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More on the KDE League
An anonymous reader writes "Timothy Butler published a nice clean-up on the misinformations that were published by dep on Linux and Main. Most of what that has been alleged by Linux and Main turns out to be wrong. Especially, the KDE League has no obligation to disclose financial information. On dot.kde.org, Mathias Kalle Dallheimer, KDE e.V. president, explains that the KDE e.V would authorize the KDE League to disclose its books to the KDE e.V members. However, the KDE e.V is not the only member of the KDE League. Other members would have to approve this."
The Justice League?
and what is there position on the issue?
I am glad that these misinformations are not allowed to persist. It's tragic when someone else sets out on a PR war crusade against an Open Source project with the only goal of causing damage and mistrust.
Thank you Tim, Kalle and Slashdot for your efforts to combat this.
(Please browse at -1 to read this comment.)
Corruption in multi-billion dollar corporations. CEO's going down faster than a hooker on ephedrine.
Now, here comes the OPEN SOURCE book keeping. Does this mean we'll get to see the live, play-by-play webcasted extortion, with the source code to match?
god, getting people busted pwns.
I worry that this sort of thing feeds into the 'crackpot' image many in business seem to have of the community...
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
tells you what it is they do or plan to do ? These are not the devolpers I believe, though I am confused enough now to not really know...anyone with a better grasp explain this to me...PLEASE...
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
It's common knowledge that OfB.biz is just a KDE mouthpiece. This article does NOT, repeat NOT, clean up anything. Even though there are no legal REQUIREMENTS to disclose the financials, it should still be done. Where did the donated money go? Wht does the KDE league do, apart from possibly syphoning money to Pour?
This is a stink that will no go away with a few nice words from a KDE friendly website.
Ever watched politicians, most of them behave in the same way. Maybe it's because the OOS 'movement' is also a political movement?
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
What a bunch of crap, just because someone posts an article that was actually researched OFB is a "KDE mouthpiece". Point out one part of his article that is factually incorrect. Can't do it, can you?
How come you totally neglect the fact that not one thing in DEP's articles was true, including comments he attributed to the Delaware Secretary of State's office that they deny ever making, anyone in their office making, and are factually incorrect. Someone refutes a mostly imaginary article and you say they are a "KDE mouthpiece".
What a bunch of crap, just because someone posts an article that was actually researched OFB is a "KDE mouthpiece". Point out one part of his article that is factually incorrect. Can't do it, can you?
:P You want it, *now*, even though you have no right to anything at all.
How come you totally neglect the fact that not one thing in DEP's articles was true, including comments he attributed to the Delaware Secretary of State's office that they deny ever making, anyone in their office making, and are factually incorrect. Someone refutes a mostly imaginary FUD article and you say they are a "KDE mouthpiece". No one talks about making up quotes and facts, but still troll KDE when they did absolutely nothing wrong.
How about the fact that the Gnome foundation hasn't released their financials yet? You'd think you'd at least give the KDE League the same amount of time they get considering they started later, but no
This whole story is crap, and proved to be lies.
Linux has existed underground for years, but the fact that large, medium and small companies are all interested in Linux today, and are willing to spend money to make Linux more useful for them, only benefits the entire community.
As an employee of a large corporation seeking to enhance Linux support across a broad line of products, I've been amazed at just how much my company wants Linux to succeed. Of course my company's interests are almost entirely financial - better Linux support for a product means more sales - but it is good to have kernel support for a lot of new, cool hardware. Without support for new hardware, Linux would be forced back into an underground scene where everything had to be reverse-engineered and supported 1-3 years later than release. I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing - most of the open source hardware drivers are well-written - but it takes time to develop, and really hurts those who want to use the latest, fastest hardware with Linux.
And, as I'm sure you realize, hardware support is what makes Linux (or any open source operating system) available to the masses. It's not like these big corporations are trying to steer the direction of Linux into something unusable and non-functional for normal Linux users, like you and me. The source code is still out there - the major commercial distributions (Red Hat, Mandrake, SuSE) are getting better than ever, the free and source-based distributions (Debian, Gentoo, etc.) are thriving and growing, and nothing prevents anybody from using Linux the way they want to.
If no business people have any say in Linux, as you suggest, then Linux will no longer be useful for business, and will no longer benefit from the investments of those individuals, venture capitalists, and corporations who want to make Linux usable in the real world.
If you want an example of an "underground" operating system, look at OpenBSD. So far as I know, the development team has practically no commercial support or corporations helping to steer the development of the operating system. They continue to work entirely on their drive for perfection, and the generous donations (including CD sales) of their user base. On the other hand, OpenBSD still has no production-quality SMP support for x86 hardware, which is a major limitation and will limit the utility of this operating system. It bugs me, but they seem to be fine with the pace of development. Contrast this with IBM's efforts to make Linux work on their newest and fastest mainframe hardware.
If you really want to back underground, then CP/M and Amiga are still out there, waiting to be revived.
BTW - The subject of the investigation (mentioned above) was the KDE League, which is a separate entity from KDE e.V. Whether or not this business operated corruptly will not affect the development of KDE - they are completely separate organizations.
Super ninja monkeys will one day rule the world!
You should login DEP...
Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam
Interested in AI? MACR
Oh good god... First there was the duplicate story, now we have duplicate postings? What's next, a headline about Microsoft shutting down some rinky dink Korean mod chip distributor?
This is my sig. Its pathetic.
1. There is no IRS not-for-profit database. There is guidestar and http://wwww.guidestar.org/ does not always have the most up to date information. Often there filings are 1 or two years behind or might not exist at all.
2. If the KDE league is not a 501(c)3 then what the heck is the KDE league?
I believe the KDE leagues corporate filings should be available from the State of Deleware.
Claiming they do not have to disclose is a joke. The IRS, for example, can demand a full disclosure of all their books.
Depending on their status they may or may not need to disclose cartain information to the public.
Statements like this do not make for good public relations. Someone needs to have a talk with this guy.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
How about mentioning something useful ?. is KDE 3.04 is out, with several bugfixes (including two security advisories and several memory leaks in the libs).
Obviously the proper way to handle this is to start a New League. Call it the Gnome League, or maybe the Sawfish League. Let the KDE league play with themselves most of the year*, and the Gnome League play with THEMSELVES most of the year*, and bring the best teams from each league together at the end of the year for one big series. Sell tickets, get it on ABC or ESPN, it'll be great. Maybe you could get Don King and pugil sticks involved somehow, with Natalie Portman as sideline reporter girl.
*you know that is how they spend most of their free time anyway...
The KDE leage did not receive donations from the public. They collect membership fees, which start at $5000. Members are corporations, like HP, Compaq, IBM, Fujitsu-Siemens, Mandrake and others.
I cannot see, why the KDE leage should have a moral obligation to open their books for us. In fact, there may be a good reason for secrecy because of their competition. Why should companies, like HP and Compaq, which depend on Microsoft so much disclose their strategies towards a competing product to Redmond?
Feel free to mod the original anon posting down, I have no moderation capability :/
Perhap DEP is the son/daughter of "Deep Throat"....
The GPL makes software more like your mom. Free and open to all.
hmm... IMHO from the DEP atricle, it sounds like KDE and OFB are SOL, but WTF do I know, I didnt RTFM... and better yet, WGASA?
TTFN!
Humor Folks, enjoy it! =)
This is my sig. Its pathetic.
And now Linux even trys to copy the leading operating system... :-) http://www.xpde.com
Oh, Linux is Osama's special weapon ;-) And of course KDE as it originates from Europe is dangerous...
For those of us who have not kept up with Days of our KDE Lives, can anybody please post the backstory?
What is the KDE League? What's their relationship to KDE / The Kompany / anyone else? And what's the current stink about?
The article just leads me to believe that "KDE League" publishes press releases for KDE, and they dissapeared all of a sudden. Was there money stolen/embezzled? I'm not sure I understand the broad picture.
O'Reilly went a long way towards undermining United Way with his unique style of journalism. Please understand that each United Way is a local entity that must pay a small fraction to the national organization for use of the name, but is generally otherwise independent. Unless you were in New York, it is unlikely that your United Way had anything to do with the Sept. 11th fund. You should be able to ask your United Way for a list of agencies that they have supported in the past, and if you don't like some of the agencies they allocate to some allow you to request that your donation only go to a particular agency or that it goes to all but some of them -- or, more constructively, you can ask to become part of their allocation process and help steer them in a direction you think is better. At worst, you can always donate directly to the agencies they support individually.
Unfortunately, most people who muster up the plan to give to charity don't need much disincentive to kill that desire. Misinformation seems to work as well as anything else to stamp out philantrophic desires. If you are concerned about the practices of your local United Way, please don't let it stop you from giving to other causes.
The KDE League bylaws clearly state that it is a nonprofit, and the article makes the case that it is not a 501(c)(3) organization. Is it, then, a 501(c)(6) organization (a business league)?
If so, there are, indeed, public disclosure requirements imposed by the IRS. See this page and read the last paragraph. Yes, this page applies to all nonprofits, including business leagues, as this page makes clear. If, in fact, the KDE League is a "business league", Dennis Powell (no matter how much of a jerk you or I might think he is, and believe me, I'm not a fan) was within his legal rights to ask for disclosures. He is not be entitled to the full books, but he is entitled to "the last three annual information returns".
If the KDE league is not a 501(c)(6) either, then I don't see how it can be a legal nonprofit at all, in which case they owe Delaware filing fees that haven't been paid.
You can't just say that you're an ordinary corporation that doesn't expect to make money. With such a status you have to pay filing fees to the state of Delaware, and Delaware is now saying that the league doesn't owe them. So which is it? Either KDE League has to pay Delaware or they have to give Dennis Powell their annual information report. One or the other.
If I'm wrong, then it must be the case that the KDE League has some alternate legal status that I'm not familiar with. If so, what is it?
I'm not saying this to attack KDE. KDE and the KDE League are distinct entities, and I'm not seeing any evidence that the KDE League is serving the interests of KDE's developers or users. Any responses should leave the personality or beliefs of Dennis Powell out, as they are irrelevant.
What *I* don't get in all of this is - isn't the KDE League getting its money from private corporations (I see NO individuals in the members list, only corporations, several of which are rather large)...one of whom is KDE e.V. (Am I reading this correctly)? Who in turn says they've got no reason to believe anything funny's going on? It's THEIR money - if THEY don't think anything wrong is being done with it, why the heck does anyone who DIDN'T give them money care?
I've only seen one entity that actually ever had anything to do with the KDE League complain, and that's Shawn Gordon, whose company apparently USED TO BE a member (but are not any more, as far as I know. Unpleasant 'break-up', perhaps?).
I keep seeing comparisons with the Gnome Foundation, which is a completely different type of group. The Gnome Foundation, as I understand it, is directly involved in steering Gnome development - it's actually an official part of the Gnome project(s). The KDE League is purely promotional - to put it bluntly, the KDE League is a "Fan Club". They have no more involvement in 'steering' or otherwise influencing development than any other fan of KDE does.
It's also been pointed out elsewhere that $120,000 is a lot of money when it's sitting in a suitcase on your doorstep in the form of small unmarked bills, but it's a pittance when considered as a yearly budget for any kind of corporation. I think the highest-paid individual there is said to have been paid $36k/year salary to run it. Take out that, rent on facilities, purchase of equipment, and so on, and there's not much left...
Now, as to whether or not the KDE League is effective at DOING anything, I couldn't say. I do certainly get the impression that they've not been active at all (basically, as far as I know, they've spent the little funding they had by just merely existing, and not really accomplishing anything), but given that the unrelated-except-by-name-and-theme KDE Software projects (that is, the actual developers, etc., who have no relationship with the KDE League as far as I know) seem to be doing just fine without the KDE League's additional promotion, I'm not too concerned about it. For all I care, the KDE League could have spent all the money on cheap prostitutes, malt liquor, and pornographic videos featuring necropedobestiality, and it will have still done no more harm than wasting a few thousand dollars each from a handful of private corporations (there are 10 listed on the members page - if they all donated the same amount, that's a "whopping" $12,000 each. That's barely pocket-change to corporations like IBM and Fujitsu-Siemens...), who don't seem to even care what happened to THEIR money...
'Scuze the long post, I'm just utterly baffled at all the screaming going on over this thing. I could understand a chorus of "Ha, ha, member corporations, you wasted your money", but shrieking hatred of the sort reserved for Enron and Worldcom and so on just makes no sense to me at all...
Hacker Public Radio is our Friend
Most nonprofit organizations file normal corporate tax returns and face no more disclosure rules than any other private organization. It is only those nonprofit organizations that have also filed for and have received tax exempt status from the IRS that face additional disclosure requirements.
Put bluntly, the IRS doesn't concern itself with whether or not a corporation is incorporated as a nonprofit organization. The IRS only cares that the corporation pays its federal taxes unless that corporation has applied for and received tax exempt status.
Given that there is no reason to believe that the KDE league has applied for (much less received) tax exempt status, there is no reason to believe that the KDE league faces additional disclosure requirements over any other non-public corporation.
You may also be interested in reading the Delaware Revised Code on the subject. See especially Title 8, Chapter 1.
Feel free to mod the original anon posting down, I have no moderation capability :/
Thank you, I wouldn't have felt comfortable modding down the post you copied if I hadn't got your permission first.
For tax exempt nonprofit organizations, public disclosure of certain documents is mandatory. In this context it matters a great deal as to whether or not the KDE Leauge is a tax exempt organization.
Bear in mind, that not all nonprofit organzations are tax exempt. A good example is that most Politcal Action Committees (PACs) are organized as nonprofit organizations. However, PACs are precluded from having tax exempt status.
They are an nonprofit corporation incorporated in the state of Delaware. You can write to the clerk of courts of the state of Delaware and get copy of their articles of incorporation. If the KDE Leage was also a tax exempt organization (which they claim their not), you could also write to them and request a copy of their IRS Form 1023 (or 1024) for the past three financial periods.
KDE seems to be run more like a private club with a small in-group appointing people to positions and making the decisions. It should take a leaf from the GNOME book and have elections and more openness generally.
.
Too much of all this KDE League Bunk is just hogwash.
Is anyone here, asside from myself able to make a couple of clicks and read for themselves?
It is VERY VERY clear that the KDE League is supposed to be a Public Relations front for KDE.
It is also quite clear that it is a not for profit, not a non-profit.
It is also quite clear that they are not working as a PR group and that moneys are being piped from for profits into the hands of a special few.
The State Attorney General of Delaware needs to be looking into this organization to see exactly what the story is and should be contacting the members.
I don't hold any stock in the companies that are members, but if I did I would be sending letters to the Boards of those companies asking for clarification.
One thing is for certain there's smoke and KDE League appears to be pulling PR pranks to pretend that it's just a low level fog, and nothings burning.
And before the legal dogs start barking at my door I want to make it clear that this is my OPINION, each of you are free to explore the facts and form your own.
> DEP did nothing but ask questions and make available information as it was presented and mostly what I saw was character attacks rather than questions answered.
Uh, the KDE league is a private corporation that has nothing to do with the KDE Project (i.e, KDE e.V) It doesn't need to disclose anything to you. Are you going to go and ask Microsoft, Dell, RedHat, and Intel for all of their private financial records?
> Perhaps my clients and I will be better served by GNOME and leave KDE to the thieves.
=troll
>How humiliating for KDE and open source!
=FUD
Please give examples what got discussed and decided secretly and presumably against common consensus. And what positions are to be appointed.
the one with the sapphire glass bead centre.
> KDE seems to be run more like a private club with a small in-group appointing people to positions and making the decisions.
:\
Care to show specific places where this is so?
As a developer with both kde-cvs and gnome-cvs accounts, I think kde is the more accessible group. From my experience, I can commit things pretty much as I please, except for things like freezes (and a few other small mishaps I won't go into).
gnome-cvs, on the other hand, has a few problems. First, a number of times, my commits have been reverted by groups (such as people employed by wipro) When the maintainer of the module is asked, they usually side with the group, not the individual programmer
Anyways, things have gotten better since gnome2 was released. It was _much_ worse before when different groups of people rallied against other groups or singled out individual people. It was quite possibly the world's first cvs war. Things like that don't happen anymore in such a scale, but it still happens from time to time.
kde-cvs doesn't really have these problems because there really aren't any groups. It's more every man to themselves, which keeps the whole group intact.
The story is basically very simple. The KDE League was set up to promote KDE, and it got $120,000 to spend doing it. This seemed like a good idea and so everyone was hopeful good things would happen. But two years have passed and little or no promotion has been done, and so most people are curious as to what went wrong. When asked, the leaders say nothing, and so a lot of people wonder if they have something to hide. I myself am a KDE user and I wish they just tell us what happened. Maybe they don't have to legally but it would settle the issue and then we could go on to other, more rewarding things.
By the way, here is a list of the original KDE League members:
Caldera
Compaq
Corel
Fujitsu-Siemens
Hewlett-Packard
IBM
KDE.com
Klarälvdalens Datakonsult
theKompany.com
Mandrakesoft
SuSE
Maybe people could email them to find out what happened. I did that with IBM three days ago and the fellow said he would look into it, but I have not gotten a reply back yet.
Number one, the IRS database is not exhaustive. You're not required to file for a letter recognizing your 501(c)3 status from the IRS for 15 months from the creation of your organization, or 27 with the automtic extention. You're additionally not required to file if your gross annual receipts are less than $5k.
Additionally, there are many types of non-profit organizations of which 501(c)3's are only a small subjection - non-profit organizations that are *ALSO* CHARITIBLE organizations. All IRS-recognized non-profits are tax-exempt, but only CHARITIBLE ones (501(c)3's and a very few others) can accept TAX-DEDUCTIBLE contributions.
Basically, the REAL question here is this:
Does the KDE League accept tax-deductible contributions? If yes, then they're likely required to have accounting information publically available (but not much - just their Form 990's), if not, then they're not.
Ultimately, it is up to the members of an organization to keep track of the organization's accounting (the rights of the members to access the accounting information is a matter of state law) and the people making contributions to make sure their contribution will be spent effectively when they make the contribution.
Not a member and not giving money and the organization is not a public charitible organization (which it does not appear the KDE league is?) Then its none of your business what they do with their money.
There seems to be a misconception that non-profit = public or that non-profit = charitible. Neither of those is true.
paintball
There are all kinds of tax exempt entities. Section 527 political nonprofits, section 107 and others. None applies here, and most (if you read the disclosure laws closely) are required to disclose some financial information publically.
501(d)s I believe are churches, which I think doesn't apply here. 501(a) organizations are related for foreign entities, and may be subject to disclosure.
In any case, the fact that the KDE league claims to the state of delaware that it is a 501(c)3 is interesting, given the fact that it says it is not such an organization.
There is such as thing as a "not-for-profit" organization where the IRS is concerned, and that's all that matters. States do not determine whether a group is tax exempt or not; the IRS does.
It is a probably a for-profit company that decides not to make a profit. That's what the KDE league appears to be. What you're missing here is that the league *claims* to be a 501(c) to the state of Delaware.
The question is why would it not want to be a 501, especially when it would be so advantageous for the league to file as a 501(C). All contributions would then be tax-deductable.
Why are people so willing to give these guys the benefit of the doubt when they have repeatedly offered unclear and inconcsistent explainations of their activity? Just because they are affiliated with the open source community? Please, take your blinders off. Something smells in the state of Delaware, folks, whether you want to believe it or not.
I think Dennis Powell should be commended for raising these questions.
I see... you use a couple labels and you are "insightful"...
I have read the charter for the KDE Leaque and it CLEARLY states that it is a non-profit organization.
The KDE League is a non-profit organization that solicits funds for the purpose of promoting KDE as the default GUI desktop.
If the funds have disappeared, then fess up and quit attacking DEP who was merely asking questions and developed some conclusions based on the actions of Mr. Pour - refused to speak or grant an interview.
And what was Mr. Pour's response? He doesn't like DEP! What a lame jerk!
So, if you consider my statements to be a TROLL and FUD - perhaps you should examine the quality of the statements of Mr. Pour (all venom and character attacks) and Mr. Powell (asking questions and drawing honest conclusions based on declined opportunities for an explanation).
As for all the Nazi and Christian crap, FYI the Nazis were and are a Christian organization.
Have a nice day.
I've Gnoticed that since Gnome 2.0 came out, Gno one has been paying much attention to KDE. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that KDE is inferior in every way to Gnome? Or maybe it's because KDE still supports businesses? WHY in this day and age should anyone support business? Computers were made for freedom in every sense of the word. KDE is STILL not truly free because it supports the corrupt practice of profit making. KDE will never be free until the project learns that Gno one wants software that they don't completely control on their own. You are all wasting your time and effort working on that pathetic crap. If you want to do something useful, work on Gnome. It's vastly superior to KDE. Stupid l00zers.
> I have read the charter for the KDE Leaque and it CLEARLY states that it is a non-profit organization.
And what part of non-profit organization do you not understand? Just being non-profit does not mean that they have to reveal financial information. There is plenty of information about this in this article; I won't bore you to death explaining it _again_.
I've seen no evidence of such outside the assertions of the Linux and Main editorials. Given the apparent lack of accuracy in said editorials, I do not find them convincing. Among other problems, the Linux and Main editorialists do not appear to grasp the distinction between being tax exempt and being not-for-profit.
The by-laws of the KDE League (available on their web site) make no mention of tax exempt status. They do not state that donations are tax deductable. There is no reason to believe that the KDE League has ever claimed to anyone to be tax exempt.
Strictly speaking, this is not entirely correct. Obviously only a federal body (such as the IRS) can make a determination on whether or not an organization is federally tax exempt. However, each state has within its power to determine whether or not an organization is also exempt from state taxes. (An exception to this is where federal law prohibits certain types of state taxes to be levied against certain types of institutions.)
The fact of the matter is that it is a trivial action to verify that status of the KDE League through the clerk of courts of the state of Delaware. That none of the parties making the allegations that the League claims to be a 501(c) have done so gives a distinct lack of credibility to those allegations.
It isn't a matter of having blinders on. It is a matter of the person making an assertion having the onus of proving that assertion when it is disputable. In the context of what little I know of corporate law, Andreas Pour's counter assertions make much more sense than Dennis Powell's accusations. Until such time as Linux and Main shows concrete evidence of their allegations (such as a copy of the KDE League's application for a corporate charter), I'll continue to be quite skeptical of their claims.
The programmers of old were mysterious and profound. We cannot fathom
their thoughts, so all we do is describe their appearance.
Aware, like a fox crossing the water. Alert, like a general on the
battlefield. Kind, like a hostess greeting her guests. Simple, like uncarved
blocks of wood. Opaque, like black pools in darkened caves.
Who can tell the secrets of their hearts and minds?
The answer exists only in the Tao.
-- Geoffrey James, "The Tao of Programming"
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