Hi Friends, As some of you know, a small committee has been investigating the possibility of creating a new "official" Inkscape forum. All along, we've been pretty much expecting that OSUOSL would host it for us (since they already host our website and wiki). However, after an initial request (nearly 6 weeks ago), an updated request (~10 days later), and a 3rd contact (which was just last week) we still have no response from them. Assuming they would notify us, even if the answer is 'no', we think they are probably still working on it, and have not made a decision yet. But we're starting to think the answer might well be 'no', and we're starting to research about other ways to host this forum. So we want to tap the resources of the whole community, and ask if anyone knows of any either open-source-friendly webhost besides OSUOSL, or maybe some kind of program which might pay hosting fees for an open source project (in the event we can't find a free host). Note that the so-called "free webhosting" sites would probably not be acceptable, since they usually accomplish making it free, by loading the site up with advertising. One idea which might be feasible, is setting up some kind of crowd funding, to create the capital for some kind of money-market fund or something like a trust, whose income would pay the monthly fee. The reason why it's such a big "might" is because it would take some time for this fund to reach the point where it could cover the fees (and we hope to get the forum online much sooner than that would take). I've offered, and I'm sure a lot of people in the community might volunteer to pay or help to pay the fees. But that puts us in a similar situation which we're trying to remedy with this effort (i.e. a single owner potentially disappearing). I would consider this to be a last resort. Has anyone heard of any webhost that might meet our needs; or maybe some kind of program which would pay the hosting fees?
Thank you very much, brynn (for the committee)