Report from incorporation research committee

[Leo Franchi]

On 8 Jan 2009, at 03:00, Bart Cerneels wrote:

>>
>> ============
>> Recommendation
>> ============
>>
>> As both Tradebit and Magnatune (to take two examples) are  
>> incorporated
>> in the United States, and given the relative size of the United  
>> States
>> to Germany, if all other things are equal it would make more sense to
>> allow tax-deductible donations from individuals or corporations from
>> the United States. This would open us up to more potential funding.  
>> It
>> seems that if we go with the SFC we basically have a very easy way to
>> get these donations, while at the same time not impinging on our
>> rights to decide what to do with our funds. Furthermore, this fits
>> well with our plans to create a board as outlined above --- the board
>> would simply be required to decide how to allocate funding, then the
>> predetermined SFC contact (on the board) would request a  
>> reimbursement
>> for the necessary amount.
>>
>> It is our preliminary recommendation that the Amarok project choose
>> the SFC for managing its funds, while considering an additional
>> second, German-based entity.
>>
>
> Has it been considered that those 3th parties might find it suspicious
> to send the funds to a proxy charity organization like the SFC? I
> Realize we are not dealing with paranoid, conservative businesses but
> innovative web-entrepreneurs, but still. Perhaps it should be checked
> informally with Magnatune, Tradebit and the like.
>
> I'm personally all for the SFC + e.V. idea.

Maybe, but it wouldn't really be a rational feeling on their part. I  
mean, they are free to look at the SFC and SFLC website on their own  
and discover that they exist to help open source projects manage their  
finances and legal terms.

If anything, they should be consoled by the fact that we can call on  
lawyers to help us resolve any problems---ensuring that we are not  
inadvertently doing something illegal (which they could get in trouble  
with later on). And it would be quite reassuring for them too i would  
imagine.

leo


---
Leo Franchi				(650) 704 3680
Tufts University 2010

lfranchi at kde.org
leonardo.franchi at tufts.edu