<html>Frank,<br><br>This is good for me.<br><br>Paul<br>
<br>
-----Original Message-----<br>
From: Frank Warmerdam [mailto:warmerdam@pobox.com]<br>
Sent: Tuesday, May 2, 2006 11:26 AM<br>
To: fundraising@fundraising.osgeo.org<br>
Subject: [Fundraising] First Meeting - May 9th<br>
<br>
Folks,<br>
<br>
I had sort of intended to have a launch meeting for the Fundraising<br>
committee today, but I see I botched the date in the wiki and I didn't<br>
send out any sort of reminder. So I would like to suggest we have a<br>
formational meeting on May 9th, at 1600UTC (12:00noon EST) in IRC. Does<br>
that sound ok?<br>
<br>
The agenda is at:<br>
<br>
http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/FunComMeeting1<br>
<br>
Please feel free to add agenda items.<br>
<br>
I am presuming our main focus will be ironing out a sponsorship program. My<br>
initial proposal is at:<br>
http://wiki.osgeo.org/index.php/Sponsorship<br>
<br>
But there is lots of room for changes, and improvements. Areas in which<br>
I can see we need to work are:<br>
<br>
o Have we picked appropriate price points? Are discrete sponsorship levels<br>
the way to go?<br>
<br>
o Are there ways we can name and position the sponsorship program to make it<br>
easier for friendly folks in organizations to sell it to management?<br>
(ie. "maintenance fees" are a well understand cost item in most orgs).<br>
<br>
o When we first floated the mapserver foundation idea Ed stressed the<br>
importance to potential sponsors to get in on the first big press<br>
deluge to get the most value out of a sponsorship. Obviously we are<br>
to late for that for OSGeo, but should we be making sure that anyone that<br>
wants to has a chance to get into the first big sponsorship press release?<br>
(ie. founding sponsors) rather than starting to get sponsorships in a<br>
trickle.<br>
<br>
o Much of my thinking has been around positioning sponsorship as a way<br>
for organizations reliant on foundation projects to providing<br>
sustaining financing to improve the core quality of the software with<br>
a hint of preferrential support access, with promotional benefit thrown<br>
in for good measure. Do we really need two programs? One aimed at<br>
those wanting a promotional benefit (perhaps not project specific?) and<br>
another that is a bit like a support/maintenance contract without much<br>
in the way of guaranteed service levels?<br>
<br>
o How do we organize our approach to organizations so as not to mess things<br>
up. I'm a bit nervous about a bunch of folks running around bugging<br>
companies without a unified sales job, possibly giving a negative<br>
impression of the foundation. How do we avoid that?<br>
<br>
o How soon do we want a sponsorship program up and running? I must admit to<br>
be eager, though you might not be able to tell that from my level of<br>
activity in leading this committee! In particular, I'm eager to start<br>
approaching my clients for OSGeo sponsorships (oriented to supporting GDAL)<br>
so I can turn some of that money around into a maintainence contract for<br>
GDAL over the summer. I have someone in mind that I'm paying out of my<br>
own pocket through May.<br>
<br>
o What other fundraising angles should we be pursuing?<br>
<br>
o What level of income are we targetting? I've put up the number $200000US<br>
per year in non-project specific funding as an objective. To me that<br>
seems somewhat ambitious but perhaps some ambition is called for.<br>
<br>
o I would like us to have a more concrete story for sponsors on what we<br>
intend to spend the money on. Currently we are rather vague on this point.<br>
Perhaps we should even look at mocking up a budget with the support of the<br>
board that we would use at a couple income levels (say at $100K and $200K).<br>
<br>
o Assuming we allow project directed sponsorship, what sorts of controls<br>
should we be putting into place on PSC's spending their dedicated funds<br>
to ensure the use is responsible? I think sponsors will expect the<br>
foundation to ensure orderly and responsible use of the money.<br>
<br>
Hmm, well that seems like lots to address!<br>
<br>
I would like to encourage lots of discussion on the list in advance of our<br>
first meeting.<br>
<br>
Best regards,<br>
-- <br>
---------------------------------------+--------------------------------------<br>
I set the clouds in motion - turn up | Frank Warmerdam, warmerdam@pobox.com<br>
light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam<br>
and watch the world go round - Rush | President OSGF, http://osgeo.org<br>
<br>
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