Re: a modest proposal - Debian needs more $
I have an interesting counter-proposal.
Everyone on this list probably uses debian in one way or another. A few
of us, myself included, have a little extra cash which we could give the
project.
Why don't we borrow an old tradition: voluntary tithe. For Debian users,
a suggested donation schedule could be made, such as $2.00 USD per
month, per Debian box if apt-get (or deselect, etc.) was used in that
month. We could make an application called tithe-manageter or titheman
or something, and enable you to set it up on any/all of your debian
boxen, that keeps track of things like dist-upgrades. It would allow the
user to set his/her own tithe amounts per whatever common action the
user wishes to tithe, and optionally store the user's credit card
numbers for automated/manual uploads to tithe.debian.org, so it will be
easy and seamless to donate.
This would also need to be a centrally managed app, such that the
lightweight tithe-server is run on all the debian boxen (8 of them) on
my local area network, and one of them would be designated as the
tithe=anager client, that would centrally gather all of the data for the
month and either report to me or optionally automagically send a
donation by credit card at the end of the month.
This would make it simple/automatic to periodically donate small amounts
of cash, for anyone who is too forgetful to do so on a regular basis. At
the same time, it would be an entirely opt-in thing, so people who do
not have the money/do not wish to donate/put in 80 hours a week
maintaining packages are not forced to do so.
--Aaron Traas
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