[OpenID board] Sponsored Projects

[Nat Sakimura]

Hi Fellow Board Members:

We all know that OIDF is rather financially constrained while there are many
thing needs to be done.
It is too much to solve it within the board, and it is not supposed to be
either.
We should be leveraging on the community, whether it would be individual or
corporate.

In this mail, I would like to run the idea of Sponsored Projects.

Sponsored Projects are the projects that any corporation (or individual) can
fund to get it going. Funding can be a monetary one or in kind contribution
such as in house lawyer time, etc. In return, the company name will be
acknowledged in the work product. For example, if it were a white paper,
then the sponsor name appears in acknowledgment section and the front page,
etc. Or, if it were a seminar that the sponsor provided conference room
etc., the sponsor will be given a slot to speak. This is actually what we
are doing at OIDF-J. In many situation, it is easier for the companies to
contribute this way than membership fee because the ROI is clearer and
usually requires less internal approval process.

FYI, OIDF-J's corporate fee is very cheap. It is only $1000/year just enough
to do some house keeping tasks. However, many members contribute
significantly more through these in-kind contributions.

Hitherto, we have not been doing justice to non-sustaining corporate
members.
I wonder how many is there now. I know some companies are dropping off
because OIDF could not provide the merit in return. (They really get nothing
in return. Not even the publicity at the OIDF site, which we are supposed to
do, I believe. Vote? Yes, but it would be much better to join as individual
then.) Getting them involved in a Sponsored Project would probably provide
much better "customer satisfaction".

What would you think?

-- 
Nat Sakimura (=nat)
http://www.sakimura.org/en/
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