MESSAGE
| DATE | 2003-02-14 |
| FROM | ruben safir
|
| SUBJECT | Re: [hangout] NYLXS Website, and Linux 1 class
|
> First off, NYLXS should be self supporting. Member's dues are now being being paid and this should help out with the financial issue of keeping the website up. You must also allow the members to contribute to the cause. NYLXS is not your personal financer and you need to take care of your personal finances.
>
I'll try not to be insulted by this.
NYLXS has never been self-supporting, altough I've tried to move it
to that position. But it has been expensive and I've run large chunks
out of it out of my pocket, including, but not limited to:
Space, Netowrk connectivity, developement work, and more.
Before waving a finger at me, consider that I've spent over
60 hours a week working with NYLXS for a little over a year
and donated nearly $15K to it from my personal work in instruction.
This organization can not continue as it has without economic development
for it's membership so that the membership can return the favor to the
organization. This is not a matter of it being someones 'personal financial
whatever', it's a matter of real life.
The economic developement for Free Software was a core part of the NYLXS
plan from DAY ONE (notice the jobs page is the oldest part of the website).
It can only be sustained if it has a healthy economic base for the membership.
Meanwhile, everyone skips the FSCC meeetings, nobody has taken hold of the
chairmanship of it, and week after week goes by without it getting
organizational support.
This is pattern which will put the community and the organization at risk.
This is not a Kohel in which the members sit and learn Torah all day while
the membership collects welfare checks.
This is an organization which promotes free Software use and education, and it
can only be self-supporting to the degree where it functions in filling the
communities needs, including and especially economic development.
Non-profits have full time staff. That staff for over the last year has
been me.
They have grant writers, marketing staff, campaign organizers, artists, writers,
researchers and more. Non-profit does not mean no money. It means we don't
give out stock dividends and our goal is not profit. But we do have a direct
goal, as do all other non-profits, or sustainable income usage for our
mission.
That has been missing and I've managed to burry myslelf in an effort to sustain
it. So the problem is NOT a website, and NOT a mailing list, but a currently
unsustainable economic foundation. And this is what needs to change.
But - that being said, this is not the only thing I need to talk about
on monday. We have a couple of other issues which need to be looked after,
including, but not limited to, our Trademark, our educational center,
participation levels, and the growing number of inquiries by radical
activists trying to sieze NYLXS for their own purposes.
Ruben
____________________________
New Yorker Free Software Users Scene
Fair Use -
because it's either fair use or useless....
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