Changeset - fc699fef0775
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Karen Sandler (karen) - 8 years ago 2015-12-01 03:19:44
karen@sfconservancy.org
edits to Bradley's revisions, adding Jeremy's comments
1 file changed with 29 insertions and 28 deletions:
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www/conservancy/static/supporter/2015-supporter-appeal.html
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</div>
 

	
 

	
 
<div class="content-with-donate-sidebar">
 
  <h1><img class="appeal-header" alt="Become a Conservancy Supporter!" src="/img/conservancy-supporter-header.png"/></h1>
 

	
 
<p>Software Freedom needs your help.</p>
 

	
 
The world today is powered increasingly by Free Software. But what many
 
people don't realize is how much support is needed to keep all of these
 
projects free and open. The work that we do every day ensures the success and
 
the continued freedom of the projects that the developers of our member
 
projects so tirelessly dedicate themselves to. Projects like Git, Samba,
 
projects dedicate themselves to. Projects like Git, Samba,
 
Wine, BusyBox, QEMU, Inkscape, Selenium, and dozens more
 

	
 
[FIXME Link to nascar pic]
 

	
 
<p>Below, we ask for you
 
<p>We are asking for you
 
  to <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">join us and become a
 
    Conservancy Support now</a>.  However, this is more than our usual annual
 
  fundraising appeal.  After the events of 2015, we must substantially
 
  increase our support now to continue the excellent work defending software
 
  freedom for our member projects and the entire Open Source and Free
 
  Software community.  We need at least [750] of you to become regular,
 
  annual Supporters just to continue our most basic of community services.
 
  We need [2500] of you to become regular, annual Supporters now to continue
 
    Conservancy Supporter</a> but this is more than our usual annual
 
  fundraising appeal.  As described in more detail below, after the events 
 
  of 2015, we must substantially increase our individual support to be able 
 
  to continue defending software freedom for our member projects and the 
 
  entire free and open source software community.  We need at least [750] 
 
  of you to become annual Supporters just to continue our basic community services.
 
  We need [2500] of you to become annual Supporters now to continue
 
  our work enforcing copyleft licenses.  If you don't become a Supporter now,
 
  we began plans to wind down Conservancy's operations.</p>
 
  we will be forced to radically restructure and wind down a substantial portion
 
  of our operations.</p>
 

	
 
<h4>2015 successes</h4>
 

	
 
This year has brought a myriad of major successes for Software Freedom
 
Conservancy:
 
Software Freedom Conservancy has had a lot of major successes this year:
 

	
 
<ul>
 

	
 
<li>We brought four new projects under the protection of the
 
Conservancy: <a href="http://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/jul/23/qemu-joins/">QEMU</a>,
 
  the generic machine emulator and
 
virtualizer, <a href="https://www.bro.org/">The Bro Network Security
 
Monitor</a>, the Godot Game Engine[FIXME]
 
and <a href="http://outreachy.org">Outreachy</a>, a program dedicated to
 
helping people from underrepresented groups get involved in free and open
 
source software. We also worked with the Debian community to launch
 
the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/aug/17/debian/">Debian
...
 
@@ -99,58 +99,57 @@ the law suit</a> Christoph Hellwig has brought against VMware in Germany, the
 
first case on derivative works and the GPL.</li>
 

	
 
<li>We fought for
 
and <a href="http://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/oct/27/DMCA-win/">successfully
 
earned an exemption from the Library of Congress in the DMCA review
 
process</a> to legally permit circumvention of encryption on Smart TVs,
 
ensuring that you are free to hack on the devices that you legally own. </li>
 

	
 
<li>We collaborated with the <a href="https://fsf.org/">Free Software
 
Foundation</a> to publish
 
the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">Principles
 
of Community-Oriented GPL Enforcement</a> , establishing community norms for
 
enforcing the GPL in the public's interest[, and
 
already <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.kr.html">translated
 
enforcing the GPL in the public's interest, which have 
 
already been <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.kr.html">translated
 
into Korean</a> [and Chinese].</li>
 

	
 
<li>Along with FSF, we
 
helped <a href="http://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/jul/15/ubuntu-ip-policy/">Canonical,
 
Ltd. achieve compliance in its “Intellectual Property” Policy</a>, while
 
pointing out that the policy fails to address important software freedom
 
issues.</li>
 

	
 
<li>We conducted friendly discussions with companies out of compliance with
 
the GPL, seeking non-litigious resolutions.</li>
 

	
 
<li>We participated in the process
 
of <a href="http://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/oct/14/FCC-comment/">telling
 
the FCC to fix its proposed rules</a> restricting third-party modification of
 
firmware in wireless devices.
 

	
 
<!--  conledger -V -b 2015-01-01 --limit 'tag("Approval") =~ /\/2015/ and tag("TaxImplication") !~ /Reimbursement/' reg '/Assets/'|wc -->
 

	
 
<li>We processed and paid 116 reimbursement requests individuals doing tireless work
 
  around the globe advocating for their Open Source and Free Software
 
  projects at conferences and other venues.</li>
 

	
 
<!-- conledger -V -b 2015-01-01 --limit 'tag("Approval") =~ /\/2015/ and tag("TaxImplication") !~ /(Reimbursement|USA-501c3|Corporation|Tax-Payment|LLC|W2|Refund)/' reg '/Assets/'|wc -l -->
 

	
 
<li>We made 172 contractor payments to developers writing Open Source and
 
  Free Software, which included various different internships and contract
 
<li>We made 172 contractor payments to developers writing free and open source 
 
  software, which included various different internships and contract
 
  software development work.</li>
 

	
 
<li>We helped, coordinated, and financially insured volunteers our three of
 
  our member projects organize large annual conferences, where thousands of
 
  attendees learned about Open Source and Free Software projects of their 
 
  interest.</li>
 
<li>We helped, coordinated, and financially insured volunteers of three of
 
  our member projects to organize large annual conferences, where thousands of
 
  attendees learned about free and open source software.</li>
 

	
 
<!--  conledger -V -b 2015-01-01 --limit 'tag("Approval") =~ /\/2015/ and tag("TaxImplication") !~ /Reimbursement/' reg '/Assets/'|wc -->
 

	
 
<li>We processed and paid 116 reimbursement requests individuals doing work
 
  around the globe advocating for their free and open source software
 
  projects at conferences and other venues.</li>
 
  
 
<li>We gave keynotes
 
at <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/aug/17/debian/">DebConf</a>, <a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2015/schedule/event/identity_crisis/">FOSDEM</a>, <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/jul/14/FISL16/">FISL</>, <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/31/libreplanet/">LibrePlanet</a>, <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/sep/30/linaro-keynote/">Linaro
 
Connect</> and participated in many conferences more all over the world, and
 
shared our expertise in initiatives
 
like <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft.org</a>. We participated in
 
interviews and <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/">blogposts</a>, and
 
Bradley and Karen published episodes of <a href="http://faif.us/">Free as in
 
Freedom</a>, dedicated to discussing the important issues in software
 
freedom.</li>
 

	
 
</ul>
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@@ -181,27 +180,29 @@ all by <a href="http://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">signing up as a
 
Supporter today</a>.</p>
 

	
 
<h4>Fighting for the GPL<h4>
 

	
 
<p>Many consider our GPL compliance and enforcement controversial.   We don't
 
think it is: We stand up for
 
the GPL at the request of the Linux kernel community, the Debian community
 
and our member projects. Most recently that has resulted in our funding
 
of the <a href="http://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">suit
 
against VMware</a>, which is the first law suit on derivative works and the
 
GPL. While this work is extremely important to the continued long-term
 
success of software freedom and copyleft, it makes fundraising from companies
 
almost impossible. While enforcement of the protections around free and open source
 
very difficult. While enforcement of the protections around free and open source
 
software is in the long term interest of the industry, many companies are
 
reluctant to fund organizations that take on this enforcement task. We do
 
reluctant to fund organizations that take on this enforcement task. Some companies 
 
have withdrawn from funding us and some have even successfully pressured 
 
conferences to cancel or prevent talks on our enforcement work. We do
 
this work because we think that it is good for everyone in the long run,
 
because we know it is the right thing to do and because we know that we are
 
in the best position to do it. But that's not enough &mdash; you have to think it's
 
right too and <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">show us by
 
becoming a Supporter now</a>.</p>
 
 
 
<h4>It's up to you</h4>
 

	
 
<p>We have raised enough money to continue the VMware case but our overall
 
enforcement work needs additional support to be able to continue.  As we
 
state in
 
the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">Principles
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