Establishing a permanent address for the Drizzle
In my mind, Drizzle is shaping up to be the next hottest thing. As I can't help the project directly with code (C/C++ isn't my forte, no matter how hard I try), I'm trying to help in other ways. One of the ways is helping Drizzle establish a solid web presence and providing them with anything else I can give in support.
First off, I hunted for a proper domain name - drizzle.org. It wasn't "in use" per-se, it was parked, and I approached the owner. After some negotiation I was able to get it down to a number that didn't give the team much heartburn. Prior to announcing this publicly which could interfere with the transaction, I fronted the money myself and I am now working on getting the money back from donations. A lot has already been pledged by #drizzle on freenode. If you'd like to contribute, please feel free to send any amount via Paypal to "paypal AT mike2k.com"
I will keep the domain in my possession safely until the Drizzle Foundation is created (I believe it is in the works) or one of the core team has a safe haven for it. In the meantime, if it's desired we can start developing/working on a website, etc.
The goal is to raise roughly $1000 USD to cover the domain + Escrow costs. I've already said I would contribute a chunk of that. Please include in the PayPal description your full name/company/whatever identifying information you'd like and if you'd like it recorded, and I will record it and if the Drizzle guys wish, we can post your info on the [not established yet] website as a Drizzle supporter.
Note that this is not tax deductable or anything as there isn't an official foundation yet, and I am not sure the foundation will be a proper 501(c) anyway. This is purely an announcement that the domain has been purchased and a chance for the community to donate (or otherwise reimburse me, which will help since next month is property tax month :))
There is a not-for-profit, public 501(c)3 organization, http://www.technocation.org, that this would fall under the umbrella of, if tax deduction is important. E-mail donate at technocation.org to contact Technocation (the mission is "to provide educational resources and monetary grants for professional IT development").
"In the meantime, if it's desired we can start developing/working on a website, etc."
We have one (more like 8 really), http://drizzleproject.org/, Ronald Branford & I started setting it up back in August, wasn't a lot of push back then (the codebase was too new for Devs to see past the compiler, still might be), but I imagine it might be time to dust it off and start again
We donated..... keep up the good work.
Kevin
Thanks to everyone so far. I'll update this soon with what I've received. Also, I'll work with you Daniel about how we can possibly work together to create a single site (unless of course people don't want that) - this is for the community, after all!
UPDATE: as of right now, I've received $601 in donations.