Re: Current state of Foundation finances
On 2014-04-13 02:20, Karen Sandler ka...@gnome.org wrote: On 2014-04-13 01:43, Stormy Peters wrote: Don't we have reserves though? We should have 6 months of operating expenses as reserves. I should leave maybe this to Kat and other board members but I'm recently enough gone that I can answer - the Foundation has adequate reserves for GNOME's ordinary operations but not for OPW, and the program has ramped up really quickly while the Foundation is still very small. That is not correct according to: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ#What_is_the_problem.3F That section states The Foundation does not have any cash reserves right now. For a rough overview, the 30 participants in the round that just ended required around $170k in expenditures, and that's the smaller of the two rounds per year. The two most recent rounds together should have approached $400k. So OPW only accepts interns with confirmed funding for each intern but if there are delays in getting that funding it adds up to a big burden for the org to bear. By writing that the OPW only accepts interns with confirmed funding, I would assume that you mean has a contract with the sponsor where the sponsor agrees to pay on time, with appropriate penalties in place for late payment. However, as you then go on to say that delays in funding are a burden for the GNOME Foundation, that does not seem to be the case. You mention an estimate of $400k as annual turnover for the OPW, which (according to the most-recently available annual report that I can find, the 2012 one at https://www.gnome.org/foundation/reports/) is very close to the turnover of the Foundation as a whole ($418k income and $409k expenditure). Those 2012 numbers include $106k of Women's Outreach expenses, so the turnover of non-OPW Foundation tasks seemed to be somewhere in the region of $300k. Additionally, the 2012 annual report states that The GNOME Foundation currently has approximately $274,000 in cash. Referring to my first point, if the Foundation now has no cash reserves I would assume that the current figure would be approaching zero. Assuming that other items in the budget have remained the same (which is unlikely, but without a 2013 annual report the best information I have to go on), this means that the OPW has a greater turnover than the rest of the Foundation combined, and the unpaid invoices have reduced the Foundation's cash reserves by around $250k since 2012. As the FAQ states, the board is evaluating various solutions, including raising the admin fee already charged and putting measures in place to assure earlier payments. I think the program should also try to raise its own reserves, though this is very difficult on a short term basis. Given the popularity of the OPW, it would seem reasonable to expect a decent amount of financial support from sponsors. If this is difficult in the short term, what are the medium- and long-term plans to raise funding for the OPW in a way that does not negatively impact the traditional activities of the GNOME Foundation? GNOME would never have been able to support the program to date without the reserves it already had in place. Those reserves no longer exist, according to the first point in the FAQ. How is it possible for the Foundation to continue fronting the costs of the OPW without those reserves? Given that the budget of the OPW now dwarfs the rest of the GNOME Foundation, it seems that the Foundation is ill-equipped to support it in terms of both administrative effort and financial backing, unless major changes are made to the way that the OPW is funded and supported. -- http://amigadave.com/ signature.asc Description: Digital signature ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: relicensing to GPLv3-family of licenses (was Re: Distribution Naming System)
On Fri, Apr 11, 2014 at 08:26:52AM -0400, Bradley M. Kuhn wrote: RMS wrote at 12:58 (EDT) on Monday: For many libraries, using LGPLv2.1 may be best, to allow use in GPLv2-covered programs. I have to disagree with RMS on this point. As I proposed on desktop-devel a long time ago: https://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2010-July/msg00097.html IMO, the best license for currently LGPLv2.1-or-later libraries is to upgrade to (GPLv2-only|LGPLv3-or-later). Some libraries such as GLib and GTK+ are licensed under the LGPLv2-or-later, not LGPLv2.1. Is it possible to migrate to the dual license (GPLv2-only|LGPLv3-or-later) ? And if I understand correctly, the applications under the GPLv2-or-later can easily migrate to the GPLv3-or-later regardless of the library licences (LGPLv2, LGPLv2.1 or LGPLv3). To move things forward, the best is probably to create a GNOME goal: https://wiki.gnome.org/Initiatives/GnomeGoals If some maintainers refuse to migrate to the GPLv3 or LGPLv3 for whatever reason, they can simply state it alongside the relevant modules. Best regards, Sébastien ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
David King amigad...@amigadave.com wrote: ... Don't we have reserves though? We should have 6 months of operating expenses as reserves. I should leave maybe this to Kat and other board members but I'm recently enough gone that I can answer - the Foundation has adequate reserves for GNOME's ordinary operations but not for OPW, and the program has ramped up really quickly while the Foundation is still very small. That is not correct according to: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ#What_is_the_problem.3F That section states The Foundation does not have any cash reserves right now. Blunt statements like this aren't very helpful, and they send a really bad message. It's easy to read this line and think the worst. Clearly we do have protected reserves - which we are preserving by the freeze on sponsorship repayments. The extra reserves that we usually have are expected to recover, and there is a plan in place to ensure this happens. Can we try and clarify this on the wiki please? Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Changes on the GNOME Foundation Membership Committee
James and Aruna - it's awesome that you want to help with this. :) Allan On Fri, Apr 11, 2014 at 5:46 PM, Aruna Sankaranarayanan aruna.e...@gmail.com wrote: Hi, I am a member of the Docs team, and interned with the Foundation in OPW July - September'13. I would like to apply to become a part of the Membership Committee as well, because I think it's time I start getting more familiar with the organisational workings of GNOME. Best, Aruna ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
So, the FAQ has a call for donations, however I can't find how to donate anywhere, the closest thing I can find is making a PayPal donation to GIMP :-) 2014-04-13 15:40 GMT+02:00 Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com: David King amigad...@amigadave.com wrote: ... Don't we have reserves though? We should have 6 months of operating expenses as reserves. I should leave maybe this to Kat and other board members but I'm recently enough gone that I can answer - the Foundation has adequate reserves for GNOME's ordinary operations but not for OPW, and the program has ramped up really quickly while the Foundation is still very small. That is not correct according to: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ#What_is_the_problem.3F That section states The Foundation does not have any cash reserves right now. Blunt statements like this aren't very helpful, and they send a really bad message. It's easy to read this line and think the worst. Clearly we do have protected reserves - which we are preserving by the freeze on sponsorship repayments. The extra reserves that we usually have are expected to recover, and there is a plan in place to ensure this happens. Can we try and clarify this on the wiki please? Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list -- Cheers, Alberto Ruiz ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
Hi Alberto, On 13 April 2014 16:31, Alberto Ruiz ar...@gnome.org wrote: So, the FAQ has a call for donations, however I can't find how to donate anywhere, the closest thing I can find is making a PayPal donation to GIMP :-) There's a link from https://www.gnome.org to https://www.gnome.org/friends/ and there's also https://www.gnome.org/friends/other-ways-to-donate/. I will add both of these to the FAQ. Thanks for pointing out! 2014-04-13 15:40 GMT+02:00 Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com: David King amigad...@amigadave.com wrote: ... Don't we have reserves though? We should have 6 months of operating expenses as reserves. I should leave maybe this to Kat and other board members but I'm recently enough gone that I can answer - the Foundation has adequate reserves for GNOME's ordinary operations but not for OPW, and the program has ramped up really quickly while the Foundation is still very small. That is not correct according to: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ#What_is_the_problem.3F That section states The Foundation does not have any cash reserves right now. Blunt statements like this aren't very helpful, and they send a really bad message. It's easy to read this line and think the worst. Clearly we do have protected reserves - which we are preserving by the freeze on sponsorship repayments. The extra reserves that we usually have are expected to recover, and there is a plan in place to ensure this happens. Can we try and clarify this on the wiki please? Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list -- Cheers, Alberto Ruiz ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
hi Alberto; you can donate to the GNOME Foundation through the Friends of GNOME program: https://www.gnome.org/friends/ which is also linked directly and prominently from the www.gnome.org landing page. ;-) ciao, Emmanuele. On 13 April 2014 16:31, Alberto Ruiz ar...@gnome.org wrote: So, the FAQ has a call for donations, however I can't find how to donate anywhere, the closest thing I can find is making a PayPal donation to GIMP :-) 2014-04-13 15:40 GMT+02:00 Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com: David King amigad...@amigadave.com wrote: ... Don't we have reserves though? We should have 6 months of operating expenses as reserves. I should leave maybe this to Kat and other board members but I'm recently enough gone that I can answer - the Foundation has adequate reserves for GNOME's ordinary operations but not for OPW, and the program has ramped up really quickly while the Foundation is still very small. That is not correct according to: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ#What_is_the_problem.3F That section states The Foundation does not have any cash reserves right now. Blunt statements like this aren't very helpful, and they send a really bad message. It's easy to read this line and think the worst. Clearly we do have protected reserves - which we are preserving by the freeze on sponsorship repayments. The extra reserves that we usually have are expected to recover, and there is a plan in place to ensure this happens. Can we try and clarify this on the wiki please? Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list -- Cheers, Alberto Ruiz ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list -- W: http://www.emmanuelebassi.name B: http://blogs.gnome.org/ebassi/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
Right! Thanks Emmanuele, We need to work out on the goolge juice so that how to donate to gnome foundation shows something useful in a search engine :-) 2014-04-13 17:40 GMT+02:00 Emmanuele Bassi eba...@gmail.com: hi Alberto; you can donate to the GNOME Foundation through the Friends of GNOME program: https://www.gnome.org/friends/ which is also linked directly and prominently from the www.gnome.org landing page. ;-) ciao, Emmanuele. On 13 April 2014 16:31, Alberto Ruiz ar...@gnome.org wrote: So, the FAQ has a call for donations, however I can't find how to donate anywhere, the closest thing I can find is making a PayPal donation to GIMP :-) 2014-04-13 15:40 GMT+02:00 Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com: David King amigad...@amigadave.com wrote: ... Don't we have reserves though? We should have 6 months of operating expenses as reserves. I should leave maybe this to Kat and other board members but I'm recently enough gone that I can answer - the Foundation has adequate reserves for GNOME's ordinary operations but not for OPW, and the program has ramped up really quickly while the Foundation is still very small. That is not correct according to: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ#What_is_the_problem.3F That section states The Foundation does not have any cash reserves right now. Blunt statements like this aren't very helpful, and they send a really bad message. It's easy to read this line and think the worst. Clearly we do have protected reserves - which we are preserving by the freeze on sponsorship repayments. The extra reserves that we usually have are expected to recover, and there is a plan in place to ensure this happens. Can we try and clarify this on the wiki please? Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list -- Cheers, Alberto Ruiz ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list -- W: http://www.emmanuelebassi.name B: http://blogs.gnome.org/ebassi/ -- Cheers, Alberto Ruiz ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
Is the budget and the current state of financials (account balances, invoices due, money expected) public? If not, can we get at least a summary? Are we paying our employee during this freeze? Is it expected that we would be able to employ an executive director if we want to? Thanks to the board members for working through this and being open. Stormy On Sun, Apr 13, 2014 at 9:31 AM, Ekaterina Gerasimova kittykat3...@gmail.com wrote: On 13 April 2014 14:40, Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com wrote: David King amigad...@amigadave.com wrote: ... Don't we have reserves though? We should have 6 months of operating expenses as reserves. I should leave maybe this to Kat and other board members but I'm recently enough gone that I can answer - the Foundation has adequate reserves for GNOME's ordinary operations but not for OPW, and the program has ramped up really quickly while the Foundation is still very small. That is not correct according to: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ#What_is_the_problem.3F That section states The Foundation does not have any cash reserves right now. Blunt statements like this aren't very helpful, and they send a really bad message. It's easy to read this line and think the worst. Clearly we do have protected reserves - which we are preserving by the freeze on sponsorship repayments. The extra reserves that we usually have are expected to recover, and there is a plan in place to ensure this happens. Can we try and clarify this on the wiki please? We do not have protected reserves. The freeze on sponsorship repayments is in place to make sure that we can reacquire our reserves. The intention of the FAQ is to be honest with our Foundation members because the board believe in being open not only in our code but also when we keep in touch with the membership. As a large portion of our membership are not native English speakers, it is important to keep to keep our communication as simple, concise and precise as possible. The FAQ already clearly states what the board is planning to do to fix the problem and when we expect it to happen. Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Changes on the GNOME Foundation Membership Committee
On Sun, 2014-04-13 at 16:02 +0100, Allan Day wrote: James and Aruna - it's awesome that you want to help with this. :) Allan Thanks Allan! Haha-- The way you say it... Should we be afraid? ;) James signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
On Fri, 2014-04-11 at 19:44 -0500, meg ford wrote: On Fri, Apr 11, 2014 at 7:36 PM, Germán Poo-Caamaño g...@gnome.org wrote: I'll play devil's advocate here: Couldn't GNOME use funds from these various sponsors to fund activities more directly beneficial to its future than OPW? I think a better approach might be: how can we motivate sponsors to fund our other activities as well as OPW. Perhaps finding members who are as passionate and motivated about other aspects of our project as the organizers of OPW are, and encouraging those members to seek funding for initiatives, would be a reasonable place to start. Hi Meg, Just to clarify: the words you are quoting here are not mine, although they you attribute them to me. Regards, -- Germán Poo-Caamaño http://calcifer.org/ signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
Hi Germán , I apologize for the bad paste. I was replying to Mathieu Duponchelle but the paste was from an email in which you quoted his previous email. Cheers, Meg On Sun, Apr 13, 2014 at 7:52 PM, Germán Poo-Caamaño g...@gnome.org wrote: On Fri, 2014-04-11 at 19:44 -0500, meg ford wrote: On Fri, Apr 11, 2014 at 7:36 PM, Germán Poo-Caamaño g...@gnome.org wrote: I'll play devil's advocate here: Couldn't GNOME use funds from these various sponsors to fund activities more directly beneficial to its future than OPW? I think a better approach might be: how can we motivate sponsors to fund our other activities as well as OPW. Perhaps finding members who are as passionate and motivated about other aspects of our project as the organizers of OPW are, and encouraging those members to seek funding for initiatives, would be a reasonable place to start. Hi Meg, Just to clarify: the words you are quoting here are not mine, although they you attribute them to me. Regards, -- Germán Poo-Caamaño http://calcifer.org/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
Yep, they were mine. Hijacking the thread to ask you which channels you're hanging in Meg, have tried #gnome-music once or twice but you were not around, I've started some work on a waveformer object, I guess you'll be interested :) On Mon, Apr 14, 2014 at 2:06 AM, meg ford meg...@gmail.com wrote: Hi Germán , I apologize for the bad paste. I was replying to Mathieu Duponchelle but the paste was from an email in which you quoted his previous email. Cheers, Meg On Sun, Apr 13, 2014 at 7:52 PM, Germán Poo-Caamaño g...@gnome.orgwrote: On Fri, 2014-04-11 at 19:44 -0500, meg ford wrote: On Fri, Apr 11, 2014 at 7:36 PM, Germán Poo-Caamaño g...@gnome.org wrote: I'll play devil's advocate here: Couldn't GNOME use funds from these various sponsors to fund activities more directly beneficial to its future than OPW? I think a better approach might be: how can we motivate sponsors to fund our other activities as well as OPW. Perhaps finding members who are as passionate and motivated about other aspects of our project as the organizers of OPW are, and encouraging those members to seek funding for initiatives, would be a reasonable place to start. Hi Meg, Just to clarify: the words you are quoting here are not mine, although they you attribute them to me. Regards, -- Germán Poo-Caamaño http://calcifer.org/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
Hi All, On Sat, Apr 12, 2014 at 7:45 AM, Ekaterina Gerasimova kittykat3...@gmail.com wrote: On 12 April 2014 05:29, Sindhu S sind...@live.in wrote: On Sat, Apr 12, 2014 at 5:02 AM, Ekaterina Gerasimova kittykat3...@gmail.com wrote: The board expects that you may have some questions or would like to know more details about the problem, please read https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ and contact the board at board-l...@gnome.org if you have any further questions. I want to ask questions. Was this situation visible or known before or at the time funds for Dev X Hackfest were being allocated? No, it wasn't know. If it had been known, spending would have been frozen by then and a budget for the hackfest would not have been approved. The email and the FAQ do not address the impact of the spending freeze on previously-approved hackfests [0]. Could the board address whether previously-approved hackfests will proceed or not? It would also be helpful to address the impact of this go / no go decision on intended hackfest participants (regardless of whether or not they had been approved for a GNOME-sponsored travel stipend). Also, in reviewing recent board meeting minutes, I do not see details that would give an indication of overall financial status. Even if they aren't disclosed publicly as part of the minutes, are things like aging summaries provided or discussed as part of a treasurer's report during the meetings? Thanks, Jim [0] https://wiki.gnome.org/Hackfests/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Current state of Foundation finances
I have also have a question: can the Board please explain why they were not aware of this situation until now, and how they became aware of it? This seems like a lot of money and I would like to know how it is that no one noticed the shortfall until we got to this point. It seems like this discussion should have happened earlier if possible. Thanks very much, Meg On Sun, Apr 13, 2014 at 11:19 PM, Jim Campbell jcampb...@gnome.org wrote: Hi All, On Sat, Apr 12, 2014 at 7:45 AM, Ekaterina Gerasimova kittykat3...@gmail.com wrote: On 12 April 2014 05:29, Sindhu S sind...@live.in wrote: On Sat, Apr 12, 2014 at 5:02 AM, Ekaterina Gerasimova kittykat3...@gmail.com wrote: The board expects that you may have some questions or would like to know more details about the problem, please read https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/CurrentBudgetFAQ and contact the board at board-l...@gnome.org if you have any further questions. I want to ask questions. Was this situation visible or known before or at the time funds for Dev X Hackfest were being allocated? No, it wasn't know. If it had been known, spending would have been frozen by then and a budget for the hackfest would not have been approved. The email and the FAQ do not address the impact of the spending freeze on previously-approved hackfests [0]. Could the board address whether previously-approved hackfests will proceed or not? It would also be helpful to address the impact of this go / no go decision on intended hackfest participants (regardless of whether or not they had been approved for a GNOME-sponsored travel stipend). Also, in reviewing recent board meeting minutes, I do not see details that would give an indication of overall financial status. Even if they aren't disclosed publicly as part of the minutes, are things like aging summaries provided or discussed as part of a treasurer's report during the meetings? Thanks, Jim [0] https://wiki.gnome.org/Hackfests/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
