[kde-community] Fundraiser money handling/redistribution - Re: KDE fundraisers and things we've learned

[Boudewijn Rempt]

On Tue, 30 Dec 2014, Albert Astals Cid wrote:

>  - For Krita: open source digital painting | Accelerate Development [3]
>
> Sometimes that projects that have had project specific fundraisers request 
> funds from the KDE eV to run a sprint.
>
> KDE eV funds are not unlimited, so for me sometimes it seems that those 
> projects are being a bit unfair to the rest by running their own fundraisers 
> and then also asking for money from the common pot.

I've been expecting this, and in fact, I've been facing that idea already 
in 2014: KDE e.V. could not help out with the siggraph presence of Krita.

We still did provide publicity for KDE, by prominently display KDE's logo 
in the booth and on the leaflets we were handing out, which could be 
considered really valuable for KDE, especially since we were reaching a 
set of people who, if they had heard of KDE before at all, were pretty 
much uniformly negative towards KDE, and now they got some positive 
impressions. In other words, Krita sponsored KDE e.V. in this case.

Also keep this in mind: Krita's fundraisers are not meant to provide for 
the usual costs any KDE project faces: they are meant to pay for 
development time, something KDE e.V. cannot do. Asking for Krita to pay 
for sprints means asking the Krita Foundation to cut down on support for 
development.

Finally, I understand the reaction -- oooh, look, they got _20k euros! 
they are rich! I understand that it makes some people feel that those 20k 
were a loss for KDE e.V. It's not true, because doing fund-raising isn't a 
zero-sum game, and different projects are targeting different audiences. 
The money is used for different purposes. Money raised by Krita is not 
money lost by KDE e.V., it is not money stolen by Krita from KDE e.V. 
'common pot'. Krita is not double-dipping in the same moneybag.

And compared to the cost of developing Krita, 20k just a bagatelle. To 
keep Krita moving as fast as in 2014, I need about 10k a month. Which is 
an extremely cheap and non-commercial estimate.

And moreover, I don't have 10k a month : which is why I asked Intel, KDE 
e.V. and others to support Krita's stand at Siggraph (and promised 
exposure in return) and KDE e.V. to support our sprint in Deventer (which 
was further supported by me personally, taking care of accomodation in my 
own place).

If asking for that sort of support is 'a bit unfair', then how long until 
using KDE's infrastructure is considered 'a bit unfair' for projects that 
manage to get some funding? Especially when a project like Krita is a 
relatively _heavy_ burden on the infrastructure, which I totally admit.

This is a big discussion, and I am not sure I want to be a real part of 
that discussion: when I was approached by the board about the thorny 
question of what to do now that KDE project has some money of its own that 
wasn't coming to the KDE e.V., I had to beg for more time and a 
postponement of the discussion until 2015.

After all, I am on the dole now, because right now, nobody can afford to 
pay for my work on Krita development, and I need to get 2.9 released.

Until that's fixed, I guess that I'll go on expecting KDE e.V. to continue 
to support Krita, a KDE project, with the usual support extended to every 
other KDE project.

Boudewijn