<div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, Feb 21, 2011 at 08:46, Donna Benjamin <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:donna@cc.com.au">donna@cc.com.au</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
The council has decided to support the Ada Initiative with a donation of<br>
$5000.00 (<a href="http://adainitiative.org" target="_blank">http://adainitiative.org</a>)<br></blockquote><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
So - is it appropriate for LA to support the initiative?<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>It's appropriate if and only if it matches LA's goals. LA's goals have variously been summarised as:</div><div><br></div>
<div>"Linux Australia helps individuals to realise their potential and supports them in events and schemes to support and help the Australian Linux community."</div><div> -- <a href="http://linux.org.au/org/charter.phtml">http://linux.org.au/org/charter.phtml</a></div>
<div><br></div><div>"Linux Australia Inc. was founded to cater specifically to the needs of the Australian Linux community."</div><div> -- <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20050308210639/www.linux.org.au/about/">http://web.archive.org/web/20050308210639/www.linux.org.au/about/</a></div>
<div><br></div><div>If you ignore the word "Australia" in those, this seems fairly easy to justify: the geekfeminism wiki has plenty of examples of problems, and the Ada Initiative site already has bunches of proposed solutions.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Even if the Ada Initiative didn't do anything in Australia (even proportionally), you could reasonably argue that merely by publicly supporting the initiative at this time helps promote Linux in Australia (getting us mentioned in press stories on the topic, eg) and helps promote <a href="http://linux.conf.au">linux.conf.au</a> as a haecksen friendly event.</div>
<div><br></div><div>I'd like to think there might be some bias towards Australian activities given LA's support and a key Aussie member in TAI and three Aussies and an ex-pat by my count on the just announced advisory board; but I don't think I've seen any indication of .au specific projects.</div>
<div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
If yes, then given the project is calling for cash, that support would<br>
best be delivered in the form of a donation.</blockquote><div><br></div><div>Note that LA doesn't have a lot of ability to support projects in ways other than giving cash. (There's also helping with insurance coverage, lending LA's good name to them, and to a lesser extent helping with hosting for web sites/mailing lists)</div>
<div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">Is $5,000 too much or too little?<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>That depends on two things: what can LA afford, and what is the Ada Initiative planning on spending the money on. As far as I know, neither of those things are publicly known.</div>
<div><br></div><div>(Personally, as far as supporting the Ada Initiative goes -- as distinct from wondering what LA should support and how it should do so -- I assume one of the goals is to raise the awareness of people currently in the field who might be ignorant of the problems, and to direct them towards approaches for improving matters that actually work. Actually having these discussions seems like a win to me in that respect)</div>
<div><br></div><div>Cheers,</div><div>aj</div><div><br></div></div>-- <br>Anthony Towns <<a href="mailto:aj@erisian.com.au">aj@erisian.com.au</a>><br>