FSF-FUNDING(7) GNU FSF-FUNDING(7)NAMEfsf-funding - Funding Free Software
DESCRIPTION
Funding Free Software
If you want to have more free software a few years from
now, it makes sense for you to help encourage people to
contribute funds for its development. The most effective
approach known is to encourage commercial redistributors
to donate.
Users of free software systems can boost the pace of
development by encouraging for-a-fee distributors to
donate part of their selling price to free software devel-
opers---the Free Software Foundation, and others.
The way to convince distributors to do this is to demand
it and expect it from them. So when you compare distribu-
tors, judge them partly by how much they give to free
software development. Show distributors they must compete
to be the one who gives the most.
To make this approach work, you must insist on numbers
that you can compare, such as, ``We will donate ten dol-
lars to the Frobnitz project for each disk sold.'' Don't
be satisfied with a vague promise, such as ``A portion of
the profits are donated,'' since it doesn't give a basis
for comparison.
Even a precise fraction ``of the profits from this disk''
is not very meaningful, since creative accounting and
unrelated business decisions can greatly alter what frac-
tion of the sales price counts as profit. If the price
you pay is $50, ten percent of the profit is probably less
than a dollar; it might be a few cents, or nothing at all.
Some redistributors do development work themselves. This
is useful too; but to keep everyone honest, you need to
inquire how much they do, and what kind. Some kinds of
development make much more long-term difference than oth-
ers. For example, maintaining a separate version of a
program contributes very little; maintaining the standard
version of a program for the whole community contributes
much. Easy new ports contribute little, since someone
else would surely do them; difficult ports such as adding
a new CPU to the GNU Compiler Collection contribute more;
major new features or packages contribute the most.
By establishing the idea that supporting further develop-
ment is ``the proper thing to do'' when distributing free
software for a fee, we can assure a steady flow of
resources into making more free software.
SEE ALSOgpl(7), gfdl(7).
COPYRIGHT
Copyright (c) 1994 Free Software Foundation, Inc. Verba-
tim copying and redistribution of this section is permit-
ted without royalty; alteration is not permitted.
gcc-3.3 2003-05-14 FSF-FUNDING(7)
