Re: [activities] Group Membership detail online

[Del <del@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Zhasper wrote:
> Detail of proposed constitutional changes to allow group memberships is 
> now online at http://wiki.slug.org.au/creation_of_a_corporate_membership

You're getting awfully close to crossing over with the membership of
OSIA, however I won't address that at the moment.

What you do need to address is what would a company gain from joining SLUG
as an affiliate member?

With < 10 staff, it'd be better for my company to pay for (head count)
memberships of SLUG and get that many votes, rather than 10 memberships
of SLUG and get zero votes.

Are you promoting yourself as an alternative to an industry association
(association where most members are companies, and the primary aim of
the association is to provide for the needs of those companies[1])?  Or are
you attempting to promote yourself as an alternative to a professional
association, where a company would pay memberships for its staff for the
benefit of those staff [2]?  It is currently recognised in the open
source industry that SLUG and LA are neither industry associations nor
are they professional associations.  Without an attempt to genuinely
promote SLUG as one or the other or an alternative to one or the other,
then why make this change at all?

What would a company gain from joining SLUG?  What would a staff member
of a company gain from joining SLUG?  If you can answer the first question
then you can gain corporate (associate) members by giving them a rationale
that the SLUG membership fee is tax deductible at a company level.  If
you can answer the second question then you can give corporate staff a
rationale that the SLUG membership fee is tax deductible on a personal
income tax level (membership fees for professional associations usually
are).

Without being able to adequately answer either question, then your
changes are irrelevant, and not just because of the tax deductibility
issue.

What element of the current SLUG membership is driving this change?
Why?  What would SLUG gain out of having corporate members?

Ref:

[1] Examples are http://www.osia.net.au/about_osia/charter or
    http://www.bia.org.au/member_directory/index.php

[2] http://www.acs.org.au/

--
Del
Babel Com Australia
http://www.babel.com.au/
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