TK19.
End-users shouldn' t notice any changes at all, from all I've read.
Antony wrote:So a non-profit organisation can have a commercial subsidiary to generate revenue?
Is that allowed?
Yes
Antony wrote:Also, what is Mozilla Corporation's activities? What products or services is Mozilla Corporation selling? In other words, exactly what sort of business is Mozilla Corporation is doing in order to generate revenue?
From what I've gathered, Mozilla generates income through business relationships such as with Google, for featuring it's search engine.... Mozilla gets paid for that, it's not done for free
..... More in the talkback article.... the "Read More" link provided by Ramona:
http://www.mozillazine.org/talkback.html?article=7085(look at the replies by mlefevre and AlexBishop)
More on the Mozilla reorganization, from
http://glazman.org/weblog/dotclear/inde ... 1145-mozcoMozilla Corp. in 12 simple items
Why?
1. because MozFo probably makes too much revenue for a non-profit organization, and that may become a serious legal problem
2. because corporations (partners, embeddors, ...) and potential hires prefer dealing with a corporation rather than with a non-profit, they just don't understand/trust non-profit; that's why "Mozilla Corporation" name is perfectly adequate.
3. because it can trigger new revenue streams
Cons:
1. taxes, so less revenue immediately for the foundation, but that was not an option, see Why-1 above
2. potential negative feedback from some fanatics in the community
3. stricter division of workforce between "mozilla products" that generate revenue, and "mozilla projects" that don't generate revenue, potentially disadvantaging the latter
Protections:
1. 100% owned by MozFo
2. no stocks, no shares, no IPO, products remain free, income is 100% shared, boards to control everything
3. same people, same spirit, same <>goals
Open questions AFAIC:
1. it's not clear at all who's responsible for evangelism. Or even marketing. MozFo or MozCo? MozFo is responsible for promoting blahblah but MozCo has to productize branded tools based on Mozilla
<snip>
Frank Hecker (director of policy for the Mozilla Foundation) wrote: Why 1: I am not a tax lawyer (insert standard disclaimer), but my personal understanding is that the issue with revenue is not the amount of revenue, but rather the type of revenue. If an organization raises money in ways similar to those that might be used by a traditional for-profit corporation, and performs similar functions to what a traditional for-profit might do, then it makes sense to use an organizational framework more like a traditional corporation than a tax-exempt nonprofit organization.
However to my knowledge nothing prevents the Mozilla Foundation from raising as much revenue as it can through donations and related means associated with tax-exempt nonprofit organizations. The Mozilla Foundation will still accept donations, and I encourage people to make donations; one of the topics I'm interested in is how to use such donations to best effect.
Open questions 1. Who does evangelism for what is indeed somewhat of an open question, one that we can and should discuss going forward. As an initial statement, clearly product marketing (in the traditional sense) for Firefox and Thunderbird should be coordinated by the Mozilla Corporation, and it might make sense to have initiatives like SpreadFirefox (i.e., that are tied directly to Firefox and/or Thunderbird) also be coordinated by the Mozilla Corporation. On the other hand, for products that are not directly handled by the Mozilla Corporation (for example, Camino, to pick one at random), it might make sense for the Mozilla Foundation to coordinate evangelism efforts, in cooperation with the international affiliates where appropriate.
In these latter cases I'd expect the actual evangelism itself to be done mainly by volunteers, with the Mozilla Foundation and/or its affiliates providing oversight, coordination, and support where it makes sense to do so. (This is one place where donations could likely be put to good use.)
From
http://www.hecker.org/mozilla/dot-reorg
The Mozilla Foundation reorganization
[quote="Frank Hecker"]
.....At the same time the success of Firefox and Thunderbird has created significant economic value, in particular around the tens of millions of Firefox users and the web traffic they generate. This economic value represents an opportunity for the Mozilla Foundation to generate revenue to support the achievement of its goals, and to do so in a manner compatible with its public purpose and its focus on providing a high-quality end user experience. In other words, Firefox and Thunderbird can continue to be what people want them to be and expect them to be: free as in speech and free as in beer, gratis products based on open source code developed in the context of a public community.
However doing this successfully requires rethinking the organizational structure of the Foundation. Establishing the Mozilla Corporation as a taxable subsidiary of the Mozilla Foundation (as opposed to just another tax-exempt organization) provides more leeway to establish business relationships in support of the project, while still keeping the Mozilla Foundation itself as a traditional tax-exempt organization. As a wholly owned subsidiary the Mozilla Corporation is firmly tied to the Foundation and its goals and purposes—there are no outside investors, no stock grants or stock options for employees or others, and no possibility of an IPO, acquisition, or other “liquidity eventâ€
UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.11) Gecko/20050728
