Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 14:28:12 -0800 From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@zippy.cdrom.com> To: Wolfram Schneider <wosch@panke.de.freebsd.org> Cc: freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: donating money to the FreeBSD project Message-ID: <18938.920154492@zippy.cdrom.com> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 27 Feb 1999 22:11:56 %2B0100." <19990227221156.40094@panke.de.freebsd.org>
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Please ignore the comment about donations being tax deductable, however, since FreeBSD is not a 501(c)3 charity (yet). I've already asked the webmaster to correct that unless he knows something about Walnut Creek CDROM's role in this (making it a tax deduction) that I don't. There are advantages to *not* being such an organization for certain companies who have to deal with 501(c)3 organizations entirely differently and can't just "send a check" as easily as some companies have already sent checks to FreeBSD, Inc. There are also individuals for whom a true charity is an advantage - it's not just a simple matter of one corporate organizational scheme or the other being superior. Running a legal charity is also more work here in the U.S., at least, since there's greater legal expense at tax time in getting all the forms properly filled in. Without expert help at this, you'll quickly lose your 501(c)3 status and have to go apply for it all over again, which is Not Fun, so it costs you more to keep all the i's dotted and t's crossed. We've never really collected all that much in donations on a yearly basis so it wasn't an attractive scenario to imagine accounting fees eating up a substantial portion of the donations. If donations continue to climb at their current rate, however, then it may soon be quite practical to go through all the paperwork of creating a registered charity as well as the existing corporation. I'm not sure how the cross-flow of cash would work since I'm not an accountant, but I'm sure it could be worked out in such a way that companies who needed to deal with other companies could continue to work with FreeBSD, Inc. and individuals could deal directly with the charity. It would all go towards the same basic causes anyway (promotional expenses, hardware, custom software) in the end. Anyway, just an idea. For all I know, the above scheme is also blatantly illegal. I have to ask the accountant. :) - Jordan > Donating money to the FreeBSD project, > from a secure web page: > > http://www.freebsdmall.com/donate/ > > -- > Wolfram Schneider <wosch@freebsd.org> http://wolfram.schneider.org > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
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