[OSGeo-Discuss] Membership fee (was: Proposed process for selecting OSGeo charter members)

[Arnulf Christl]

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María,
good points, thanks. I strongly believe that paying a fee for one type
of membership must not estrange anybody else who wants to participate.
And I don't think that this is in the interest of anybody proposing a
paid scheme.

Trying to gauge the volunteer effect to decide whether somebody is
"worthy" or not takes somebody to actually measure. Who would be this
poor sod? What should she measure and how? Mission impossible and no
fun, so forget it. :-)

I guess the paid membership - if it comes, will just be complimentary
to what we have. Ideally we can somehow carry all Charter Members over
to a paid model, just because it would simplify our process so much.
And maybe this is also a perfectly sound step to more professionalism.
This does not mean that those who do not pay are less professional,
instead they will also profit from a more professional environment.

Having said that, all who use the word "professionalism" have probably
just run out of sound arguments. :-)

Cheers,
Arnulf

On 06/24/2014 02:38 PM, María Arias de Reyna wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I have been reading this conversation silently and for my point of
> view, if paying helps OsGeo, then subsctription fees are welcome.
> 
> But there is a big but: for students and people who are
> unemployed, subsctription fees can be very discouraging. It
> happened to me with IEEE and I still haven't returned to them after
> so many years. Once I couldn't pay the membership, it was like
> forcing me to go away. I know that OsGeo is more open and that even
> people who is not a member can participate actively on mailing
> lists and projects but... it helps if you feel that you are part of
> the community.
> 
> So, couldn't we add some kind of volunteer work to compensate the
> fee on some cases? For example: people that work on maintenance of
> the servers, or translate very hard or help on conferences, can
> they get a discounted or even free subscription?
> 
> This way, all OsGeo members will contribute to OsGeo (with fees or
> work) and people who are very active but cannot pay the fees will
> have also recognition.
> 
> Just a random thought.
> 
> 
> On Tue, Jun 24, 2014 at 2:17 PM, Mateusz Łoskot
> <mateusz at loskot.net <mailto:mateusz at loskot.net>> wrote:
> 
> On 24 June 2014 14:02, Jorge Gaspar Sanz Salinas <jsanz at osgeo.org 
> <mailto:jsanz at osgeo.org>> wrote:
>> El 24/06/14 13:26, Mateusz Łoskot escribió:
>>>> 
>>> Shortly, I see nothing wrong in expecting as an organisation 
>>> that if an individual aims and agrees to be nominated for OSGeo
>>> Charter Member she/he also agrees to donate on
> yearly/monthly basis.
>>> 
>> 
>> Yes but I see that as different things, one is being nominated
>> and elected as member, and other being an active sponsor of the 
>> organization.
>> 
>> They are complementary, some people want to be involved on the
>> organization donating time, others maybe just want to donate
> funds,
>> and finally some crazy people both :-)
> 
> So, you prefer that Charter Members and non-Charter Members is not
> differentiated (among other things) by paid membership.
> 
>> But when it comes on deciding who is on the board or any other
> important
>> issue, I prefer having a membership that has been in one way or
>> the other elected by the community, not one that has paid their
>> annual
> fee.
> 
> AFAIU, nobody proposed to replace Charter Members election with
> membership fees, but to complement the former with the latter.
> 
>>>> Ha! Not exactly that, but maybe doing better outreach effort
>>>> to show where the money is used would help to a better
>>>> understanding of
> the need
>>>> of funds.
>>>> 
>>>> Budgets are published and anyone willing to ask can reach
>>>> them, but maybe being more proactive on showing the need for
>>>> money could
> help to
>>>> increase the perception that maintaining OSGeo is not free
>>>> (as
> free beer).
>>> 
>>> Yes, but that is more a technical issue. So, it's the easiest
>>> one to solve, I think.
>> 
>> It's not important now but anyway I didn't explain well myself.
>> I
> see it
>> as an organizational and marketing issue. As our treasurer, the
> task of
>> publicly remembering where the money comes and goes is probably
>> one of most ungrateful jobs anyone can have here, only for a
>> tireless
> special one.
> 
> The books show where the money comes from and where it goes, so
> still technical issue, but yes it requires hard work to maintain. 
> However, the marketing side...is a different issue that is much 
> harder to work on than the former one, I think.
> 
> Best regards, -- Mateusz  Łoskot, http://mateusz.loskot.net 
> _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing
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> 
> 
> 
> 
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