I have an interesting counter-proposal. Everyone on this list probably uses debian in one way or another. A few of us, myself included, have a little extra cash which we could give the project.
Why don't we borrow an old tradition: voluntary tithe. For Debian users, a suggested donation schedule could be made, such as $2.00 USD per month, per Debian box if apt-get (or deselect, etc.) was used in that month. We could make an application called tithe-manageter or titheman or something, and enable you to set it up on any/all of your debian boxen, that keeps track of things like dist-upgrades. It would allow the user to set his/her own tithe amounts per whatever common action the user wishes to tithe, and optionally store the user's credit card numbers for automated/manual uploads to tithe.debian.org, so it will be easy and seamless to donate. This would also need to be a centrally managed app, such that the lightweight tithe-server is run on all the debian boxen (8 of them) on my local area network, and one of them would be designated as the tithe=anager client, that would centrally gather all of the data for the month and either report to me or optionally automagically send a donation by credit card at the end of the month. This would make it simple/automatic to periodically donate small amounts of cash, for anyone who is too forgetful to do so on a regular basis. At the same time, it would be an entirely opt-in thing, so people who do not have the money/do not wish to donate/put in 80 hours a week maintaining packages are not forced to do so. --Aaron Traas