Xfce project and financial contributions

Wed Apr 21 22:12:53 CEST 2021

HI Kevin,

Would discourage the use of platforms that charge platform fees like
gofundme, indiegogo, etc.

If Xfce ever is set up as a non-profit, donorbox.org would be a good choice
to look at.

Regards,
Yousuf

On Wed, Apr 21, 2021 at 4:57 AM Kevin Bowen <kevin.bowen at gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks for the input Bruno.
>
> I think part of what you wrote neatly summarizes my concerns/criteria in
> finding a suitable alternative to bountysource. I definitely do not wish to
> place an undue administrative burden on the devs by using an org that
> requires providing tax papers(e.g. 1099s) upfront. Especially since many of
> these folks are located outside of the U.S. So, they have already been
> disqualified, in my opinion. The GitHub Sponsors program would be one of
> those, for example (among other reasons for not wanting to use them ;-)).
> Many of the programs that I have been looking use PayPal, or Stripe as a
> backend for fiscal disbursement. That is pretty common denominator with
> many of the candidates.
>
> I think Andre, in a separate mail, has addressed some of your other points.
>
> And just for the sake of clarity/transparency. Here is the list, in no
> particular order of importance, of the organizations that I have been
> researching besides opencollective.com:
>
>
> Patreon Developer https://www.patreon.com/developers
> GoFundMe
> liberapay https://liberapay.com/
> paypal
> coil https://coil.com/discover
> indieagogo
> snowdrift.coop
> Software in the Public Interest (SPI) https://www.spi-inc.org/
> Software Freedom Conservancy https://sfconservancy.org/projects/apply/
> https://www.oss.fund/
>
> Thanks again,
>
> Kevin
>
>
> On 4/20/21 9:58 AM, Bruno Schmidt wrote:
>
> Greetings to y'all!
>
> Fwiw: if your objective is to withdraw from bountysource (@
> https://www.bountysource.com/teams/xfce ) then the link to that service
> should be removed from xfce's page ( @ https://www.xfce.org/getinvolved )
> sooner than later. As you can see, donations are still flowing in, thus
> donors will have to be contacted to redirect their payment directives --
> not an easy task, for sure...
>
> I have looked at kde.org, ubuntu-mate, mate-desktop, linux mint,
> opencollective, patreon, and other paywalls, and would humbly suggest to
> develop a PayPal-based solution. For the simple reason that it their API
> works well and can be used internationally. However, there's a rub: if the
> person/entity that manages (read: admin & bank accounts) the PayPal account
> is a US-"taxpayer" (has an SSN or applied for/uses an EIN), then the flow
> of donations becomes subject to US tax-laws per se, and possibly tax
> liabilities, and perhaps additional information-report filing requirements
> (ie f1099) on US recipients of donated funds.
>
> On the up-side, Incorporating a non-profit corp / trust  /foundation here
> in one of the US states is relatively simple and cheap, but does require a
> "registered agent" (for legal process) in the state of incorporation, ie
> Nevada or Washington.
>
> Just some constructive thoughts. Cheers, BW
>
> ------------------
>
> On 4/19/21 5:31 PM, kevin.bowen at gmail.com wrote:
>
> That was definitely not the case. But thank you.
> On 4/18/21 6:23 PM, Yousuf Philips wrote:
>
> After we got rejected, I had reached out to the person handling social
> media for Endeavor and he found it strange that Xfce would be rejected and
> said "If he [Kevin] wanted to join the team, then I understand the
> rejection. This is only reserved for the founders and our fiscal host. If
> he has an Open Collective account he should be joining it. By it, I mean
> the collective."
>
> Regards,
> Yousuf
>
>
> On Sun, Apr 18, 2021 at 7:15 AM Kevin Bowen <kevin.bowen at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> It appears that Open Collective has admitted an error and reversed their
>> decision for not allowing Xfce to join one of their communities/fiscal
>> hosts. *shrug* I'll pick this up again next week.
>>
>> Kevin
>>
>> On 4/15/21 1:41 PM, Kevin Bowen wrote:
>> > Update:
>> >
>> > Open Collective is quickly being moved off of the table as a viable
>> > fiscal host for the Xfce project.
>> >
>> > I had applied to join one of there collective, and was rejected
>> > because Xfce did not meet their criteria.
>> >
>> > https://www.oscollective.org/#criteria
>> >
>> > I can only guess that Xfce is not popular, or open source enough for
>> > them. Perhaps we don't have enough GitHub stars on our repositories.
>> > :-/ I don't really know as they have not responded to my specific
>> > questions.
>> >
>> > I am still sort of engaged with them; but, this reception may be a
>> > good indicator that we may not want to deal with them. We shall see.
>> >
>> > Kevin
>> >
>> > On 4/13/21 9:22 PM, Kevin Bowen wrote:
>> >> Hello all,
>> >>
>> >> The Xfce project is currently in the process of looking to engage
>> >> with a new
>> >> organization to help us manage our collective funds as well as allow
>> >> us to
>> >> solicit donations and encourage fundraising efforts directed to end
>> >> users who
>> >> would like to support Xfce financially.
>> >>
>> >> Back in June 2020, Simon had elaborated
>> >> [here](
>> https://simon.shimmerproject.org/2020/06/18/why-bountysource-why/)
>> >> as well as
>> >> [here](
>> https://simon.shimmerproject.org/2020/06/26/bountysource-update/)
>> >> on some of the issues encountered with Bountysource and that Xfce
>> >> has, subsequently,
>> >> disabled its bug bounties and is looking to separate from its
>> >> association with
>> >> Bountysource.
>> >>
>> >> As of this month, the Xfce team is considering signing up with
>> >> [opencollective](https://opencollective.com/) to assist us in
>> >> managing donations and financial contributions.
>> >>
>> >> There are a few other options/orgs that are still being considered;
>> >> but, opencollective is looking like a contender for where we will be
>> >> moving towards to manage collecting funds.
>> >>
>> >>
>> >> Hopefully, we can announce, in a few weeks, that we are open for
>> >> business; and,
>> >> a few new donation buttons can be put up on our pages. Perhaps we can
>> >> even do a PR push to do a fundraiser. I am open to suggestions on
>> >> how, exactly, to pursue this.
>> >>
>> >> That being said, I would like to open this up to the general dev
>> >> mailing list for discussion and feedback for at least two weeks
>> >> before we make a final decision. As of today, the decision to go with
>> >> opencollective is not yet final.
>> >>
>> >> Any constructive feedback is welcome. Additionally, we are open to
>> >> considering other sites/orgs for handling our donations.
>> >>
>> >> Thank you,
>> >>
>> >> kevin
>> >>
>> >>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Xfce4-dev mailing list
>> Xfce4-dev at xfce.org
>> https://mail.xfce.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce4-dev
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Xfce4-dev mailing listXfce4-dev at xfce.orghttps://mail.xfce.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce4-dev
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Xfce4-dev mailing listXfce4-dev at xfce.orghttps://mail.xfce.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce4-dev
>
> _______________________________________________
> Xfce4-dev mailing list
> Xfce4-dev at xfce.org
> https://mail.xfce.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce4-dev
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://mail.xfce.org/pipermail/xfce4-dev/attachments/20210422/f84546ce/attachment-0001.html>