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To Whom Should I Donate?

Posted by Soulskill on from the think-of-the-devs dept.

jasonmanley writes "I currently use DesktopBSD. The other day I gave some thought to donating money to the project, but then I got to thinking — to whom would I donate the money? DesktopBSD benefits from FreeBSD and KDE among other projects. What about software with a smaller focus, such as OpenSSH? In fact, there are heaps of other projects' software embedded in FOSS packages, and I would like to know who the community thinks should get the donations."

13 of 299 comments (clear)

  1. just choose your favorite project by crazybit · · Score: 4, Interesting

    and give them some of your time and effort by reporting bugs, making some code (if you can), helping with documentation, helping newbies on their support lists, etc.

    sometimes our time is as good as some cash.

    --
    - Human knowledge belongs to the world
  2. To the Digital Standards Organization by pieterh · · Score: 5, Interesting

    OK, since I'm one of the founders, I'm biased. But free and open source software needs free and open standards and the Digital Standards Organization is the only international network set-up specifically to defend and promote free and open digital standards.

    Coincidentally, on the day we signed the Hague Declaration, Microsoft announced they would support ODF in Office.

    Luckily, Digistan does not want your money, just your support. Sign the Hague Declaration online, and help us by getting involved.

    --
    My blog
  3. I would donate to the Perl Foundation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Perl6 (Rakudo && Parrot) is making big steps forward in the last months. The Perl Foundation is using the money to support some of the developers which are working part-time on the projects.

  4. Let the flamewars begin... by Kjella · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...since everyone will cheer for their pet project. Personally I'm inclined to go with KDE - they and QT are working to create a real development platform (phonon, solid, all the non-UI classes already in QT etc.) on Linux, not just a UI toolkit. Yes, I know GTK+ and family also have various non-UI things but none as polished that I've seen.

    --
    Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
  5. Relevancy ? by BrainInAJar · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I would personally probably donate to the most relevant project, which since DesktopBSD is more or less a FreeBSD distro, and since KDE gets help from SuSE/Novell, the KUbuntu people, etc. it would end up being FreeBSD

  6. The little guys by Bogtha · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Rather than donating to a project with corporate backing, why not split your donation up and give it to a few smaller projects instead? You're more likely to make a difference there. Even the tiniest donation could give a lone developer the extra enthusiasm needed to fix that one last bug before calling it a night.

    --
    Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
    1. Re:The little guys by value_added · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Yeah. Nothing sets the spirits like receiving $0.05 from an enthousiastic user.

      You could always extend that to a more personal approach.

      I'm a regular at a local Mexican restaurant. Instead of dropping my loose change anonymously in the tip jar, I show up with a few sixpacks of beer for the staff, and maybe some cut flowers for the hostess. I don't do this on a regular basis, but frequently enough to give everyone a good laugh. Now, my food orders are on the grill as soon as they see me pulling into the parking lot, and I walk out knowing the burritos I ordered were bigger than everyone else's, or my order included things that everyone waiting in line would pay extra for.

      Substitute beer with hookers and blackjack (be sure the hookers aren't crossing state lines), airline tickets, gift certificates or whatever else you think may be appropriate, and you might discover those few cents can add up and have a greater effect than you'd think.

  7. Re:A bit of perspective by slim · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Software you are talking about is business, or should be business. I fundamentally disagree with this statement. Business is part of the software ecosystem. But software, including operating systems, can and should be written, distributed and used outside of a business context.
  8. Re:There Can Only Be One by xaxa · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I don't really follow what GNU do with donations, but I donate to the FSF Europe -- and they're campaigning against DRM, standing up against Microsoft in court etc.

  9. It won't work if we tell you by explodingspleen · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There are clearly a multitude of metrics by which you can assess the answer to your question.

    Humanitarian: language translation / disability assistance software / tor.
    Wanting to overthrow the evil empire: wine, firefox.
    Wanting better hardware support: kernel developers.
    Wanting to thank people: any projects you use/couldn't do without.

    Really, it works best to just donate according to your own special favoritism. This way the projects get money in proportion to how much people/need want them. If you just wanted to pick the one project that will contribute the most to humanity, well, I can tell you already it's going to involve feeding hungry children and not improving your boot time.

    If you like, you can imagine you are purchasing the software, and donate whatever is the highest price you would have been willing to pay for it (or at least use that to figure out the proportions in which you should divide your money).

  10. Re:Some options by Corporate+Troll · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Well, that depends on your own vision of things. One of the most useful software packages I found in the last 8 years (is it really already that long) was OpenBSD. At first I bought their CDs and T-Shirts occasionally. Then I started buying their CD on the 6 month release shedule and I just rounded it up to the next 100€ (back then CDs were 30€ or so) donating the difference. Now I even stopped doing that: I just have a monthly standing order to their account. I still buy the CDs occasionally, but it's not the rule anymore.

    Why OpenBSD? Because I like the system (not on the desktop, but as a server it's nice). They created OpenSSH which benefits pretty much every Unix out there. Their security fixes propagate to other platforms and software.

    So, no, "useful" is what you define it to be. I find OpenBSD useful because it's there, in the background, routing my packets, protecting my computers. I find that insanely more useful and important that anything else. (Note, that this has never stopped me from donating to other projects, including OpenOffice.org, Mozilla, OpenWebmail, and many others...)

  11. Me Too! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I too am one of those unfortunates.

    I sit and watch my 42" LCD with a tear in my left eye. With a 50" plasma, both my eyes would be on fire!

    Donate much and regularly. Please.

    On a serious note: In ten years of OSS programming I've only once received a user donation. It was $25 deposited into my paypal account and it meant a lot to me. Unsolicited donations are a pick-me-up that lasts for days.

  12. Re:Making things complicated. by erikina · · Score: 3, Interesting

    You have a point. With traditional services/product - if you want to support someone, you simply use them. Want to support Honda? Buy one.

    However, when everything is free - this really doesn't work in the same sense. So I guess the option is donating or buying products from an open source company (like red hat). Another option would be instead of just donating - pay someone (possibly through a bounty system) to fix a bug or add a feature to some program.

    Then again, there are some pretty cool projects that deserve a straight donation.