I think it's safe to say that users of ASF software buy their share of
computer books. The online retailers, like Amazon.com, offer
commission programs for people who link to their site.
The Apache Software Foundation is a not-for-profit corporation funded
solely through donations from the community. To help offset the costs
of ASF infrastructure, we could make it possible for ASF supporters to
buy books about ASF project software through commission-program links.
The commissions for such links is usually 5% or more. Given the vast
number of books ASF supporters purchase, the commissions from these
sales could become a respectable source of revenue.
Setting up an online bookstore to benefit the ASF has been a
longstanding itch of mine, which I've finally gotten a chance to
scratch. A prototype bookstore is now available as a Confluence wiki.
You can check it out at:
* http://opensource.atlassian.com/confluence/oss/display/BOOKS/Home
If anyone is interested in helping out with maintaining the site,
please let me know. I'd especially welcome ASF project committers
who'd like to help oversee the section about their project.
If there was interest, we could also add pages for books recommended
by ASF committers. Here, we could list other related books and
off-topic items, like DVDs and CDs that we enjoy. There's an
unfinished prototype of a committer page here:
* http://opensource.atlassian.com/confluence/oss/display/BOOKS/husted
If anyone would like to make any existing links commission-program
links, there are instructions for how to do that on the bookstore
Feedback page.
* http://opensource.atlassian.com/confluence/oss/display/BOOKS/Feedback
There is also a general FAQ on the Feedback page.
Of course, this is a 100% volunteer effort and 100% of all commissions
are donated directly to the Apache Software Foundation.
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
I'm sending this message to fundraising@ and the dev@ for each Project
with a category in the online bookstore. After getting feedback from
the lists, a broader announcement could be made.
-Ted.
computer books. The online retailers, like Amazon.com, offer
commission programs for people who link to their site.
The Apache Software Foundation is a not-for-profit corporation funded
solely through donations from the community. To help offset the costs
of ASF infrastructure, we could make it possible for ASF supporters to
buy books about ASF project software through commission-program links.
The commissions for such links is usually 5% or more. Given the vast
number of books ASF supporters purchase, the commissions from these
sales could become a respectable source of revenue.
Setting up an online bookstore to benefit the ASF has been a
longstanding itch of mine, which I've finally gotten a chance to
scratch. A prototype bookstore is now available as a Confluence wiki.
You can check it out at:
* http://opensource.atlassian.com/confluence/oss/display/BOOKS/Home
If anyone is interested in helping out with maintaining the site,
please let me know. I'd especially welcome ASF project committers
who'd like to help oversee the section about their project.
If there was interest, we could also add pages for books recommended
by ASF committers. Here, we could list other related books and
off-topic items, like DVDs and CDs that we enjoy. There's an
unfinished prototype of a committer page here:
* http://opensource.atlassian.com/confluence/oss/display/BOOKS/husted
If anyone would like to make any existing links commission-program
links, there are instructions for how to do that on the bookstore
Feedback page.
* http://opensource.atlassian.com/confluence/oss/display/BOOKS/Feedback
There is also a general FAQ on the Feedback page.
Of course, this is a 100% volunteer effort and 100% of all commissions
are donated directly to the Apache Software Foundation.
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
I'm sending this message to fundraising@ and the dev@ for each Project
with a category in the online bookstore. After getting feedback from
the lists, a broader announcement could be made.
-Ted.