Post Syndicated from Bradley M. Kuhn original http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2014/09/11/gsoc-conservancy.html

[ A version of this post originally appeared
on the
Google Open Source Blog, and was cross-posted
on Conservancy’s
blog. ]

Software Freedom Conservancy, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity that
serves as a home to Open Source and Free Software projects. Such is easily
said, but in this post I’d like to discuss what that means in practice for an
Open Source and Free Software project and why such projects need a
non-profit home. In short, a non-profit home makes the lives of Free
Software developers easier, because they have less work to do outside of
their area of focus (i.e., software development and documentation).

As the summer of 2014 ends, Google Summer of Code (GSoC) coordnation work exemplifies the value a non-profit home brings its Free
Software projects. GSoC
is likely the largest philanthropic program in the Open Source and Free
Software community today. However, one of the most difficult things for
organizations that seek to take advantage of such programs is the
administrative overhead necessary to take full advantage of the program.
Google invests heavily in making it easy for organizations to participate
in the program — such as by handling the details of stipend payments
to students directly. However, to take full advantage of any philanthropic
program, the benefiting organization has some work to do. For its member
projects, Conservancy is the organization that gets that logistical work
done.

For example, Google kindly donates $500 to the mentoring organization for
every student it mentors. However, these funds need to go
“somewhere”. If the funds go to an individual, there are two
inherent problems. First, that individual is responsible for taxes on that
income. Second, funds that belong to an organization as a whole are now in
the bank account of a single project leader. Conservancy solves both those
problems: as a tax-exempt charity, the mentor payments are available for
organizational use under its tax exemption. Furthermore, Conservancy
maintains earmarked funds for each of its projects. Thus, Conservancy
keeps the mentor funds for the Free Software project, and the project
leaders can later vote to make use of the funds in a manner that helps the
project and Conservancy’s charitable mission. Often, projects in
Conservancy use their mentor funds to send developers to important
conferences to speak about the project and recruit new developers and
users.

Meanwhile, Google also offers to pay travel expenses for two mentors from
each mentoring organization to attend the annual GSoC Mentor Summit (and,
this year, it’s an even bigger Reunion conference!). Conservancy handles
this work on behalf of its member projects in two directions. First, for
developers who don’t have a credit card or otherwise are unable to pay for
their own flight and receive reimbursement later, Conservancy staff book
the flights on Conservancy’s credit card. For the other travelers,
Conservancy handles the reimbursement details. On the back end of all of
this, Conservancy handles all the overhead annoyances and issues in
requesting the POs from Google, invoicing for the funds, and tracking to
ensure payment is made. While the Google staff is incredibly responsive
and helpful on these issues, the Googlers need someone on the project’s
side to take care of the details. That’s what Conservancy does.

GSoC coordination is just one of the many things that Conservancy does
every day for its member projects. If there’s anything other than software
development and documentation that you can imagine a project needs,
Conservancy does that job for its member projects. This includes not only
mundane items such as travel coordination, but also issues as complex as
trademark filings and defense, copyright licensing advice and enforcement,
governance coordination and mentoring, and fundraising for the projects.
Some of Conservancy’s member projects have been so successful in
Conservancy that they’ve been able to fund developer salaries — often
part-time but occasionally full-time — for years on end to allow them
to focus on improving the project’s software for the public benefit.

Finally, if your project seeks help with regard to handling its GSoC
funds and travel, or anything else mentioned
on Conservancy’s list
of services to member projects, Conservancy is welcoming
new applications for
membership. Your project could
join Conservancy’s more
than thirty other member projects and receive these wonderful services
to help your community grow and focus on its core mission of building
software for the public good.