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

[Alex Mandel]

On 06/24/2014 06:14 AM, Mateusz Łoskot wrote:
> On 24 June 2014 14:38, María Arias de Reyna <delawen+osgeo at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> But there is a big but:
> 
> That's why I decided to ask, what are those "buts", as I haven't learned
> any concrete arguments from the original thread.
> 
>> 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.
> 
> Yes, I experienced similar situation, but ACM/IEEE/... are different
> organisations.
> 
>> So, couldn't we add some kind of volunteer work to compensate the fee on
>> some cases?
> 
> Again, that is a technical issue related to amount of fee,
> region-based adjustment of fee, etc.
> 
> First, we should focus discussion on the aspects Howard explained [1]
> and understand what are the major pros and cons of paid membership.
> 
> [1] http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/discuss/2014-June/012964.html
> 
> Best regards,
> 

There is a question about whether or not people value enough the Free
services they are currently receiving. This is a general question about
whether people truly value things they get for Free. I'm still looking
for good research on the topic and not just internet chatter.

Many of our committees are somewhat short-handed or non-operational due
to lack of volunteers. Webcom is almost non-existent, so the main
website upgrade has been on hold for years even though a design plan was
created. There's also been a suggestion for stipends for some system
admins to keep things running more smoothly. Marketing/Outreach always
gets requests for materials and we do allocate I think up ~$500 to new
chapters needing permanent materials but we don't cover any handouts.

I agree $ should not block anyone from access to any of our services. So
the question is what would people get for their membership besides a
resume line?

Your note about professional society fees being a blocker is why I
suggested they be quite low. If even 1/2 of our mailing list subscribers
joined ($10-$20) we could double or triple our operating budget. Maybe
we just need fundraising drives every year or for specific things.

Thanks everyone for contributing lots of ideas.

Alex