The Eclipse Foundation is a not-for-profit organization that is mainly funded by fees from our corporate members. Our corporate members definitely get a lot of value from their involvement with the Eclipse Foundation. Their support of the Eclipse Foundation is essential to the ongoing operations.
There are also millions of software developers who make use of Eclipse technology on a daily basis. For the most part these developers and their organization use the Eclipse IDE and other projects free of charge. Of course this is perfectly fine given the open source license for Eclipse projects. However, to sustain a community the size of the Eclipse Foundation requires ongoing support and resources. End user support for open source foundations, including the Eclipse Foundation, is important to the ongoing sustainability of the community.
To encourage end-user support, we are launching the October Donation Campaign. The goal is to have over 1000 individuals donate to the Eclipse Foundation and help support the overall community. Last year we ran our first annual donation campaign which resulted in 847 people donating to our community. This year I am sure we can do better.
Please take the time to donate to the Eclipse Foundation. For those who have donated in the past, thank you! You will also notice that we now accept credit cards. This will make it easier for people who can’t/won’t use Paypal or bitcoin.
