[Consortium] Greetings, thanks, LAC report, and other important stuff...

[Ivica Ico Bukvic]

OK, so I finally got some sleep... Hopefully, no more jumbled sentences and
obfuscated statements for me :-).

Many thanks to all who replied for their insight on this matter!

I believe that perhaps this should be a good point to take a moment and
explain my intentions behind the idea of establishing some kind of
relationship with FSF. I completely agree that we should not pursue strong
ties with FSF as our agenda on many levels differs from theirs (although we
do also have some things in common). However, as Andrea has already pointed
out, we could benefit from their legal department's advice while dealing
with foundation-related issues. This was my primary impetus for such a
suggestion.

Regarding the actual paperwork and the overhead in respect to foundation's
inception, I am not that concerned as I am currently learning a lot about
the inner workings of a non-profit organization by serving on the board of
another, well established society. As a result of this experience, should we
decide to use US as the home of the foundation, I now have adequate
knowledge regarding the tax-related issues as well as some other concerns
which should ultimately help us at least get the foundation on its feet. As
far as I know, in terms of reporting tax, as long as the income is below
something like $25K/year, a registered non-profit organization is not even
required to file taxes (although for the sake of clean paperwork, I would
encourage that we do so regardless). The tax reporting in effect boils down
to filling out 2 papers.

I would really like to see the idea of foundation happen in the next 6
months as I believe that this would give the consortium additional leverage
where it is most needed.

Of course, there are other pressing matters and this is where I am hoping
that the FSF lawyers (Andrea's contacts) may be of help. Considering that
Andrea has ample experience in this department I would like to propose that
he serves as our liaison for these matters. And this brings me to another
issue...

I would like to propose that in the next couple weeks/months we elect couple
more officers which would fulfill some of the foundation-related functions
in order to ensure that the consortium is as efficient as possible. From
what I've seen, once a foundation is instantiated, there is no feasible way
that one person will be capable of fulfilling all of the responsibilities
and therefore I see this as the most logical next step.

Concerning the logo proposal, please pardon my ignorance, but when I was
composing my previous e-mail, I was completely unaware of the fact that
there is an official logo for the consortium. Hence, please understand that
it was not my intention to propose changing the consortium's logo but rather
propose one where I thought there was none. That being said, Daniel, I was
wondering if you would be so kind as to please make the current logo
downloadable off of the consortium's website, so that members could
incorporate it into their homepages, if they so desired.

Apart from the existing logo, I am still interested in the whole idea of
"Made in Linux" initiative which, obviously depending upon the board's
decision as well as other relevant factors, may be at some point hopefully
merged or at least somehow cross-related with the official consortium's
logo.

Finally, I very much appreciated Daniel's comments regarding the whole
"GNU/Linux" vs. "Linux" concept and I must say that I personally am also
leaning towards naming the initiative "Made in Linux" (as originally
presented at LAC), but have presented it as "Made in GNU/Linux" in my last
e-mail after discussing the matter with some of the LAC attendees in order
to make the initiative as all-inclusive as possible. In the light of
Daniel's comments and after further deliberation on the idea, I must say
that I am very much in agreement with Daniel. Of course, this is definitely
one of those matters that will hopefully be addressed by the remaining board
members in order to reach a decision that will be to everyone's liking.

Best wishes,

Ivica Ico Bukvic, composer & multimedia sculptor
http://meowing.ccm.uc.edu/~ico/