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Ask Slashdot: With Grants Drying Up, How Is a Tech Non-Profit To Survive?
helios17 writes "Non-Profits like this have traditionally gotten started from the money grants provide. Most grants award vehicles, computers, and even pay for organization rental and utility costs. The problem fledgling and even established non-profits are encountering is the dwindling number of grants allowing for Operating or General Support costs. What good is a vehicle received via grant if you can't afford to put fuel in it? With the number of Operating or General Support grants shrinking and those available funds competed for heavily, should we be looking on line for help? Can efforts like this be a better way to approach it?"
but larger organizations tend to have less overhead and better accountability
What reality do you live in? In my experience that is exactly the opposite of how it works at every organization I've ever seen. Be it an organization of friends, a shoestring non-profit, or too-big-to-fail businesses.
The larger ones may have more paper trails, but that doesn't actually mean ANYONE is accountable, as we can see the world over as big businesses fuck up economies left and right and the only thing that happens to them is ... nothing. They don't even get fucking fired for needing the government to save their asses.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
WTF? Get your ass to work and do something to earn the money you want to blow.
Why the hell should any one give you money when the most effort you appear to put into it is asking someone else how to do it on slashdot.
You are part of the problem. You seem to believe you are entitled to other peoples money because you want to start a 'non-profit'.
Heres a hint. A non-profit is still a business just like every other business. You still have to provide something people care enough about to give you money.
Stop expecting people to throw money at you and DO SOMETHING.
Stop blowing your political ideals about software all over it as well. I shouldn't see Linux plastered on both of the links you give. You want to not alienate people, Linux is a good way to do that. GPL scares a lot of people with money, they don't even actually know why, take that crap out and stop making it clear your more concerned with your biased view than accomplishing the goal at hand.
Stop trying to sell your crappy books as some awesome bundle that people will want to buy to donate to your cause. Dude, you've got a grand total of about 15 reviews. You are not popular. People don't care about your books or what you write and they certainly aren't going to donate because some random dude published a book being that anyone can publish a book on Amazon for almost exactly 0 effort and certainly 0 cost.
Looking at your front page ... I see a lot of begging 'because I'm going to do something good' but pretty much nothing that tells what you actually do.
In short, its clear you want people to give you free shit, but it is unclear how you are any different than a street begger who just doesn't want to actually work for a living.
WHY SHOULD PEOPLE GIVE YOU ANYTHING?
'Because' isn't an answer. 'I'm going to do 'good' stuff for people' isn't an answer. Have a plan, tell exactly how funding will be spent, then people might listen.
Right now, you're sites just a semi-pretty scam as far as anyone is concerned.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
I take it you think there's a problem here? My view is that non profits are an excellent place for parasites to thrive since there's no real accountability aside from whatever donors happen to impose. Donors are merely getting wise to what's been happening over the past few decades to the non profit sector.