My company badly needs Lazarus. Therefore it could pay some money in
order to support it, and contribute to keep the Lazarus project alive.
From the postings in this mail list I believe that many others are in a
similar condition.
But there's a problem. A company can't just send money somewhere.
Accountants (and tax collectors) are quite strict about this point. It
would be too easy to send all profits to a compliant person, call them
expenses, and avoid paying taxes. Only if an organization provided of
legal status (a company, a foundation, a cooperative, a church,
whatever) can provide a product or a service, and then bill for it, then
there's no problem.
Someone proposed, some time ago, a Lazarus foundation. It was a solution
without a problem, and so the matter was dropped.
But an organization providing a service could raise some money, which
could be put to use in many ways, mostly to get those parts which are
harder to obtain from voluntary work, because they're less interesting
and stimulating, like documentation, but which greatly contribute to the
diffusion and usage of Lazarus.
We need a service which would cost pretty much nothing to provide
(otherwise the money raised would be eaten by the service), but which
could be useful to Lazarus users, and easy to explain to those who
authorize expenses.
An idea: what about a Lazarus updates service? It would be sufficient to
set up a little gimmick which sends an e-mail to a subscribers mailing
list whenever an svn commit is done, (or once a day) with the log
content as the body of the message. Another e-mail could be sent
whenever a new stable release is available (this could be done manually).
The cost of such service is negligible. It's useful, because one could
avoid updates when they cover parts he's not interested to, and be kept
informed even when one is so busy with tight schedules that he has no
time to follow the mailing list. It's easy to explain: we pay so that we
get informed whenever a new feature is available, or when a bug has been
fixed.
If it's not too expensive, let's say in the order of 100$ (or Euro's) a
year, then I believe that the number of subscribers could be interesting.
If the idea doesn't appear too stupid, the the debate about a Lazarus
foundation (or company, cooperative, church or whatever) could be open
again, but with a goal in mind. Personally I would be in favor of a
church, because they usually enjoy a lot of privileges, and also because
a lot of faith is required in our line of business, but maybe someone
with some law background could come out with a more realistic proposal.
What do you guys think about that?
Giuliano
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