[Board] In-kind sponsorships

[Venkatesh Raghavan]

Ari Jolma wrote:
> I see the point you make. My reaction was that we shouldn't say no to 
> somebody wanting to help.We do need help also, don't we? But yes, 
> perhaps it's best to not use the word "sponsor" unless it's cash or 
> something that has a price tag.

I agree with what Howard has said and with Ari that the word "sponsor" 
should have a price tag.

If OSGeo wants to have some formal recognition for "Volunteer Services",
we could consider some other mechanism. The UN has the UN Volunteer
Service and several international aid agencies have them too
(e.g. Peace Corps, JICA-Volunteer etc). OSGeo could have
  "OSGeo-Volunteer" as a means of formally recognize volunteer
efforts.

Venka
...
> Robert Bray kirjoitti:
>> I agree with everything said so far, Howard may have summed it up 
>> best. Let's not go down this path...
....
>> IMO, it would be foolish to go down this very slippery slope.  Members
>> who are active in committees and organization generate their own
>> visibility, and if it is seen that a business is committing a lot of
>> resources to allow someone to do stuff, that effort will be implicitly
>> recognized.
>>
>> Recognizing in-kind effort presents a number of problems:
>>
>> - Impossible to quantify
>> - We need money, do we not?
>> - Pretty much the entire OSGeo enterprise has been an in-kind endeavor
>> (except for the ED).  Do we recognize the past effort too?
>>
>> If you want to be recognized as a sponsor, pony up.  If you want to
>> support OSGeo by providing some time, you can easily generate your own
>> recognition by being active and visible.