Hi Ian, Ian wrote on 2010-06-20 13.47:
So why has an OOo foundation never been set up? If one had been set up 10 years ago maybe we would have millions of dollars to spend. If started now maybe in 10 years we won't be having the same conversation ;-) But really that is down to the CC as I can't see many individuals having the authority, motivation or resources to do it on their own.
the foundation discussion is really quite old, indeed. I always said I'm a strong supporter of an independent foundation. Not because I dislike Sun/Oracle, but because I think it's the best way things can be managed and handled: an independent foundation where all major stakeholders can take part in. At least in my weird dreams. ;-)
Setting up this, however, requires lots of time and money, and one of the problems surely is that we need people to do that. When one already spends several hours per day on OpenOffice.org, finding more time for setting up a foundation is not an easy task. In addition, for OpenOffice.org the specialty is that most developers are employed by one major stakeholder, who also owns the brand and trademark.
This means we need to get the major stakeholder in the boat, otherwise things will get real hard. I don't know about the discussions that took place on that in the past, but as you see, there are various reasons why a foundation isn't an easy task.
Yes but the point is that some people get expenses approved for some things while others will get them turned down. (Rightly so) So in
Is there any request for expense funding that has been denied erroneously? I don't recall. If so, please let me know.
principle some people get expenses and some people don't and that could be for very similar events. Some people commit their own money - personally I have spent thousands of Euro promoting OOo and I know others that have done so too. It isn't a problem for me, I'm just saying
I can join. I'm a student, my monthly income is way lower than to most of the OOo project, and in 2007, I've spent nearly 1.700 € from my private pocket for OpenOffice.org. It's much better these days with the funding options, but basically, joining for a CeBIT trade show for one week means not going out the month to me, because even with funding, being at a trade show for one week costs a lot of money. Especially those who are unemployed or students really have to calculate.
But, after all, that's part of our volunteer "job" and our hobby, and it's similar for other volunteer jobs, so there's nothing wrong about it.
Of course, looking at other communities can make one jealous when you see their trade show attendance is paid worktime, while you pay yourself -- but again, our communities are different. I'm all for a foundation and more options, but the current situation doesn't have it, so we have to make the best out of our current resources, and be fair to everyone.
that in principle decisions are already made about who gets paid expenses and who does not. It's bound to be the case with a finite budget.
I think we are doing a fair and transparent process. There need to be certain rules, and I think the reason behind them is obvious to anyone. Again, if there has been any funding request we denied so far, and anyone considers that a mistake, please let me know.
I don't think so either, I just wonder why paying expenses selectively is seen as different from paying for time selectively.
Because it makes a difference. Paying expenses means covering costs that actually occured, refund people's payments. Paying for time is paying costs that did not occur, but rather merit people's time. And that makes a big difference.
As an example: Assume the Japanese website took 20 hours to be created. 1.000 € / 20 hours = 50 € per hour. I can name you dozens of people who spend probably 30-60 hours per month on OpenOffice.org volunteer work. Shall we now give each of them 3.000 € per month? We simply can't.
It makes a big difference if you cover costs that actually occured, or pay people for their volunteer worktime. We can pay expenses for travel and lodging for one week of CeBIT. But we can't pay 6 days of CeBIT attendance per hour. We just don't have that money.
The CC does pay some people to go to some shows, but not everyone for any show requested (and rightly so). Decisions are made about priorities
No, it does not. It pays their expenses, not their worktime.
So we could do the same with other uses of resources. X is a high priority and a very small resource will make a big difference Y can do it but can't afford to do it without some funding. Z would cost the same in travel expenses for P but will have marginal effect. Therefore better to spend the resource on X.
Sure, spending wisely makes sense. But again, the difference for me is if we fund expenses, or if we pay worktime. If we start to pay people per working hours, we actually employ them, and then we are not a volunteer project anymore.
We of course can discuss some more attractive options, and maybe some small fee per day (let's say 20 €) in addition to the actual travel expenses, but we cannot really pay people the money they would get in a contracted job.
I'd agree that donations are not likely, but consider whether it might be better to invest 1.000 Euros in generating a further 1.000 Euros or just spending the first 1.000 and hoping someone will donate more.
How will you measure that?
To be honest, I just raise these issues occasionally to see if anything has changed. I don't think that there has ever been the right enterprise culture in OOo to really capitalise on the potential of the product. For a global project of this size there really should be scope to generate millions of Euros per year.
I share your thoughts, and believe me, I was much happier if we had more options. My thoughts do not mean we should stop investigating those options, but my thoughts mean we should be careful on how to spend our current ressources.
Florian -- Florian Effenberger <flo...@openoffice.org> OpenOffice.org Marketing Project Lead Tel: +49 8341 99660880 Fax: +49 8341 99660889 Mobile: +49 151 14424108 Skype: floeff | Twitter/Identi.ca: @floeff --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@marketing.openoffice.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@marketing.openoffice.org
