OpenCollective (bank) Account for SerpentOS

[Zie0]

Hi serpentOS!

I noticed this blog post mentioned the project doesn't have a bank account

Does this project have interest in using https://opencollective.com/ for donations, a bank account, and other financial structure?

It appears they provide a bank account and legal structure for project open source and community projects. I like to donate what I can to support opensource projects and so far have been enjoying opencollective for donations to logseq. It's pretty cool to see the finances of the project in the open from a contributor perspective. I'm not sure what it's like from the maintainer side, but thought I'd float the idea because I want this project to succeed. Thanks for the work so far and the roadmap update!

[pjolt]

OpenCollective was used but the fees seem to have been one of the reasons for leaving it back in 2022. What the other reason(s) was and if they still are a issue i do not know.

[ikeycode]

Well it was fees and how we were engaged with. Kofi is even cheaper, and obv gh sponsors is currently free.

Didn't have a great experience. I don't know if the structure there has since changed but tldr it was OK to be ignored for long periods of time and then asking for an update was termed "harassment". We were very patient but even the CEO tried to flip the situation on us, which ended about as well as you'd expect. It was that bad we were left with no choice but to bring it up on twitter at the time.

While of course I hope things have improved I lost all confidence. Those donating are paying for the mediators to perform a service. It's not a charity.

In the absence of workable solutions perhaps we could look at a uniform dashboard that sources stripe api for kofi payments, gh api for sponsorships, and whatever else needed?

[Zie0]

Dang, that's a bummer it wasn't a good experience. I hear what you're saying about expecting them to perform a service and not treating it like a charity. From what I understand the pandemic was really hard for them and they've done some restructuring since. I hope they've improved their platform because I like the idea of it, especially what they say about providing a bank account and transparency into project finances.

That being said if it's not a good fit for SerpentOS and/or you're not willing to give them another try given the poor experience you had I understand. I'd like to live in a world where the vision of OpenCollective thrives with community projects and corporate infrastructure like Microsoft's GitHub sponsors isn't needed so much. That being the case, most of my interest comes from idealism and wanting to vote with my dollars.

As a SerpentOS contributor in only the financial sense right now, I don't think I know enough about the operational cost: benefit of home growing a uniform payment dashboard for kofi, GitHub, and the like. Just thought I'd share about OpenCollective because I saw the note about a project bank account and I recalled that being a service they provide.

Thanks Ikey and team for the effort you've put into creating SerpentOS. Ikey, I wish the best for your health, family's well-being, and continued success of this project