Re: [gentoo-nfp] Gentoo Foundation Trustees nominations

[Rich Freeman]

On Wed, Jul 12, 2017 at 9:53 AM, Francisco Blas Izquierdo Riera
(klondike) <klondike@g.o> wrote:
>
> Keep in mind that although the Gentoo
> Foundation is based on the USA, there is no reason (other than statu quo
> and therefore ease of management) to keep it there.
>

Really?  Certainly many other reasons have been brought up on the
lists, but a few that come to mind include:

1.  Lower regulatory overhead.  For as much difficulty as we seem to
have filing our taxes/etc, the paperwork in the US is a lot easier
than in many places from what I've heard.
2.  Tax benefits for US donors, assuming we ever get 501c3 status.
I'm not sure how important this really is, but a LOT of organizations
set up 501c3s in the US for this reason alone.
3.  A big part of the Foundation's purpose is to be an IP holding
entity, and the US has some of the strongest IP laws in the world.  If
for some reason we wanted to pursue a GPL violation case against
somebody we would get a lot further as a US company in a US court than
we would in a lot of other countries.  I'm not saying I love US IP
law.  I'm just pointing out that the reason copyleft works is because
of copyright, and stronger copyright laws actually result in stronger
copyleft protections.  This is the beauty of copyleft - maybe some day
we'll see IP law reform, but until then having access to US courts
does help make the system work for us.  I didn't mention trademark but
the protections are strong there as well.

There are of course benefits to being elsewhere as well and you've
touched on some of those.  I'm not dismissing that.  However, I think
it is a bit of a stretch to say that there are NO benefits to being
incorporated in the US beyond the status quo.

IMO there are probably benefits to having access to legal entities in
a few countries, but I'm not sure I'd want them to be Foundation
subsidiaries.  And of course it requires people to step up and make it
happen, and keep it going.

-- 
Rich