[drupal-devel] some drupal stats

[Eric Scouten]

Dries Buytaert wrote:
>> However, on the making-money-for-the-project angle....Dries, do you
>> want to bring up the Google issue?
> 
> 
> I don't have the details at hand here so I'd rather bring it up when I'm 
> back in Belgium.  Unfortunately, I guess that is too late now.  In 
> short: we got an offer from Google to integrate AdSense support into 
> Drupal.  For each Drupal user that signs up with Google and enables 
> Google Ads on his or her Drupal site, we would get money from Google.  
> Clearly, this is a great opportunity to generate some money.  However, 
> the question arises: do we want to go there, and if so, how?

In principle, I don't mind this idea. However, when you start talking 
about generating (significant?) revenue, I have to ask a few questions:

What expenses does the Drupal project have? What new activities would 
the project pursue if it had an extra $500 at hand? $5,000? $50,000? Or, 
put another way, is there a clear point beyond which the organization 
will not benefit from additional revenue? What is the plan for handling 
"excess" revenue (e.g. donate to other non-profit orgs, hire consultants 
to address tricky/unpopular parts of the code?)?

How can I as a potential supporter of the Drupal cause see that there is 
accountability for whatever revenues are placed in the Drupal collection 
jar (by whatever means: direct donations, or indirect compensation 
through Google)?

I'm not at all excited by the concept of generating money for the sake 
of generating money. But if I can see that the Drupal project will do X 
(and I think X is a legitimate activity for Drupal project) with the 
first $1,000 it generates, I'll be happy to see that happen, and do what 
I can to help it happen.

IMHO, this information needs to be available to the public before before 
you agree to accept the revenue.

-Eric