Paid for Free Software discussion notes Among RMS, RTFS, TT and TV Draft 1 by TV 1: 10% to the administrating institution. 2: No arbitrator if possible: RMS thinks that customer votes can be used in cases of conflict to fairly allocate the money to the right developer/contributors. (Votes may be weighted sum over contributors multiplied by the customer/voter's contribution size.) Teams should organize themselves into contributing entities rather than having individual developers through negotiations with a project manager. 3: RMS says: don't damage the volunteerism of the movement by making it seem that every little contribution should get paid for. RMS sees this as useful for big projects that noone would otherwise do on a volunteer basis, not as a general method for funding any software whatever. 4: RMS says it should not be patented on moral grounds. (So anyone can use this for projects whether they produce free software or not.) 5: Specs should not be too detailed most of the time (although "a clone of proprietary program X" is both a detailed and a short spec). 6: Work needs doing: establishing payment methods establishing a bank account establishing (a database) methods for keeping track of the state (pledged, taken, spendable, spent) and project-associations of each contribution. a website to put it on an email discussion list to work out details (pffs@gnu.org, done) >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> RMS is averse to patenting PFFS, to using an investment motivation for the initial dollar problem, to taking money up front rather than after a reasonably full amount is pledged, to having management in the system. But he likes the idea anyway and we'll chew on it in email cycles. The group's email distribution list is pffs@gnu.org.