With the approaching release of OpenBSD 3.9 [1] on May 1, 2006, project creator Theo de Raadt [interview [2]] stressed the importance of contributions, "I would like to remind our community that our project lives and breathes because of the sale of CDs and the receipt of donations." He went on to note that most of the donated funds [3] are actually from individuals, "almost all of our donations really do come from individuals, and almost none from companies using our software. Even though there are many many companies doing so. Some companies are small, but there are also quite large ones. And banks. Government institutions. Ones you see in the news every day. And operating system vendors who reuse our code." His plea went out to the larger companies, "financially we are under strain, and it is not letting us grow any of our bigger plans. If anyone has any real clout to make changes within institutions that could help us in the long term, please do. Like universities, or even companies that want to sponsor an entire hackathon."
Hackathons are unique to the OpenBSD project [story [4]], regular week long events attended by most OpenBSD developers in which they all sit down and focus on their respective interests, benefiting from face to face communication with their peers. I was fortunate enough to attend the 2005 OpenBSD hackathon in Calgary, seeing firsthand the impressive amount accomplished at the high-energy low-sleep events [story [5]] [story [6]] [story [7]]. OpenBSD CDs, tshirts and posters can be ordered from the project's ordering page [8]. A detailed list of changes in OpenBSD 3.9 can be found here [9].
From: Theo de Raadt [10] [email blocked] To: misc Subject: Pre-orders for our releases. Date: Wed, 08 Mar 2006 14:55:33 -0700 I would like to remind our community that our project lives and breathes because of the sale of CDs and the receipt of donations. In the last few years a few very large donations have allowed our hackathons to happen, but other than that we are always digging ourself a bigger and bigger hole. Most of our user community increases their use of the FTP servers, while we naturally sell fewer CDs. For instance, I would approximate that the sale of every T-shirt we make probably does not pay for the electricity used in the machine room. It's about $5000 a year. This is placing a severe strain on our ability to toss money at projects. For instance, we want to hold more mini-hackathons, since they are so incredibly productive. And we would like to pay for more travel expenses for developers to these events, since there are always developers who are less fortunate. Yet almost all of our donations really do come from individuals, and almost none from companies using our software. Even though there are many many companies doing so. Some companies are small, but there are also quite large ones. And banks. Government institutions. Ones you see in the news every day. And operating system vendors who reuse our code. But financially we are under strain, and it is not letting us grow any of our bigger plans. If anyone has any real clout to make changes within institutions that could help us in the long term, please do. Like universities, or even companies that want to sponsor an entire hackathon. (But please do not send suggestions, because unfortunately we think we have heard every single one of them before, and people never listen when we say that it is not viable for us to play non-profit games, nor selling special merchandise, nor will it help to hire people to write special books. We've heard all these ideas before. Having us impliment more ideas does not help. It's time for outsiders to impliment things which just let us continue what we do).
From: Darrin Chandler [email blocked] Subject: Re: Pre-orders for our releases. Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2006 07:58:18 -0700 Chris wrote: > Theo de Raadt wrote: > >> Yet almost all of our donations really do come from individuals, and >> almost none from companies using our software. Even though there are >> many many companies doing so. Some companies are small, but there are >> also quite large ones. And banks. Government institutions. Ones you >> see in the news every day. And operating system vendors who reuse our >> code. > ... >> But financially we are under strain, and it is not letting us grow any >> of our bigger plans. If anyone has any real clout to make changes >> within institutions that could help us in the long term, please do. >> Like universities, or even companies that want to sponsor an entire >> hackathon. > > > I'll do my part today and pre-order 3.9 and a few T-shirts for me and > the Mrs. I've pre-ordered as well, and I hope many of the individuals using OpenBSD will buy CDs and swag. And I kick in the odd donation now and then. There should be more people like us, for sure. However, I don't think that's the gist of the message. OpenBSD is being used by large companies in significant roles and few or none are kicking in money. If anyone here works for/with such a company and can influence them then consider trying to get them to send money to the project. If they contributed a small fraction of what they'd pay for a comparable commercial OS then there would be a lot less worry about resources. I work for a very small company, and I've only managed to get OpenBSD in the door recently. However, the reception has been quite positive. They won't be sponsoring any hackathons, but I can probably get them to either buy CDs or donate the equivalent cash. This will help, but not much. It's the big companies that are using OpenBSD for their edge boxes, infrastructure, public servers, etc., and not putting up a dime that could (and should) make a large difference. They're getting a big benefit from OpenBSD and have a vested interest in seeing in continue. Anyway, that's how *I* read it. Theo, correct me if I'm wrong. -- Darrin Chandler | Phoenix BSD Users Group dwchandler@stilyagin.com [11] | http://bsd.phoenix.az.us/ [12] http://www.stilyagin.com/ [13] |
From: Theo de Raadt [14] [email blocked] Subject: Re: Pre-orders for our releases. Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2006 10:42:46 -0700 > However, I don't think that's the gist of the message. OpenBSD is being > used by large companies in significant roles and few or none are kicking > in money. If anyone here works for/with such a company and can influence > them then consider trying to get them to send money to the project. If > they contributed a small fraction of what they'd pay for a comparable > commercial OS then there would be a lot less worry about resources. > > I work for a very small company, and I've only managed to get OpenBSD in > the door recently. However, the reception has been quite positive. They > won't be sponsoring any hackathons, but I can probably get them to > either buy CDs or donate the equivalent cash. This will help, but not > much. It's the big companies that are using OpenBSD for their edge > boxes, infrastructure, public servers, etc., and not putting up a dime > that could (and should) make a large difference. They're getting a big > benefit from OpenBSD and have a vested interest in seeing in continue. > > Anyway, that's how *I* read it. Theo, correct me if I'm wrong. You are right. The small donations do help, thanks guys, but it is kind of like feeding our project in little pieces, and it does not allow us to do big things, or plan ahead for big things. That said, we are the only major project doing these hackathons, and it shows. And we would like to do more. But if the finances keep coming in small like this from users, it gives us great pause before arranging these (sometimes quite costly) events.
Related Links:
- Archive of above thread [Array]
- KernelTrap interview with Theo de Raadt [15]