Hats off to the freenode folks. I feel a bit disrespectful speaking ill of the departed, but some history would provide context. Before he passed away, Rob Levin set up PDPC (and OPN before that) to essentially operate as his own piggy bank, while being tasked with 'administering' freenode.
The reality was that volunteers already provided the servers and most of the IT admin duties, and the donation solicitations over IRC were incessant -- to the point that I actually ignored all global messages coming from lilo (Mr. Levin's nick name).
The individuals that took over from Mr. Levin are to be commended for doing away with the full time position, the overzealous calls for donations, and instead relying on volunteers and the community that had always been ready and willing to chip in.
In that regard, the PDPC shutting down seems neither surprising, unwarranted, or sad. Many thanks to the folks that keep Freenode running.
Reducing their level of effort in fundraising didn't mean the lights went out overnight. It took six years for it to dwindle to where there was more cost (the cost of incorporation) than benefit in PDPC's continued existence.
It's honestly not going to make a lot of difference to us day to day.
(and I second that kudos, since while I'm technically staff I barely actually -do- anything these days because other people always seem to get to whatever it is before I even notice :)
Sadly, we were forced to dissolve PDPC, freenode’s parent organisation.
When the organisation transferred across from the US to the UK we wanted to keep the organisational structure as close to what it had been before (change is scary, right?) — however, we made the conscious decision to no longer have any paid employees after Rob Levin passed away. This meant that everyone involved with the organisation were volunteers and we no longer had anyone who could invest the time and effort required to do fundraising and similar tasks, meaning that the organisation was unable to sustain the levels of donations required to obtain and maintain charitable status in the UK.
Due to the massive reduction in financial support we found ourselves in a position where being an incorporated organisation cost more than what we were able to bring in in donations and after years of operating at a loss it was decided that we would apply for the dissolution of the corporation in order to drastically reduce costs. The application has been processed and the organisation has been dissolved; to further reduce costs we have also discontinued the majority of infrastructure services for which the organisation paid, together with the reduced administration and organisational fees this means that we are now in a position where our outgoings are restricted to domain renewals! We would like to thank everyone who has contributed to the organisation in the past, users, organisations and staff in particular, who have always been (begrudgingly?) happy to contribute towards the difference in order to cover the deficit.
What does this organisational change mean for freenode?
In practise it means very little, the PDPC has never been involved in the day to day operations of the network and there will be no changes to the way in which the network is run. freenode is staffed entirely by volunteers from all over the globe who contribute their time and expertise to keep the network up and running in between contributing to various other FOSS projects.
What about other PDPC projects, such as fosscon, geeknic, and the fossevents site?
These projects will continue as they have before, and we invite you to attend fosscon for real world talks and collaboration, to join a geeknic picnic or plan your own at http://geeknic.org, and to check out http://fossevents.org for events in your neighbourhood and around the world.
I appreciate the work you do and I still want to contribute
The best way in which to help the network is to contribute time — help out in #freenode or elsewhere on the network, assist users in finding answers to their questions and help us try keep the channel and network temperature at a nice, comfortable level which encourages collaboration!
If you are low on time but still want to help out you might be able to help us through your company or organisation by becoming a server sponsor (See “Hosting a server” for more information).
If you feel that one particular volunteer has helped you out and you want to say thank you — ask them if they have a preferred charity to which you could make a small donation! With time we might update our website to provide links and information of such preferences.
Alternatively, you may consider donating to one of the following projects:
Software Freedom Law Center
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Open Rights Group
Existing PDPC donor cloaks
Existing PDPC donor cloaks will remain valid for a full year, after which they will be converted to unaffiliated cloaks. Ongoing donations will be cancelled by us. If you have previously donated to PDPC you’ll still qualify for your donor cloak as normal. If you believe you’re due a cloak and we haven’t processed it yet please contact us.
> ...meaning that the organisation was unable to sustain the levels of donations required to obtain and maintain charitable status in the UK.
Speaking as the secretary of a UK Parent teacher association that raises about £2,000 a year I think I can say that there is no minimum required to obtain or maintain charitable status in the UK. The Charities Commission make everything as simple as possible and are very helpful.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2003/01/29/buy_a_piece_of_net/
The reality was that volunteers already provided the servers and most of the IT admin duties, and the donation solicitations over IRC were incessant -- to the point that I actually ignored all global messages coming from lilo (Mr. Levin's nick name).
The individuals that took over from Mr. Levin are to be commended for doing away with the full time position, the overzealous calls for donations, and instead relying on volunteers and the community that had always been ready and willing to chip in.
In that regard, the PDPC shutting down seems neither surprising, unwarranted, or sad. Many thanks to the folks that keep Freenode running.