[OSGeo-Board] Re: [Fundraising] Re: [OSGeo-Board] Re: [Fundraising] RE: [OSGeo-Board] German OSGeo Chapter formation, bank account

[Arnulf Christl (CCGIS)]

On Mon, August 21, 2006 19:35, Gary Lang wrote:
> Having just personally hooked us up with China and personally worked on
> bringing up thr Japan chapter, I am not sure where this bias shows up.
>
> Gary

This way of thinking is part of the bias. Its not that you do something
there but that they can do things by themselves. This seems to be
incredibly hard to understand for many people.

I assume your personal hooking OSGeo up with China has a solid commercial
interest. Which is perfectly fine but different to the kind of bias I am
talking of. I think that the OSGeo that I see growing is just one level
more global than yours. We should share our visions or something like
that.

It is a different thing whether you dictate others what you think they
need (and say "we need") and what they and you and I really need.

This is funny. I did not bother a second to think about whether this
request could be any issue at all. I am slightly stunned at the immediate
responses. There are basically two reasons why I want to have a separate
banking account. The first is that we need to put community money that has
come out of the German conferences to good use. We (the FOSSGIS conference
team) have decided to put this money into OSGeo. The second reason is that
every time you shove money accross a border it loses value. The smaller
the amount the less it makes sense. So the easiest thing is to set up a
separate Euro account. If this is a big thing for OSGeo management and
results in a costly overhead we will do it differently. We can found a
small association with a bank account and then apply for an association
with OSGeo. Same thing other way round. Would that be better? Either way
up I end up on your doorstep sooner or later with some 5000 Euros sitting
on an account waiting to be spent for some OSGeo activity. Are we going to
make this difficult?

> --- Original Message ---
> From: "Arnulf Christl" <arnulf.christl at ccgis.de>
> Sent: Mon 8/21/06 1:24 pm
> To: "board at board.osgeo.org" <board at board.osgeo.org>
> Cc: "fundraising at fundraising.osgeo.org"
> <fundraising at fundraising.osgeo.org>,
> "discuss-de at visibilitycommittee.osgeo.org"
> <discuss-de at visibilitycommittee.osgeo.org>
> Subject: Re: [Fundraising]	 Re: [OSGeo-Board] Re: [Fundraising]	 RE:
> [OSGeo-Board] German OSGeo Chapter formation, bank account
>
> Gary Lang wrote:
>> I also wonder what the impetus is. It seems like another governance
>> issue, wherein local chapters could register their localized
>> dissatisfaction with global decisions by funneling funds while enjoying
>> the benefits that we provide.
>>
>> I can't think of a practical reason for doing this.
>
> The practical reason is that Autodesk does not have to ship one set of
> posters around the world in all languages but that all languages can
> take care of it themselves. We need local money to pay for local
> expenses. Else a lot simply ends up in superfluous transactions fees.
>
>  > enjoying the benefits that we provide.
>
> Who is "we"? Are you talking of the core OSGeo PSC? That would be the
> board. The board currently has a heavy Northern-American,
> English-language bias. Ponder for a second why the US is the only
> country without an own country code top level domain? I do not think
> that this will apply to OSGeo. Hmmm. I'd rather say it more pro
> actively. I want to prevent OSGeo from becoming just that. Probably I am
> being too political and problematic again. Sorry. Guys. Uh - thats
> another one, we have a male bias too...
>
>  > global decisions by funneling funds
>
> This gives the impression that global decisions are directed by funds
> which is not what we have set down in our charter. It would immediately
> exclude any less monetary potential funders to influence global
> decisions. I do not see a problem in a local chapter using local OSGeo
> sponsoring for local OSGeo activities. This is just basic globalization,
> think global, act local. The "global thinking" part will start to cost
> money when we get an ED. The "act local" part is already happening
> everywhere with people spending time and resources on OSGeo activity.
>
> Regards,
>
>> Gary
>>
>> --- Original Message ---
>> From: "Dave McIlhagga (External)" <dmcilhagga at dmsolutions.ca>
>> Sent: Mon 8/21/06 9:34 am
>> To: "fundraising at fundraising.osgeo.org"
>> <fundraising at fundraising.osgeo.org>
>> Cc: "Arnulf Christl" <arnulf.christl at ccgis.de>, "board at board.osgeo.org"
>> <board at board.osgeo.org>, "discuss-de at visibilitycommittee.osgeo.org"
>> <discuss-de at visibilitycommittee.osgeo.org>, "brassat at geo-consortium.de"
>> <brassat at geo-consortium.de>
>> Subject: [OSGeo-Board] Re: [Fundraising]         RE: [OSGeo-Board]
>> German OSGeo Chapter formation, bank account
>>
>> Yup - just thinking that if this ends up being a model for other
>> organizations around the world and somehow needed to be coordinated
>> under a common OSGeo entity - yikes that sounds really complex,
>> financially and legally.
>>
>> Probably the net result is the need for an arm's length entity with
>> OSGeo affiliation -- but I'll let Gary do his homework with the
>> legal/financial guys on that one.
>>
>> Dave
>>
>>
>> Gary Lang wrote:
>>  > I have no idea what the ramifications of doing this are on the
>> corporate
>>  > body that is OSGeo, but I suspect it can create headaches for us.
>> I'll
>>  > find out.
>>  >
>>  > Gary
>>  >
>>  >
>>  > -----Original M
>


-- 
With best regards,
Arnulf Christl
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