Dear PLC,
sorry, wall of text, but it's on purpose so that you are well-informed.
We have the opportunity to show our support for a German petition (https://www.ehrenamt-opensource.de/en/) that aims to strengthen and enable official public recognition for volunteer work in open source projects. Germany already has legislation that recognizes volunteer work in more traditional areas like fire fighters, social work, caring for the elderly etc., so this petition is about to broaden that circle and provide more equality among volunteer workers.
On the one hand the government already recognizes the importance of open source by advocating its adoption and running more and more initiatives to replace proprietary software with open source, but on the other hand it is often only enjoying the benefits of this ecosystem without contributing much back/ensuring its survival. This petition wants to influence German lawmakers so that volunteer work in open source is no longer at a disadvantage compared to other areas.
What is a petition in Germany? - It's the first of many steps how the German populace can exert its democratic rights to get the government to concern itself with a given topic/request. This is done by getting people to sign a petition to reach a certain threshhold as German law dictates "if you have at least xyz signatures, the government needs to concern itself witih this". In other words: this is not some random person's personal endeavor, this is an official and public democratic process according to German law.
What would happen if this petition succeeds? - It makes open source volunteer work more attractive. It opens the door to various government programs, tax benefits, boasting about it on your resume. It will turn "a hobby for nerds" into "a good cause for the public good" over night. This will be huge in the long run.
What does supporting this petition mean for Inkscape? - This is a marketing thing (compare it with our sponsors page), there are no other obglitations, there is no cost (I have confirmed this with the organizer). The petition runs a website with a section where it collects and shows logos of supporting organizations (same link as above, scroll down a bit) in order to emphasize/show off how many people feel this to be of great importance. Inkscape would officially allow them to show our name/logo, basically putting our reputation behind this. We will be mentioned in their social media. And Inkscape would publish an accomodating news article on our website, declaring our support for maximum media coverage.
Why should Inkscape support a petition that is local to Germany? - Because of the big picture. Strengthening the public recognition for open source is something we need to rally behind, no matter where it originates. Today it's Germany, tomorrow it might be somewhere else. The open source community as a whole does benefit from local improvements. Just how we iterate over our code, every improvement helps. There is also the promise of creating precedence and of creating a domino effect.
How did we come across this? - Media coverage in Germany. This is a well-known thing for open source developers in Germany.
I'd like to manage this. Not that it has to mean anything, but the petition's organizer lives in my area (20 minute drive). Who knows, could be useful.
Please vote:
a.) allow the petition to show our logo/name and mention us on social media and we publish a news article ourselves b.) do not support the petition c.) other/I have questions
René