kubuntu-council team mailing list archive

[Harald Sitter <apachelogger@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Hey David and Michael,

As previously noted on G+ [0] I do have various questions WRT how the
donations are being handled and would love some answers.

0. I think it would help a great deal if the community could get an
outline of how exactly the donation process works. To that extent a
lot of the question below seek to better understand how it works,
where money goes and how it eventually ends up in an applicant's bank
account. Could you perhaps document the process either on the funding
page on ubuntu.com or somewhere else so the community as well as
possible donors know exactly how the process works and how money ends
up where it ends up?

1. Were the funds described in [1] simply part of Canonical's revenue
stream during the mentioned time period?

1.1. If so, are the 'donations' now still part of the regular business
finance or are they somehow kept apart (separate bank account and/or
accounting)?

1.2. How is this working presently? Is Canonical managing the assets
on behalf of the community or is it revenue that is graciously given
to the community?

1.3. As the original setup (during the time period in question), where
money was apparently [2] simply used for day-to-day business expenses,
is in stark contrast to what the donor was and is being suggested when
making his contribution. Is this still the practise for donations made
towards non-community 'sliders' (e.g. phone development, juju
development...). Or to perhaps put it more clearly: are all donations
now actually target-directed as suggested to the donor, meaning they
are used in the relevant departments within Canonical and only there?

1.3.1. If not, why not?

1.3.2. If not, would this be something that could be implemented in
the interest of not misleading the donor?

2. Who actually owns/holds/administers/accounts the funds until they
are distributed?

2.1. Assuming it is Canonical, are the donations then actual taxable income?

2.1.1. If they are taxable incoming are the numbers we see in the
community funding report before or after tax? I guess what I am asking
is whether Canonical is paying tax on these funds without actually
forwarding these costs, i.e. in a way paying the tax out of
Canonical's pocket.

3. What measures have Canonical and the UCC specifically taken to make
sure that donated funds are correctly reported and accounted for as
part of the funding reports in a reliable way without them entirely or
partially disappearing in Canonical's revenue stream as apparently was
the case previously [2]?

3.1. In case the answer entails relying on numbers coming out of
Canonical. Is there a process in place to verify the correctness of
these numbers to ensure everyone is working with accurate numbers and
no one made a mistake along the line? For example: can the UCC request
a look at the actual books pertaining to the public community funding?

4. Since recently a community member was incorrectly listed as having
received community funding when in fact he only had been approved but
not received any, could you please elaborate on how the reports are
compiled such that an inaccuracy like this happened?

4.1. Are measures to make reporting more reliable already being
discussed? In particular with regards to the fact that the incoming
numbers for Q1-2 2013 were incorrect and funding being accounted for
that has not actually taken place.

Finally I would like to point out that I strongly believe that trust
should never be part of an equation that involves money. In particular
with regards to funds that are considered donations collected on
behalf of the community for the community. As a member of the
community I feel that donations collected on my behalf need to be
managed with the utmost care and at the end of the day every penny
ought to be accounted for and be invested towards the end we promised
it would be invested.
That being said, I at least would feel much better if there was a
transparent peer review in place. For instance by having donations go
into a non-profit entity of which the UCC or the entire Ubuntu
membership are members and can look into the books and verify the
accuracy of accounting and management of the donations.

[0] https://plus.google.com/u/0/+MyriamSchweingruber/posts/4VFRygUzyzA
[1] http://fridge.ubuntu.com/2015/05/27/community-donations-report-oct-2012-apr-2013
[2] https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-community-team/2015-May/000510.html

HS