Quote: "@All: I was not aware the donations system was breaking legal or moral laws, it was just a simple way of administering voluntary contributions from the community to pay freelancers who wish to volunteer their services for things the community wanted to see sooner."
That`s why I refrained from taking any judgment. I have no idea. In Austria, you would have the business chamber and the tax man burning down your house if you try naming anything "donation" in a for-profit environment. In Australia, I have seen companies doing that and it seems legal. As said, no judgement from me. But I can understand why users who combine "donation" with "charity" in their minds are upset.
Quote: "On your points about hiring and running a business properly, if you managed a product that could just about sustain the fair wage of one programmer, and that product needed updating, would you hire a second programmer to get the work done quicker (and push the product into a monthly loss)"
Hell, yes, yes and yes - as long as it doesn`t push the company into a monthly loss. In some countries, you would be even legally forced to do so (as long as you don`t risk bankruptcy for your whole business entity).
Gewährleistungspflicht is something not to be taken easily.
Also, thank you for
Quote: "No timeline set for the next update, or what will be in it, only that priority will be placed on items in the issues tracker that tackle 'bugs' before 'enhancements'. I am anticipating August for beta and PP testing, so if that goes quickly then September for the next public release"
but it doesn`t answer the question "Ok, and when do I get my shadows if I pay for the bugfix / feature completion myself?"
Quote: "There should not be any moral issues. Its a donation for third party work and its up to the donator if they want to pay or not and not really for others to criticise if they wish to do this . so far its benefitted us all ( donators and non donators )
But if you want to throw a gift horse in the mouth then so be it . "
No one wants that, but honestly, you need some reality check regarding the wording and public appearance here.
Customers are paying additional money to A COMPANY (TGC) to get stuff fixed or stuff implemented by 3rd parties. As outlined above, this can be morally and legally perfectly fine, but it doesn`t change the nature of the business transaction. Hell, even VAT is collected with TGCs VAT number - you can call it what you want, it`s a purchase of goods & services then. Which comes with additional obligations, of course. Change it to "Stretch Goal Pots" or whatever, just get rid of the word "donation" and half of the complaints here vanish into thin air.
Quote: "That was an investment not a donation though. The pledges helped pay it back."
And quite quickly, if we look at the pledgers credits
Quote: "I would pay the balance … I said above I would pay the balance if at least a good effort was made.
I actually want this added so I don't mind going the extra mile … "
I will pay all of it, if needed, but I want a clear comittement from TGC regarding timeline and quality. And of course point lights included. This would be then my donation to the community and myself. But I need some level of transparency and accountability here, because...
Quote: "Are we still in the 6 months of bug fixing phase? "
Questions like those being unanswered are not building any trust here. Either there was some less-than-ideal communication, leading the vast majority of the community to the obviously wrong assumption that 6 months of bug fixing have been invested, or the plans changed after that announcement without telling the community (=customers).
"I am a road map, I will lead and you will follow, I will teach and you will learn, when you leave my sprint planning you will be weapons, focused and full of JIRA tickets, Hot Rod rocket development gods of precision and strength, terrorizing across the repository and hunting for github submits."
