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

[Jeff McKenna]

Hi Dirk,

Several people have told me privately how impressed they were with your
thoughts on this issue; I myself am not surprised to hear this about
you, as you've impressed me with your vision before.  In fact I hope you
consider joining the OSGeo Board for this next term, we really need your
leadership.  I hope someone nominates you.

-jeff



On 2014-07-03, 12:13 PM, Dirk Frigne wrote:
> Mateusz,
> 
> [and others],
> 
> thanks for your reaction,
> 
> On 02-07-14 11:44, Mateusz Łoskot wrote:
>> On 1 July 2014 18:46, Dirk Frigne <dirk.frigne at geosparc.com> wrote:
>>> [...]
>>> I may be naive, but for me personally this works out well, and having
>>> that feeling is one of the important incentives to keep contributing to
>>> the community. (And by the way, working with other members of the OSGeo
>>> community didn't result in any bad experience until now)
>>> [...]
>>> "Core principles are:
>>>
>>>     OSGeo should act as a low capital, volunteer focused organisation.
>>>     OSGeo should focus support on OSGeo communities and initiatives
>>> which support themselves. " [1]
>>> [...]
>>> Personally, I don't think it are the users nor the community members who
>>> should take care of that. Because the belonging to the community should
>>> remain a *free* right, where the value comes from respect and the
>>> intense feeling of giving something without expecting something back.
>>>
>>> The strange thing is that many of the members are also professional
>>> involved into OSGeo (acting as A T G or C).
>>> So I suggest it should not be the (community) members who should pay for
>>> the support, but these professional actors.
>>> [...]
>>> The sponsoring should not be an obligation either, but should be the
>>> common responsibility of the companies sponsoring the FOSS4G events today.
>> Dirk,
>>
>> You've captured the essence well and it fits my personal point of view
>> at OSGeo too.
>> You've also given some good ideas to work on, on how to move about the mixture
>> of expectations within the community.
>>
>> We may need to be careful to not to divide the community to classes of members,
>> professionals and non-professionals. It may turn into a very similar
>> issue as paying
>> and non-paying members.
> I agree with you.
> What I tried to express with next phrase:
> 
> The strange thing is that many of the members are also professional
> involved into OSGeo (acting as A T G or C).
> So I suggest it should not be the (community) members who should pay for
> the support, but these professional actors.
> 
> Is the following:
> 
> We are all members of one community, and as such are we are all acting
> as users, in the broadest sense.
> However, belonging to the community gives each member a return, also in
> the broadest sense.
> (f.e. because of the simple principle you will not become a member if
> there is no return).
>  
> What is important in my view, and I think many of us agree with that
> (counting the positive reactions on my reply [2]), this return is not
> about money, but in many aspects much more valuable. (I'll come to that
> in the reply to Bruce [3] I am preparing).
> 
> I observe that many (if not all) members of our community have different
> roles in life. I tried to simplify these roles into 4 categories to use
> the image of Deoxyribonucleic acid ( *DNA* ), where 4 nucleotides form
> the kernel of all known living organisms. The only thing I tried to
> express was that it should be the members that benefit in these
> different roles in life, using tools, techniques, software or know how
> they share in the community should have the [*not* mandatory]  respect
> to donate to the community they believe is valuable.
> 
> (valuable not to be expressed in $$ but real *value* such as:
>  - having qualities worthy of respect, admiration, or esteem: a valuable
> friend.
>  - of considerable use, service, or importance: valuable information.
> )[4]
> 
> Why? Because they get the opportunity to benefit from the common assets
> of the community in whatever aspect, and get the possibility to return
> some of these benefits for the needs of the community.
> Important is that there is no guarantee what is done with what you
> return, just like [many] members commit time, code or whatever without
> expecting immediate return.
> 
> Hope this makes it more clear.
> 
>>  
>>
>> Thanks for your writing.
>>
>> Best regards,
> You're welcome,
> 
> [1] http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Board_of_Directors#Board_Priorities
>  
> [2] http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/discuss/2014-July/013030.html
> [3] http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/discuss/2014-July/013043.html
> [4] http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/valuable ; meaning 2. and 3.
>