[GRASS5] [acuster@nature.berkeley.edu: Re: [Freegis-list] Funding for free projects (was: ArcInfo to Free conversion)]

[Markus Neteler]

Hi all,


On Tue, Jan 09, 2001 at 06:47:35PM -0800, Eric G . Miller wrote:
> On Tue, Jan 09, 2001 at 08:40:33PM +0000, Markus Neteler wrote:
> > Hi all,
> > 
> > here an forward from "free-gis" mailing list.
> > We should work out a policy how finanical donations
> > can be done to the GRASS project. I am sure some
> > ideas we can borrow from other projects like KDE or
> > whatever.
> > 
> > See attachment,
> > 
> >  Markus
> 
> > Subject: Re: [Freegis-list] Funding for free projects 
> >          (was: ArcInfo to Free conversion)
> > From: Adrian Custer <acuster at nature.berkeley.edu>
> > To: Freegis-list at intevation.de
> > X-Mailer: Evolution 0.8 (Developer Preview)
> > Date: 09 Jan 2001 11:26:39 -0800
> > 
> > On 09 Jan 2001 18:54:17 +0000, Markus Neteler wrote:
> > 
> > > Perhaps an idea: Why not spending the "proprietary maintenance tax" into
> > > such a project like GRASS? That will speed up its development - of course it
> > > remains free. Such GRASS-related funded projects are already running, but it
> > > could be more.
> > > 
> > > And keep in mind: An open source project is what people make of it. So the
> > > GRASS Development Team is open to interested programmers and open to new
> > > ideas! Many new features are on the way (like a new GUI, integral database
> > > management for vectors etc), but more "staff" is required to finish them.
> > > 
> > > Cheers
> > > 
> > >  Markus
> > 
> > 
> > Do you have an explicit policy whereby a group of counties could make an
> > investement in GRASS for functionality it may lack or for modifying the
> > development priorities of the project? I suspect it is much easier for a
> > group to cough up a few thousand dollars than find an employee who could
> > do the work. You would never get them to spend all of the proprietary
> > maintenance tax"  on GRASS but perhaps  they would give you a
> > contribution if they could show the higher authorities that it was
> > generating software for their specific needs.
> 
> Well, if someone (or group) really wanted to do something like this,
> they could:
> 
> 1)  Contract for the development directly with the stipulation that
> functionality be released and integrated into the free GRASS source
> tree under GPL.
> 
> 2)  Go to some site/service like collabnet and try to find developers.
> 
> 3)  Make a donation to the FSF and ask the money be directed to GRASS.
> 
> 4)  Baylor and or Hannover could probably handle "grants" or
> "foundations" for such donations.
> 
> 5)  Set up an independent non-profit for such development.
> 
> 6)  Hire developer's directly and have them work on GRASS.

Thanks for your comments. I have added some stuff at:
http://www.geog.uni-hannover.de/grass/commercial.html
 
> Out of any of the above, the first would probably see the most direct
> translation of money to features.  However, it'd likely be expensive and
> may create a bit of a rift between the developers under contract and
> developers donating their time.  The same could probably be said for any
> scenario where developers are paid directly to implement feature X.
I agree - he a problem might arise. How do other sponsored OSD projects live
with such a situation?

> The scenarios that are more indirect may see little bang for the buck
> and the donaters may feel they threw away their money.
> 
> I like the last two scenarios, but somebody with a lot of energy would
> have to step up to the plate for organizing a non-profit (not to mention
> getting funds and developers!).  The last one could be done by large
> enough organizations, but finding good applicants could be challenging.
> 
> The OSSIM project, obviously, comes to mind...

In Germany we are currently in process to found a GRASS-related non-profit
organization. Another annoucement will be posted if this process is
finished. As the GRASS audience in Germany is quite small, this might
attract more users then.

Markus

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