Helen,

Your Firebird book is excellent.

I am amazed by your response to my suggestion. How can you think I
was suggesting every user should donate 1 dollar? How can you
proudly proclaim that the foundation "does not pay salaries", and at
the same time moan that nobody has time to do anything? The message
I hear from you seems to be, "the Foundation is short of money,
short of time, short of developers, but don't you dare suggest that
anything should change". Fair enough.


Roger Vellacott



--- In Firebird-general@yahoogroups.com, Helen Borrie <helebor@...>
wrote:

>
> At 06:30 PM 25/02/2006, you wrote:
> >The biggest difference between FB and its competitors, including
> >MySQL, is money. Money pays for more developers, more publicity,
> >more pressure on ISPs, and also provides the ability to attract
> >people like Jim Starkey away from the competition.
> >
> >So regardless of the relative technical merits of MySQL and FB,
> >MySQL is streets ahead because it has muscle. Its muscle comes

from

> >an operating model which generates money.
>
> Actually, this is simplistic. MySQL AB is a commercial vendor.

MySQL

> AB had money before it started generating money. Pots and pots of
> money, from dotcom speculators. We don't really know whether they
> are generating money at all. They've just sucked in a whole lot

more

> financier money. Sadly, it looks to me more like struggling to
> survive against superior closed source vendors. So they went

shopping

> for miracles and found Jim. Let's hope for the best for them
> because, on a software level, the stuff that people pay for (and

that

> pays for what their freeloader users get) has to make a lot of
> progress real fast.
>
> Though Fb is competing in the same space as the commercial end of
> MySQL AB, Firebird a *lot* different. We don't pay salaries. We
> don't have an advertising budget because what funds we have goes

into

> grants to help our key people to do what they do without too much
> sacrifice. Most of the people who are making money out of

Firebird

> just take the software and take none of the responsibility. They
> don't want to give anything back.
>
> Technically, it's ludicrous to consider MySQL as a competitor in

the

> free database space. It's a DBISAM database. Some of our low-end
> users could get away with using it now, but it would be a big
> loss. When they get to need upscaling, they will have to launch

into

> unknown technical territory AND pay for the privilege.
>
>
> >This is what we should be discussing. How can FB generate cash?
>
> Why?
>
>
> >My company, like thousands of others, uses FB commercially, and we
> >deploy it to a significant number of our own clients. My single
> >download of FB 1.5.3 will be deployed to 20+ different sites, and
> >around 100 users.
>
> In fact, your company (like most companies that make money out of
> Firebird) is a freeloader.
>
> >So actual users of FB around the world must number many

millions. I

> >am not familiar with Foundation finances, but I would guess that
> >even $1 per year from every FB user would help a bit.
>
> >My whole business depends on FB, yet I have never paid a penny for
> >it. And of course, I don't want to pay for it.
>
> I don't want to pay rent or taxes; I want free computers and free
> books; I want my lawns mown for free. I want free petrol. Who
> wants to pay for anything?
>
> I don't follow your logic. The kind of users who use FB as part

of a

> product like yours have already paid. You propose that your
> customers, not you (the beneficiary) should carry the payback

obligation.

>
> >I sometimes think I
> >should make a donation, but I am running a business, not a

charity,

> >and when it comes to the moment of deciding whether to give money
> >away, or hang on to it to help with the payroll, then my

charitable

> >instincts do not win.
>
> OK, I see. It is an act of business to take what the Tooth Fairy

is

> giving away, but an act of charity to give back a financial token

to

> help the elves to make an even better one for next time you are
> lining up for the freebies.
>
>
> >So, as a community, we need a mechanism for turning those millions
> >of users into serious cash. If such a mechanism depends on

changing

> >human nature, then it will fail, so rather than fighting against
> >human nature, we need to use it.
>
> We have a mechanism already. Out of those hundreds of thousands

who

> are using Firebird, about 150 are channelling some of the benefit
> back into Firebird development. It's a serious mechanism, believe
> me. Most of these people are people with just your kind of
> involvement, i.e. they are making their living from products that
> they developed with Firebird and with free help from fellow

community

> members. And they are carrying you.
>
> >Here is an idea.
> >
> >Let the FB Foundation
>
> i.e. "anyone but me.."
>
> >provide some inspiring, official Firebird
> >documentation which developers can pass on to their users, which
> >enable users to make a direct annual donation to the foundation.
> >There could be a small leaflet, describing the Foundation, and a
> >donation form, looking a bit like an invoice. The documents can be
> >given to the client, and the developer can suggest that making the
> >donation is the decent thing to do. Developers can modify the
> >donation form to show an amount of money which is appropriate for
> >the specific country or the specific client.
> >
> >The developer has the benefit that it makes him look good - he is

a

> >member of an international community of highly skilled people, and
> >he is working selflessly to support that community.
>
> Oh? are these "selfless" developers the same ones whose free use

of

> Firebird makes it possible for them to charge their customers a

bit

> less? or to skim off a bigger margin for themselves without

raising

> their prices?
>
> > He can also
> >show his client the support newsgroups, so the client sees that he
> >has access to resources beyond the single developer, should it

ever

> >become necessary.
> >
> >The idea also has the benefit that the donation does not seem to

the

> >client like just yet more money for the developer.
>
> No, that would never do, would it?
>
> >It brings the
> >client in to the FB community, and may even make him aware, for

the

> >first time, that he is using a Firebird database. And so the
> >process helps with FB publicity and public awareness as well.
> >
> >Shame will help.
>
> Ahem, what is shame? :-)
>
> > The client needs to know that the developer will know whether

he

> > made the donation.
>
> I wonder why, if the developer isn't himself a contributor.
>
> >The developer, perhaps, can show
> >the client a sample certificate which the developer will get from
> >the Foundation on receipt of the client's donation. He will pass
> >the certificate on to the client, to be hung on the wall, and it
> >says something like
> >
> > "My Client Inc
> >
> > is a contributing associate of
> >
> > The Firebird Foundation"
> >
> > for the year 2006
>
> Ah, OK. Now let's have an international community competition for
> the best scheme whereby "someone" could process all these $1
> donations and print and post out certificates in return for

receiving

> and processing each of these $1 donations from everywhere; with
> bonus competition points for listing all the banking institutions
> that will handle deposits in multiple currencies for fees of less
> than $27 per transaction. (Oh, and before anyone starts talking
> about PayPal - which takes a mere 4% in commissions - PayPal won't
> accept $1 payments.)
>
> First prize will be one licence to the latest release version of
> Firebird, with unlimited free deployment licences.
>
> As a matter of fact, anyone can be a donor or sponsor to the

Firebird

> Foundation's funding scheme. Those who join as Associate members

pay

> $50 (once, or annually) and get the right to use the appropriate
> Foundation logo on their website, stationery or whatever...as long

as

> their support lasts.
> http://firebird.sourceforge.net/index.php?

op=ffoundation&id=support_logos

>
> And, no, we don't send out certificates that anyone would want on
> their wall. We send receipts and thanks, in PDF format.
>
> Not that I disagree that some physical memento would be a nice

thing

> to offer. Dmitri Kouzmenko even drafted something like that last
> year...but, alas, so far, the Tooth Fairy has been somewhat
> ungenerous with free colour printing, postage stamps and elves to
> stuff envelopes.
>
> Helen
>