Inspired by this I went over to donate money to Arch Linux, since I've just been getting nothing but joy from using it for the last 2 years.
They use Click2Pledge which, frankly, is a UX which is a tad frightening, but I'm not a snob so I carry on.
And then I find that of all the countries in the world they seem to have left Ireland out (Eire, Republic of Ireland, no, nothing). I mean they have the Isle of Man - but not Ireland. So, I cannot complete their payment form.
So what all these guys need is a separate FOSS organisation exclusively dedicated to fund-raising.
I see the arch linux web page links to "click to pledge" service as reported, which apparently is extremely limited in legal coverage area, but the SPI Inc web page for arch links to a paypal link, and paypal seems to "work" in most countries on the planet.
Back when it took 5000 bitcoins to buy a pizza and my 486 software miner was generating about 100 coins per week, I donated 5 BTC to the FSF who promptly wanted no part of the accounting and legal problems so they got rid of my 5 BTC. At the time that 5 BTC was worth like 50 cents but now would fund somewhere around 2 or 3 gradstudent-years of development, Oh Well. Anyway BTC should be a viable transfer mechanism.
> So what all these guys need is a separate FOSS organisation exclusively dedicated to fund-raising.
I'm afraid that such an organisation will gradually be taken over by people looking to make money more than to help open-source software, and in the end we'll end up worse off than not having anything, because most donations to that organisation will get used for "internal expenses".
I think this attitude is holding FOSS back. The most successful projects are the ones that are funded: Linux, Blender, and Ubuntu to name 3. On the other hand we have projects like Gimp, which steadily makes excellent progress and gets better with every release, but the rate of change is glacial because the team are all working on it in their spare time.
That's not to say that the motivation of profit can't also be corrupting. Gnome 3.0 and the associated libs was a complete disaster IMO, and a lot of the stupidity came IMO from a fear that Windows Vista would leave the Linux desktop behind, but the net gain of monetary investment is clear to me.
The silly thing is, I'd much rather pay for software that is free than software that is proprietary. I won't use Adobe Suite on principle, especially now that it is subscription only, but I'd pay a subscription to Gimp in a heartbeat. I may not be in the majority, but I'm sure there are enough of us that we would generate enough income to make the difference.
It's fine when it's one project seeking funding for itself. When it's some umbrella org gathering funding for some nebulous "F/OSS community" that I start getting wary. I think it would be better if each large project could build within itself a framework for seeking funding, rather than one group seeking joint funding for everyone. That concentrates too much political power in one place leading to a higher chance of a takeover by unwanted people.
Haha! I didn't believe you about them leaving Ireland so tried it for myself and sure enough you're right! Pathetic. I see San Marino, Vatican City and Monaco et al are represented... guess, they're big players.
They use Click2Pledge which, frankly, is a UX which is a tad frightening, but I'm not a snob so I carry on.
And then I find that of all the countries in the world they seem to have left Ireland out (Eire, Republic of Ireland, no, nothing). I mean they have the Isle of Man - but not Ireland. So, I cannot complete their payment form.
So what all these guys need is a separate FOSS organisation exclusively dedicated to fund-raising.