to me it isn't. :-)=20
>
> Count me in as person #1 of the 9 others.
> =20
>  =20 
> they
>  =20 
>
> Good ideas.
>
> Best regards,
> Conrad Schneiker
>
> www.AthenaLab.com
>
> http://www.perlfoundation.org/perl6  =97 Official Perl 6 Wiki
> http://www.perlfoundation.org/parrot =97 Official Parrot Wiki
>
>
>  =20

> From: moritz@casella.faui2k3.org [mailto:moritz@casella.faui2k3.org]
> Sent: Friday, February 22, 2008 1:24 AM
>=20 
> parellel 
induces 
> likely 
help, 
>=20
> Very good idea.

++

> Any takers?
>=20
> I would, but my internet connectivity is severely constrained atm.
> That will change from April 15th on, if noone made it until then, I'll
> do.
> But it would be shame to wait that long ;-)

We have the Perl 6 wiki.=20

That might be a good way to set up a preliminary version.

I could help out this wend, but right now I've got to catch up on
sleep and $work.

Best regards,
Conrad Schneiker

www.AthenaLab.com

http://www.perlfoundation.org/perl6=A0 =97 Official Perl 6 Wiki
http://www.perlfoundation.org/parrot =97 Official Parrot Wiki

On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 11:03:03AM +0300, Richard Hainsworth wrote:
> No one likes bureacracy. But I feel much happier about handing over money,
> or persuading someone else to hand over money, to a group of people with
> established procedures and collective responsibility, than to some
> enthusiatic individual who promises the earth and whose the
> world-number-one genius at code writing, but might also go and blow the
> whole lot on girls and booze cos his cat died.

Let me make a clear statement here.  I have no trouble with the
committee making its decisions--that's what the committee is obliged
to do.  The committee is *not* obliged to feel secure about that;
(nor do I feel obliged to allow them to feel secure about that ;)
nevertheless, the committee is also not obliged to demonstrate its
insecurity by heaping scorn upon such persons of indeterminate feline
attachment while turning them down.  A simple "no" would suffice
without the we-had-to-say-this-because-you-suck bits.

By the way, it's possible that I might deserve a little more money,
because *my* cat died last year, and as near as I can tell, I didn't
spend any money on girls and booze because of it...  :)

Larry

OOOWWW my tail is burnt!!! But I wasnt on the committee... promise.

Sorry about the cat...

So lets get some money into this Foundation, so that, perhaps, Larry
might possibly, if he deserves, get a little more money.

Richard

Larry Wall wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 22, 2008 at 11:03:03AM +0300, Richard Hainsworth wrote:
> 
>
> Let me make a clear statement here.  I have no trouble with the
> committee making its decisions--that's what the committee is obliged
> to do.  The committee is *not* obliged to feel secure about that;
> (nor do I feel obliged to allow them to feel secure about that ;)
> nevertheless, the committee is also not obliged to demonstrate its
> insecurity by heaping scorn upon such persons of indeterminate feline
> attachment while turning them down.  A simple "no" would suffice
> without the we-had-to-say-this-because-you-suck bits.
>
> By the way, it's possible that I might deserve a little more money,
> because *my* cat died last year, and as near as I can tell, I didn't
> spend any money on girls and booze because of it...  :)
>
> Larry
>

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008, Joshua Gatcomb wrote:

> I am mostly ignoring the rest of what others have said in this thread
> because I think it is detracting from your intention of getting money to
> people to work more.  Here is one thing that has frustrated me about TPF.
> They are a non-profit organization.  Yeah, kind of suprising that would be
> the frustrating thing.  The issue is that they can't take money from Bob t
o
> give to Sue to work on Bob's widget.  This is an extreme oversimplificatio
n
> but in general, they have to abide by the rules that allow them to keep
> their non-profit status.  Where am I going with this?

This doesn't make any sense to me. There's nothing about being a nonprofit
that prevents TPF from accepting donations targeted to a specific program.
There's a bit of accounting overhead to make it happen, but it's perfectly
legal and in keeping with TPF's 501c3 status and its mission.

> Regardless if we use TPF or not, I think what will get more people to
> contribute is having some say as to where there money goes.  To that end, 
I
> suggest having a list of projects currently being funded.  A donator can
> choose which fund their money goes to or can choose a general fund if they
> don't care.  I don't suggest these projects be generic and nebulous either
> (though they could be for the same reason a general fund is).  In other
> words, there might be a Rakudo fund - generic.  There might also be a fund
> to fix RT # 31415 which is a Rakudo bug.

I don't object to the idea of targeted donations, nor of having the
community be more involved in that targeting. Sounds groovy.

However, I'm not too interested in handing my personal cash over to TPF.
I've thought about this for a while, and I'm convinced that for a variety
of reasons, TPF should be working on getting most of its funding from
corporations. One of the main reasons is simply that there's more bang for
the fundraising effort. I can't afford to give TPF $5k, but there's many,
many companies using Perl that could easily give $5k or maybe $50k.

> over where it went.  Actually, it has been years since I have contributed 
to
> TPF.  Now, I just write a check to the individual(s) I want to help.  I
> don't get the tax write off but I know where my money is going.

I would never do this, because it's not tax-deductible. Also, if you pay
them enough (>= $2k, I believe) you'll have to file a 1099 form because
they're now a subcontractor for you ;)

Personally, I really think it's important that any money funding Perl work
go through TPF. It keeps things tax-deductible _and_ it imposes a higher
degree of accountability on the process.


-dave

/ *=======================================
============
VegGuide.Org                        www.BookIRead.com
Your guide to all that's veg.       My book blog
 ========================================
===========*/

On Thu, 21 Feb 2008, Geoffrey Broadwell wrote:

> Someone earlier in this thread mentioned that this can't be done
> directly because of rules surrounding TPF's non-profit status.  Someone
> else pointed out the problems with TPF officers benefitting directly
> from the donations, even though some of the current and former TPF
> officers would be great candidates for support.
>
> Which made me think ... wasn't this why Mozilla created a corporation?

I doubt that's why. If TPF owned The Perl Corporation (TPC), there'd still
be serious conflict of interest issues were TPC to be employing TPF board
members or other officers.

If anything, this would look even _worse_ than giving them grant money
from TPF!

The main reason a nonprofit would create a for-profit subsidiary is in
order to engage in business activities outside of that nonprofits
tax-exempt purpose. That purpose is generally defined by the nonprofit's
mission. TPF's missions is:

The Perl Foundation is dedicated to the advancement of the Perl
programming language through open discussion, collaboration, design, and
code.

I would guess that MoFo founded MoCo primarily because it wanted to pursue
income sources that weren't compatible with MoFo's nonprofit status. I'm
guessing that this was primarily the Google deal, and it was determined
that the income from Google would be business income, and that it would be
so much that if it came directly to MoFo it would compromise MoFo's status
as a 501c3 nonprofit.

I'd guess that the reasoning behind this is that in the Google deal,
Google gets a benefit from the money it pays. It's not a donation. That
means it's business income.

TPF is not in a similar position at this time. There is no massive source
of income available that would not be a donation, to the best of my
knowledge. If there were such a source, forming a subsidiary for-profit
corporation would be worthwhile.


-dave

/ *=======================================
============
VegGuide.Org                        www.BookIRead.com
Your guide to all that's veg.       My book blog
 ========================================
===========*/

Nikki Cox and Mariah Care
y Lick Pussies On Sofa!

Uri,

Consider the position you put me, or another sponsor, in. You mention a
specific person, someone who is highly respected and extremely talented.
You ask if I consider this person to be as flaky as a character that was
a figment of my imagination, and if I say 'no he is not so flaky', then
the implication is I will provide sponsorship. And if I demur, you might
say 'put up or shut up' and I feel under pressure to do something I
might not really want to.

But even if I say 'sure, how much?' to Damian Conway, what do I say to
another request for a Klingon of altogether unknown character? And
suppose I cant manage the whole amount, but I can pay a part, who makes
up the rest? And suppose I pay my money, but the trip is cancelled, who
pays me back?

And suppose I want to sponsor the development of perl6 over parrot,
leaving training to someone else? Can I respond easily to your direct
request without implying some slur on Damian?

The whole point about having an institutional channel for sponsorship is
to remove the need for personal judgments, for sponsors to specify
exactly how their money should be used, for the procedures to be in
place to cover shortfalls from a central budget, for rules to be clear
about what happens to money that is in excess of earmarked programmes,
and for there to be clarity in all possible grey areas that happen in life.

What the perl6 language needs now is a systematic development plan, with
broad aims and clear goals that will lead to good quality software and
to the tools to enable ordinary programmers to use perl6 for a variety
of tasks. More than that it needs the excitement that comes when there
is tangible progress (just look what has happened to parrot as a result
of the funding arranged via The Perl Foundation). Ad hoc, piecemeal
processes will yield ad hoc piecemeal results.

I have absolutely no issues with the excellent series of courses you
run, especially if they are taught by Damian. But where do they fit into
the general scheme of things? Are they essential to the development of
perl6, or do they only benefit a small group of regional companies. Do
they benefit me (bear in mind that the company I run is based in Moscow,
Russia)?

Sorry. You asked questions I am not prepared to answer because the
questions were posed in a manner that prevents me from answering. Do
this through The Perl Foundation and you will get a clear answer.

Richard Hainsworth

Uri Guttman wrote: 
>
>   RH> No one likes bureacracy. But I feel much happier about handing over
>   RH> money, or persuading someone else to hand over money, to a group of
>   RH> people with established procedures and collective responsibility, th
an
>   RH> to some enthusiatic individual who promises the earth and whose the
>   RH> world-number-one genius at code writing, but might also go and blow
>   RH> the whole lot on girls and booze cos his cat died.
>
> would you think damian has enough anti-flake genome in him to qualify
> for a more direct donation? :) if you do and agree that damian is worth
> supporting, i have an opportunity to propose. i am producing the perl
> college which is a set of classes taught by damian in boston, aimed at
> junior perl hackers. the college is sponsored by companies looking to
> hire intermediate level perl developers. your company or you as an
> individual, can be a sponsor which will support damian to come to the
> states for this set of classes and also for the conferences (which he
> missed last year because his funding came up short). if you are
> interested contact me off list at uri AT perlhunter.com. for more info
> on the perl college go to:
>
> 	http://perlhunter.com/college.html
>
> thanx,
>
> uri, dean of the perl college.
>
>