Software Freedom Conservancy Launches 2015 Fundraiser

While speculating about “who did what” is intriguing politics, I fundamentally believe that the most relevant story here is that it's just better for a charity like Conservancy to receive support primarily by individuals of the public at large. It's really the best way to fund a charity and we at Conservancy would like to get there. That's why we launched this fundraiser.

On the issues discussed in this thread, I won't comment at this time specifically on which Conservancy sponsors ceased contributing and why.

But, more generally and based on my extensive charity fundraising experience since 1999, I can confirm that for-profit and trade association funding for charities is always fickle, even in the best of times. Individual support is much more resilient. After all, a charity serves the public, not companies, so ultimately companies can often find more lucrative investments for their money than via donations to charities.

But that's almost beside the point. The money belongs to them. Professional charity fundraisers often prefer the term “gifts” to “donations”. It's a good phrase because it reminds us that no one is obligated to give a gift. A gift is usually an unexpected surprise that the receiver appreciates. If someone gives you a gift then doesn't give you another gift the following year, maybe it means they don't like you anymore, or maybe they've had a bad year financially and can't afford gifts this year. It's unfair to judge without clear evidence.

— Bradley M. Kuhn, President, Software Freedom Conservancy

The Linux Foundation's Core Infrastructure Initiative funds a bunch of people including Eric Raymond to update Dave Mill's implementation of the Network Time Protocol.

That seems to me to be a very set of priorities, unlike (for instance) delivering a drive-by defamation on a website where we really Do Not Want flame wars.