KDE e.V. transparency (was: Re: Voting rights - the GNOME way)

[Rob Kaper]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

On Wednesday 27 November 2002 01:09, Dirk Mueller wrote:
> Bullshit. The members of eV are not some strangers that came from outer
> space to conquer KDE. The members of KDE e.V. are the people who wrote at
> least 90%, if not more, of the code of KDE and much of other stuff
> (websites, documentation, translations etc). They're all KDE supporters and
> addicts, right from the beginning.

I'll take the 90% claim lightly, but I am not doubting any of the individual 
members of the e.V. or their intentions.

You must admit that the visibility of the e.V. is rather low and that the e.V. 
website doesn't give a lot of information. The only reason it has credibility 
to me is because it is hosted on kde.org and I know the names of the board 
members. For an outsider, that might not be enough.

> The KDE e.V. is the legal body to accept donations "for KDE developers".
> Face it or not, companies do not hand out money to individuals just because
> they show a printout where they show that they have a @kde.org email
> address or because they look nice.
>
> Companies only donate money e.V.s or similiar institutions.

I'm not opposing to an organization, not at all. I just feel that with the 
current *public* information on the e.V., it is not clear to me why someone 
should want to sign up or make a donation.

Yes, *I* know the e.V. paid the ETAP hotel for LinuxTag last year because I 
was there. But I am sure a lot of developers might not know this, let alone 
KDE users considering to make a donation. Adding such activities to the e.V. 
website would greatly help because it would give some visibility. Just 
because a lot of active KDE developers doesn't automatically give the body 
credibility. The e.V. could do better to promote itself.

> > I'm hoping to get a clarifying answer from one of the eV board members
> > soon about their budget, plans, concrete goals and membership
> > applications (I know of at least two people who were promised to get an
> > answer about their membership before the end of October)..
>
> concrete goals ? Like "we're planning to reach 40% market share as KDE
> Desktop in 2004" ?

That's more something for the League.

More concrete goals would be naming a few specific events that are important 
to KDE and its development. What's the amount of the donations? After paying 
for servers and the likes, how much is left to be spent on events, flyers and 
other stuff? What decisions are made to budget that money?

What resources are available for which events, for example? Would Charles be 
able to get some funding for LWCE in San Francisco just like our LinuxTag 
presence is partially funded? We had to do with flyers that were a year old 
this summer.

The lack of feedback some developers have been getting on their membership 
status is also frustrating. Maybe everyone is just too busy or policies are 
not in place to handle that kind of stuff speedily.

> > If the e.V. cannot provide us with any relevant information, I might
> > consider starting my own organization with the purpose of aiding KDE. As
> > open en accessible as KDE itself. Our primary virtue is that we are an
> > open source project and I see no reason to abandon that quality when it
> > comes to organizational issues.
>
> Oh boy.. no idea about what it does but trying to fork it. Have luck.

It's a last resort. Hopefully I my membership application is processed quickly 
and I can work from within to bring more visibility to the e.V. for the 
average KDE user and developer.

Just look at http://www.kde.org/kde-ev/about/

"The Association aids in creating and distributing KDE by securing cash, 
hardware, and other donations, then using donations to aid KDE development 
and promotion." isn't really making me go "wow, great job".

Marc's critism that there is no method in-place for Internet participation for 
meetings. That makes it look hard to participate to the e.V. when - face it - 
not living in or near Germany. Overseas developers cannot easily be 
represented in meetings.

Anyway, I'm applying for membership. Hopefully I can use that to make a bit 
more information on the e.V. activities public, which should avoid 
discussions like these.

Rob
- -- 
Rob Kaper     | Gimme some love, gimme some skin,
cap@capsi.com | if we ain't got that then we ain't got much
www.capsi.com | and we ain't got nothing, nothing! -- "Nothing" by A
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.1 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQE95CVYtppIl2G1SjcRAuhiAJ9bFzeQ15W10ctDQXkFPAOjtAMPkQCeOnxz
9st/4RazRxEU7/lcBXnz2yY=
=NM5J
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----