NetBSD achieves permanent charity status

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The NetBSD Foundation has been granted permanent 501(c)(3) charity status

under United States law. The Foundation has been a 501(c)(3) charity since

2004, but previously the status was given under an advanced ruling period,

i.e. it was of limited time. The permanent charity status is also known as

170(b)(1)(A)(vi) [1].
To achieve the permanent "public charity" status, we needed to prove that

we are publicly funded by going through the financial activity of the past

5 years and filing the necessary forms. Lex Wennmacher, Martin Husemann,

and Christos Zoulas spent quite a few weekends going through all the

numbers and completing the forms, and we are happy to report that the IRS

accepted our paperwork.
Being a public charity is important to us, as it means that we are eligible

to receive employer matching donations, as well as to enjoy the most

beneficial tax treatment.
Jared D. McNeill

The NetBSD Foundation
[1] http://bestpractices.cof.org/community/ViewStandard.cfm?itemNumber=901
About NetBSD:
NetBSD, a free, secure, and highly portable descendant of the BSD UNIX

family, is one of the oldest open source operating systems. It is

available for many platforms, from 64-bit Opteron machines and desktop

systems to handheld and embedded devices. Its clean design and advanced

features make it excellent in both production and research environments;

its source is freely available under an unencumbering business-friendly

open source license. More information is available at

http://www.NetBSD.org/.