You raise a good point, Karen. Already Yorba and Elementary are doing "small specific campaigns"/bug bounties (the way you described it, they seemed synonymous to me):
http://elementaryos.org/journal/fix-bugs-get-paid http://blogs.gnome.org/jnelson/tag/bounties/ Also, a highly desired feature for Telepathy has also been around for a while: https://freedomsponsors.org/core/issue/333/telepathy-should-support-otr-encryption It seems like there are two variables in play here, the size/amount of desired money of fundraiser & whether the fundraiser has specific goal(s). So we have: large & vague -- GNOME Privacy large & specific -- Geary/Pitivi/Mediagoblin crowdfunding (where they enumerated specific features) small & vague -- Friend of GNOME small & specific -- bug bounties I wonder what is best for GNOME... On 04/24/2014 12:50 PM, alex diavatis wrote: > Clear goals will also skip the need to check back with donors and tell > them where their money goes. > They will almost instantly know :) > > > On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 7:48 PM, alex diavatis > <alexis.diava...@gmail.com <mailto:alexis.diava...@gmail.com>> wrote: > > As an alternative idea, which I am not sure you would really want to > follow, > you can try small and often campaigns over specific highly > anticipated features > > For example, we need $3.000 to create folders-application within > Shell overview. > > Then you can contact a student to work on it the same way that GSoC > works. > If the feature won't get completed, just refund the donors. > > This way you will also save time from the main developers which can > spend time > to work on other things, that you would cover in a less "attractive" > campaigns. > > Additionally you can involve more people on GNOME Project, which > they might continue contribute afterwards. > As it actually happens with some GSoC students. > > But my opinion is that campaigns should have very very clear goals, > and not be as general as "privacy". > > - alex > > > > On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 4:00 PM, Karen Sandler <ka...@gnome.org > <mailto:ka...@gnome.org>> wrote: > > On 2014-04-24 05:13, Allan Day wrote: > > Oliver Propst <oliver.pro...@gmail.com > <mailto:oliver.pro...@gmail.com>> wrote: > When we are doing a campaign we tend to be very focused on > it (thus > busy), and not have the resources to focus on more long term > planning. > > Thus its a a good time for us now to think about how we can > improve > our fundraising efforts [1]. A great start is to learn how > from how > other free/open source projects have conducted their fundraising > campings. > ... > > Thanks for getting this started, Oliver. I've been thinking > about this > a bit myself recently, and I'd like to do some work on > Friends of > GNOME if I can find the time. I wanted to discuss it in a team > meeting, but the mailing list works. > > > yes! The best time to think of this is when there's nothing > pressing going on. > > > So, some general thoughts: > > * One of my main issues with Friends of GNOME right now is > that we > don't do enough to engage with existing donors. If people > donate, the > least they should get back is regular updates about how we are > spending their money. Right now, Friends of GNOME is a black > hole - > people make their donations and that's pretty much it. This > is not an > effective way to encourage people to keep donating or to get > them to > donate more (see below). One obvious thing we should be doing is > sending regular updates to donors, probably as an email (I > wonder if > this could be tied in with the annual report somehow - eg. > quarterly > donor updates could be used as the basis for each annual > report). > > > I like the idea of a newsletter - the main thing is that we > actually commit to write something on a regular basis. Given how > hard it was to get quarterly reports together I think this is > non-trivial. > > > * We ought to be looking to existing donors as the potential > source > of additional cash. If someone is making a regular donation, the > chances are that they will also be willing to donate to > periodic fund > raising campaigns. This is the way a lot of charities > operate - once > you are a donor they will contact you about their campaigns. > One thing > we need to do here is separate Friends of GNOME and our fund > raising > campaigns into different entities. > > * It doesn't seem like the adopt a hacker postcards and the > t-shirts > are being tracked and distributed very effectively, and I'm not > convinced that we have the administrative capacity to do a > good job of > these. I wonder if we should drop them in favour of other > incentives > that don't have the same administrative burden. Ideas: discount > vouchers, vouchers to spend on GNOME merchandise, freebies at > conferences, membership badges you can download and print at > home. > > > Actually, thanks to Tobi, this has gotten much much better. > Reminder emails are reliably sent. I know that at least for the > postcards I'm asked to send, I get nagged periodically until > they are sent (though I usually send them right away - I swear!) > > > * It's time to be thinking about another campaign. When that > happens, > we need to be certain that we will be able to use the money > fairly > quickly - this hasn't happened in the past, and that is > potentially > damaging. (Again, people need feedback about how their money > is being > spent, otherwise they might not donate again.) We should > think about > what we actually need money for, and I'd like the board to > provide us > with some advice here. There are outstanding sysadmin tasks, for > example, like upgrading Bugzilla, or maybe we need to > improve our > infrastructure in some way. > > > I like this a lot, but we should also consider that the > campaigns are also a way to state our ideals. I think this has > benefited us in the past. Also, I think maybe just keeping > people posted about the plans would help. We don't really have > an informal way to communicate officially. The closest we have > is the GNOME Twitter feed, I guess, but there's nothing on the > website where we can post small updates and musings, etc. > > > * Aside from the funding campaigns, we don't actively promote or > publicise Friends of GNOME. This is a basic error - we should be > routinely inviting people to join, posting about the scheme, and > advertising what we are doing with donations. This should be > part of > the Engagement Team's regular activities - not just when we > happen to > have a campaign running. A good way to start here would be > to come up > with a plan for what kinds of posts we should be making and > how often > we should be making them; this is something we can check > ourselves > against at each team meeting. > > * It seems to me that the Foundation's money goes into a > central pot > - I don't get the impression that particular income is > earmarked for > specific uses. I wonder if the finances could/should be > organised in > such a way that we can definitely say where Friends of GNOME > money is > going, or even channel it to areas that we think are more > interesting > to donors. Again, that's something for the board. > > > The money technically goes into a single account but the funds > are tracked. For example, I'm pretty sure the GF is still > spending down the Sysadmin FoG campaign amounts. > > > * Finally, we need data about our existing donors. There > needs to be > a system where we have email and postal addresses so we can > contact > them. We need to know how much they donate and how long they > have been > members for. We need to know how many people are > joining/leaving over > time. We need to know why people are joining/leaving. This will > require new infrastructure, and we need advice from the > board about > what is technically required and how we can get it. > > > We started to implement CiviCRM, but there were a few reasons > why this wasn't a great solution for GF, including the fact that > we have indefinite donors. Tobi's scripts are capable of > generating this data. For example, he was able to generate a > list of donors who had been giving for two years or more. > Perhaps it's not the most ideal solution but it's something and > he's surely work with us to create regular reporting scripts if > we want them. > > > Sorry for the long post! > > > This is great, and thanks to Oliver for starting the discussion! > > karen > > > > Allan > _________________________________________________ > engagement-list mailing list > engagement-list@gnome.org <mailto:engagement-list@gnome.org> > https://mail.gnome.org/__mailman/listinfo/engagement-__list > <https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/engagement-list> > > _________________________________________________ > engagement-list mailing list > engagement-list@gnome.org <mailto:engagement-list@gnome.org> > https://mail.gnome.org/__mailman/listinfo/engagement-__list > <https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/engagement-list> > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > engagement-list mailing list > engagement-list@gnome.org > https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/engagement-list > _______________________________________________ engagement-list mailing list engagement-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/engagement-list
