Re: Membership dues [ was: Re: Advisory Board Letter ]

[Chris DiBona <chris valinux com>]

No, I'll handle all press and such concerning VA's connection with the
Gnome foundation.

 Chris

--
Linux Community Evangelist, VA Linux Systems            http://www.valinux.com
President, Silicon Valley Linux Users Group               http://www.svlug.org
Grant Chair, Linux International.                            http://www.li.org
Co-editor, Open Sources	                                 http://www.dibona.com

On Wed, 2 Aug 2000, Bart Decrem wrote:

> Chris,
> 
> Wonderful.  It's awesome to have you on board!
> 
> For the press release and the organization of the event, we have created a
> separate, closed mailing list that includes the entire Gnome Steering Committee
> and PR reps from Red Hat, Helix Code, Sun and Eazel.  It's tricky to get sign off
> from everyone involved so I do think we need to keep that list closed and small,
> but if there's someone here who's dying to get involved in those discussions, pls
> let me know and I'll be happy to add you.
> 
> Chris: shall I add you to the press-release list as the VA contact, or is there
> someone else I should add for that?
> 
> Bart
> 
> Chris DiBona wrote:
> 
> > You can release our name, I had the 10k cleared, then it was raised to 20.
> > I'm clearing that right now. IT was sort of annoying getting two numbers
> > so close together, but that's understandable.
> >
> > How is the press conference being handled? A problem with this kind of
> > effort is if one company is seen to dominate, then everyone loses and the
> > thing falls apart. But outside of stating obvious stuff, I'm glad to be
> > here and hope I can help out. I'm curious as to how the press is being
> > handled?
> >
> >  Chris
> >
> > --
> > Linux Community Evangelist, VA Linux Systems            http://www.valinux.com
> > President, Silicon Valley Linux Users Group               http://www.svlug.org
> > Grant Chair, Linux International.                            http://www.li.org
> > Co-editor, Open Sources                                  http://www.dibona.com
> >
> > On Wed, 2 Aug 2000, Bart Decrem wrote:
> >
> > > Hi Owen,
> > >
> > > I initiated a private discussion about this among reps from initial corporate
> > > members because, well, they have to agree to pay the membership fee, so we
> > > have to  come up with something that'll be acceptable to them.  But now it's
> > > time to open up the discussion, so here we are.
> > >
> > > I agree that the official step on that will be taken by the board of
> > > directors, and it probably doesn't belong in the by-laws.  However, since
> > > we're in the process of signing up initial members, we have to tell them how
> > > much this will cost.  So we need some initial number.
> > >
> > > A number of people have suggested that the foundation should have an
> > > executive director to handle the adminstrative tasks involved with moving
> > > Gnome forward: set up meetings, deal with the advisory board, help set up
> > > technical conferences, coordinate press releases etc.  So I have been
> > > assuming that the foundation will need to raise approximately $100,000 per
> > > year (a salary + overhead and some misc).  Based on that, and looking at the
> > > list of likely corporate members of the advisory board, I came up with the
> > > $0/$10k/$20k proposal.    I figure that will allow us to raise approximately
> > > $120k.  At this point, it looks like all  the initial corporate members are
> > > comfortable with this approach.
> > >
> > > Based on my experience helping get the foundation off the ground, and being
> > > part of the Gnome community, I would say that it's not a bad idea to have one
> > > paid staff person, but that's certainly not set in stone.  I'd love to hear
> > > your, and others', opinion on this.
> > >
> > > BTW, at this point, it looks like initial corporate members of the Advisory
> > > Board will be Sun, Red Hat, Helix Code, Eazel + at least 2 (more likely 3 or
> > > 4) major PC OEMs.  We haven't received clearance yet to release those names
> > > here.
> > >
> > > I do want to flag that we have private list with a group of PR people (which
> > > also includes the Gnome steering committee) and the current proposal is to
> > > have representatives from all the corporate advisory members on stage at the
> > > press event, in addition to Gnome hackers.  So a big part of the announcement
> > > on 8/15 would be to showcase major industry support for Gnome.  I want to
> > > flag that here because a number of people have raised concerns about
> > > corporate influence in the Gnome Foundation.  The corporate members would be
> > > on the advisory board only, but it will be a terrific endorsement of the work
> > > the Gnome hackers have been doing.  I think this is the right way to go, but
> > > I'm sure a number of people will have concerns about this.  So let's talk
> > > about that.
> > >
> > > Bart
> > >
> > >
> > > Owen Taylor wrote:
> > >
> > > > Robert Humphreys <rob@collab.net> writes:
> > > >
> > > > > Corporate members with more than ten full time employees will pay
> > > > > $20,000 a year for membership dues, and companies with less than ten
> > > > > full time employees will pay $10,000 a year for membership dues. Special
> > > > > considerations for non profit organizations, early stage start ups, etc.
> > > > > can be made and are subject to approval by the Board of Directors.
> > > >
> > > > I've been told there been some discussion of the membership dues
> > > > in private email, but so far I've not seen any public discussion,
> > > > so I wanted to bring it up here.
> > > >
> > > > I have several concerns here:
> > > >
> > > > - Who decides (decided???) the fees? This would either be
> > > >   part of the bylaws, or decided by the elected board of
> > > >   directors.
> > > >
> > > >   I don't think hard-coding it into the bylaws is a good
> > > >   idea, and the board of directors has not been elected
> > > >   yet...
> > > >
> > > > - $10,000 or $20,000 doesn't seem to jibe with making the
> > > >   advisory board "open". These aren't huge amounts of
> > > >   money, but I think it is certainly large enough to act
> > > >   as a discouraging factor to some companies.
> > > >
> > > > - Do we need a foundation with this much funding? One thing
> > > >   I think we're all agreed on is that we don't want this
> > > >   to become the OSF ... we won't be doing development, we
> > > >   don't need a management structure, etc.
> > > >
> > > >   I think, in general, accountability, responsiveness, and
> > > >   "community spirit" are going to be a lot higher if member
> > > >   companies donate marketing, infrastructure, etc, resources
> > > >   rather than donating money and trying to build those
> > > >   up at the foundation.
> > > >
> > > >   (Clearly, the proposed membership dues are not big enough
> > > >   to become a new OSF - but I think they are possibly big
> > > >   enough to get in the way of lean, mean, thin, flexible
> > > >   foundation.)
> > > >
> > > > Regards,
> > > >                                         Owen
> > > >
> > > > _______________________________________________
> > > > foundation-list mailing list
> > > > foundation-list@gnome.org
> > > > http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
> > >
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > foundation-list mailing list
> > > foundation-list@gnome.org
> > > http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
> > >
> 
>