Help Support Python

[Guido van Rossum]

I'm pleased to announce that the Python Software Foundation (PSF) is now
accepting donations from individuals and companies interested in
supporting our mission to improve the Python programming language.

The PSF holds the intellectual property rights for Python and is working
towards building a program to fund future Python development. Your
donation will make a real difference in the quality of Python's future.

For US individuals: The PSF is recognized as a 501(c)(3) charity, which
means that you can deduct the full amount of your donation from your
taxes. There is no minimum donation amount, so please help even if you
can only afford a small contribution.

For companies: The PSF is also seeking additional companies interested in
becoming sponsors. For more information, please email ps*@python.org.

About the PSF: http://python.org/psf/
To donate: http://python.org/psf/donations.html

You can donate using PayPal or by writing a check.

Please pass this message along to anyone who may be able to help us.

Thank You!

Guido van Rossum,
President of the Python Software Foundation

--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)

[Gerhard Häring]

Ben Finney wrote:

On Fri, 11 Jul 2003 15:13:43 -0400, Guido van Rossum wrote:

The PSF holds the intellectual property rights for Python

Ugh. Please don't propagate this ridiculous, meaningless term. It's
used to refer to a wide range of greatly disparate legal concepts; to
use it as a single term implies that there's some unifying "intellectual
property" principle joining them together, which is a falsehood.

If the PSF holds the copyright to Python, please say that.

If the PSF holds patents which cover Python, please say that.

If the PSF owns the trademark for Python, please say that.

If the PSF has trade secrets in Python, please say that.

But please *don't* muddy the water by saying the PSF holds "the
intellectual property rights" for Python. That says nothing useful --
it doesn't help determine which of the above fields of law are
applicable -- and only promotes the idea that all these different fields
of law are part of a whole, which they are definitely not.

It also encourages another falsehood: that of considering intellectual
objects as property. This is something which many people who use Python
would disagree with strongly.

<http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html#IntellectualProperty>

Well said.

-- Gerhard

[David McNab]

On Sat, 12 Jul 2003 08:10:48 +0950, Ben Finney paused, took a deep breath,
then came out with:

But please *don't* muddy the water by saying the PSF holds "the
intellectual property rights" for Python. That says nothing useful

<snip>

Too right.

Copyrights create a level of 'ownership' of verbatim code. Good.

Patents, as they're administered today, create a level of 'ownership' of
even the most simple concepts (the kind of thing anyone could think of),
whereby it's almost impossible these days to write more than a few dozen
lines of code without infringing n patents. Very bad.

The lumping together of these two very different legal categories is an
insidious lie that runs totally counter to the spirit of freedom which
Python represents, and threatens to turn software development into a
closed shop for only the largest corporations (which it was in the
earliest days, when only the largest organisations and companies could
afford a computer).

EB

[Aahz]

In article <sl******************************@rose.localdomain .fake>,
Ben Finney <bi****************@and-zip-does-too.com.au> wrote:

On Fri, 11 Jul 2003 15:13:43 -0400, Guido van Rossum wrote:

The PSF holds the intellectual property rights for Python

Ugh. Please don't propagate this ridiculous, meaningless term. It's
used to refer to a wide range of greatly disparate legal concepts; to
use it as a single term implies that there's some unifying "intellectual
property" principle joining them together, which is a falsehood.

What Guido probably should have said was something more like, "The PSF
is the holding organization for intellectual property rights for
Python." The point being that -- eventually, if not now (due to some
current muddles) -- the PSF will hold any and all intellectual property
rights relevant to Python.

While you've got a valid point, it's unnecessarily clumsy to iterate
over all the different forms of intellectual property every time you
mention them. The idea is that the PSF functions in a manner similar to
the FSF in protecting all the bits of Python from encroachment. We
don't know -- and can't know -- all the aspects that will be comprised
under that umbrella, as various corporate interests try to stretch the
idea of intellectual property.
--
Aahz (aa**@pythoncraft.com) <*> http://www.pythoncraft.com/

"Not everything in life has a clue in front of it...." --JMS

[Bengt Richter]

On Sat, 12 Jul 2003 12:22:41 +0200, Max M <ma**@mxm.dk> wrote:

Guido van Rossum wrote:

I'm pleased to announce that the Python Software Foundation (PSF) is now
accepting donations from individuals and companies interested in
supporting our mission to improve the Python programming language.

It would be nice if there was some suggested amounts.

Like:

$x.xx for a "one year Student Python subscription"
$xx.xx for a "one year private Python subscription"
$xxx.xx for a "one year company Python subscription"

I wonder how employers would react to being asked by employees to contribute
some percentage of (employee's estimate of time savings)*(employee pay rate)
when some free python resource results in such a savings.

Even if approvals are not forthcoming, with $-estimates presented the idea
may sink in that free software (and participation in a free software community)
is valuable ;-)

(It might be that a log of such incidents would have to be logged & accumulated
to get a number that was bigger than the company cost of processing approval
and cutting check (and the cost of keeping the log ;-), unless they establish
policy so it can be done cheaper).

Contributions could be informally classified, to give some indication of what
was $-valuable, e.g., "for cookbok recipe," or "for c.l.py support" or to
encourage specific development, e.g., "for distutils," or "for unittest" etc.

Of course. if someone wants to pay for entertainment value received,
that's fine too ;-)
Etc. That could make it easier to decide what amount to donate. To me at
least.

Anyhoo, I plunked in some $ and hope others will too. It's a great
language that has made my workday a lot more fun.

True. But money isn't everything. I think it must be recognized that the bulk
of contributions to free software in general is still <volunteer time>*<some level of pay
that isn't being paid>, even though increasingly organizations are recognizing
that free software is a process they can benefit from, and most if they contribute.
So it is recognized that some level of <emloyee time>*<actual pay rate> can be justified.

But it is a social interaction. Being the only cook and provider at a pot luck
is not a very good pot luck, but if most contribute, it can be great. If professional
chefs volunteer or are paid to contribute, all the better. And digital
pot lucks are magic, since eating doesn't use up what's on the table!! ... unless someone
can limit the table access artificially, like with patents and copyrights etc. ;-/

Regards,
Bengt Richter