[Opensim-users] Funding/Donating to the OSGrid Project

[Frisby, Adam]

Sorry about this - we switched it (or should have) recently over to a fixed message on the screen (may not have been put on the live site yet, I believe Dave was supposed to be doing that?), since tracking the donations turned out to require a manual count of the subscriptions every time it needed to be updated (which naturally resulted in it not getting done after a few months), and it needs to be updated in about fifteen different places on the site's code.

That said, I do think it is still a little shy of the target right now, but we're ahead of our costs which is good - I would like to prod Ckrinke (*prod prod*) to do some kind of news piece on the site with just a quick update on where the fundraising efforts are going, and what the current donation levels are - we're trying to hit a target of having about years operational fees in balance (which should be described on that page) which gives us a bit of long-term security.

If you are curious about what it's being spent on - right now, I believe (and don't quote me here, I'm not doing the books) we're slightly ahead of our current costs which are entirely consumed by server lease fees. We also had a couple of one-off expenses this year with paperwork filing fees in CA to get the registered organisation wrapped up (and we're formally applying for federal tax exempt status this week - long process). If I had to guess based on the balance in the bank account; we're taking in about $250/mo right now, and our target is $300 (so 80% or thereabouts).

We do also get a couple of one-off payments which we don't count towards the regular monthly commitments; we've had a couple of very generous persons who have donated $100+ at a time; which we're putting into a rainy day fund that will be used to cover shortfalls in other months (ie; if we have a month where donations is less than our costs, as has happened occasionally), or may be used in the future to purchase new hardware (we are eyeballing replacing the current asset server with something more purpose built for the task.)

Costs remain right now at $160/mo + one-offs; so the donations are still much appreciated - once we hit that magic $300/mo, we want to go ahead and buy a second UGIM server to act as a hot-backup to the current systems (since right now our regular backup is in Nebadon's basement - and not really ideal if we ever need to do a big restore like in January.) - this is non-essential for the grid operations, but we do want to insure ourselves against catastrophic hardware failure and has been a priority to setup hopefully sometime this year.

In addition to the donations, there are also the sponsors - OSgrid is sponsored to a fairly considerable tune by people who have donated dedicated servers to the grid. The electric sheep company provides our central database & UGIM server right now, Dave Coyle/Knifejaw Systems provide a fairly powerful box that hosts LBSA Plaza & others; DeepThink (disclaimer, I'm part of D.T.) donates two boxes which host the remaining plazas (inc. Wright) [which deepthink recently just upgraded].

As mentioned on the site - OSgrid is a registered nonprofit, and while the above may paint a somewhat rosy position; in absolute terms it is still only ~$250 per month; and we desperately want to both; a) have savings for a rainy day (e.g.; a critical machine fails & needs replacing), and b) purchase some new equipment from time to time to expand our services when possible; which means that every donation is very-much appreciated - and it can be assured we're doing our best to keep our costs down & not wasting any funds we receive.

With all the above said, the opensim-users list isn't really the place for osgrid specific discussion (#osgrid on freenode is probably the proper place) - but I hope I answered any questions or concerns you might have about the donations & where they go.

Regards,

Adam
(OSgrid Vice President)

From: opensim-users-bounces at lists.berlios.de [mailto:opensim-users-bounces at lists.berlios.de] On Behalf Of Len Brown
Sent: Saturday, 7 November 2009 10:52 PM
To: opensim-users at lists.berlios.de
Subject: Re: [Opensim-users] Funding/Donating to the OSGrid Project

I just noticed this on their donations page:

"Current Status: $50.00/mo pledged. (Last updated: 11:36PM PST, Monday 20th July 2009)"

That is quite interesting as well.  I don't see how they come to the conclusion that a $50 donation pledge is "58% of Target" which is $250.

:)

- Len
On Sun, Nov 8, 2009 at 12:12 AM, Len Brown <lenwbrown at gmail.com<mailto:lenwbrown at gmail.com>> wrote:
Hi!

     I've been wanting to make a monthly donation to OSGrid.org but for the last several months (as far back as I can recall) the site has shown a static "Funding at 58% of Target" and not changed whatsoever.  I find that extremely hard to believe.  Is OSGrid simply lying and maintaining that 58% donation figure for months on end to compel people to donate?  for all I know at this point, they may be receiving thousands in donations per month, but of course, without transparency, that is impossible to identify.

    I regularly donate money to open source projects I have an interest in, but only when their donation requests are transparent and clear.  On OSGrid's donation page, they state their target is $250.00 per month.  I just find it very hard to believe that, with the thousands of users and connected regions they are still only getting about $150 per month without any changes in that contribution level all through the summer and fall.

     I have the suspicion that others who would like to donate as well are turned off by the seemingly forever static contribution coverage percentage.  If I saw even a little fluctuation I'd at least know there is some variability in contributions and I'd not hesitate to offer a monthly contribution via PayPal.

     Heck, even if they said that contributions were at 100% but that they could always make use of more money, even if for personal compensation to those working on the project, I'd not have the slightest problem with that.  I have no reservations about making a donation that the recipient pockets - as long as they are actively contributing to the project in some manner.

     But for now I'm donating my money to other groups while OSGrid.org maintains their contributions as only 58% of their meager $250/month goal...

- Len W. brown
     lenwbrown at gmail.com<mailto:lenwbrown at gmail.com>

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