swick , vor einem Monat

@karolherbst

> collect money from desktops

what money

Nulhomme , vor einem Monat

@karolherbst i think it's a good idea that should be explored :blobcatcoffee:

mupuf , vor einem Monat

@karolherbst The X.org foundation used to pay some people to develop stuff, and it got abused. So the current stance is: only students can be funded.

karolherbst OP , vor einem Monat

@mupuf oh, I've never heard of that, but that also sounds like a terrible reason to not do it.

mupuf , vor einem Monat

@karolherbst Wanna create the framework to make it hard to exploit?

Who would you pay?

karolherbst OP , vor einem Monat

@mupuf I mean, I'm sure everybody had good people in mind we would be able to trust with that money. That's really the wrong question here.

The question is rather, do we really want to keep such a policy, because somebody abused it in the past?

Of course, us being a non-profit, we have to make sure the money is well spent and everything. And the person we'd pay also needs a mentor who would take care of that part.

The actual question is just if we want to do it or not.

mupuf , vor einem Monat

@karolherbst And on whose authority is this mentor able to chose what this contractor should work on or not?

It would have to be that the board votes on everything... but the board should not decide on technical matters, just facilitate collaboration between members.

So... maybe that could fly for some infra work but I doubt it would for specifications... too much pressure to deliver and it would put this contractor on unequal ground with other contributors... at least in perception.

karolherbst OP , vor einem Monat

@mupuf it doesn't have to be spec work. And you have to trust people at some point.

Sure the org has to decide on what to spend money on, but that doesn't have to be the board itself.

We could appoint a group of people we trust to decide what's worth spending money on which also addresses dire needs in the Linux desktop. Maybe even focus on underfunded areas.

Maybe the CoC team can do it to improve inclusion of people we left behind.

Again, we just have to want to do it.

dotstdy , vor einem Monat

@karolherbst i think it would be tough, because you'd need a lot more money that what is probably available. and also the politics of what that means by "desktop-agnostic" exactly. only paying desktops?

sonny , vor einem Monat

@karolherbst I have been wondering about that too. I don't think desktops have money to spare though.

Perhaps at least starting with establishing a proper governance model and unifying/mutualizing efforts on Wayland, Flatpak, portals, xdg-specs, ...

karolherbst OP , vor einem Monat

@sonny yeah, that's I guess the least we could do with the current state.

But I do wonder what if Gnome, KDE, Cosmic, others... would all chime in a bit of money and maybe that's enough for a full/half time position.

But then there is sooooooo much to do and whatever we'd spend that money on, somebody will have some problems with the decision being made.

But then desktops participating is already a big help.

karolherbst OP , vor einem Monat

@sonny However... FDO being in a neutral position might allow to fund work specific desktops couldn't due, due to regulations on "non-profit" and them not wanting to risk losing their financial status by funding work not directly aligning with their goals.