Re: [gentoo-project] Is an umbrella organization a good choice for Gentoo?

[Michał Górny]

On Thu, 2020-08-27 at 01:05 -0700, Alec Warner wrote:
> Again I'm not saying "we will book the same revenue year over year" for
> these items, but its unlikely we will book 0$ every year[0] [...]

I'm not saying that either.  All I'm saying is that *it is possible*,
and it is more likely (though not very likely) than small donations
going down to $0.  It's the 'all eggs in one basket' thing.

> [0] Down years are fine given our cash reserves. At our current burn rate
> we can likely fund Gentoo for 10 years without earning another cent in
> income for that entire 10 year period. That is crazy! But it also means we
> don't need to care too much about annual fluctuations in revenue because we
> have small expenses and large cash reserves. If our cash reserves go down
> or our expenses go up, this becomes more of a pressing concern because down
> years may cause cash flow problems....but this is not a problem for Gentoo
> at this time.

I'm not sure if we're on the same page here.  My goal is to find what's
best for Gentoo -- and in my opinion this means 1. long-term
sustainability, and 2. maximum revenue spent on Gentoo.

I don't think the argument 'we have so much reserves that even if we
neglect everything we'll survive for many years ahead!' works here.
 Burning up reserves doesn't help Gentoo, and even if it works for a few
years, it doesn't guarantee long-term sustainability.

When a dam starts cracking, you don't say 'at this rate, the water
in the reservoir will last for another 10 years!'.  Because you ought to
know the crack will only get bigger and the whole thing's gonna fall
apart sooner than later.  And once it starts falling apart, it will be
much harder to stop.

-- 
Best regards,
Michał Górny