Proposed: Funding Open Source Accounting software

[Jimmy Kaplowitz]

Hi Zack,

On Fri, May 03, 2013 at 08:45:27PM +0200, Stefano Zacchiroli wrote:
> Don't get me wrong: I've worked with SPI accountant(s) for many years
> and I know they do *a lot* of work. But that doesn't mean they could
> scale indefinitely. At some point, given the purpose of SPI, you should
> probably question whether accounting is the kind of internal job you
> want to keep volunteer or go professional.
> 
> That said, I'm torn on this matter. I'm *very* excited by SFC
> initiative. I think their goal is laudable, I know how seriously they
> work, and that makes me confident that they can be successful with this
> initiative and have a real impact on the day-to-day activities of NPOs,
> and in particular umbrella organizations like SPI. But that doesn't mean
> that *SPI* money are well spent by participating in the fund-raising.

I agree with everything Josh said in his reply - we should proceed on both
fronts. I'm mainly replying because of the next paragraph:

> I've only been a "customer" of SPI accounting services, so I might be
> missing a lot of details. But from the outside my feelings are very
> similar to Clint's: SPI current bottleneck on the accounting front is
> more at the level of process/work-flow than at the level of accounting
> software. Feel free to disregard this comment of mine if my perception
> is wrong.

Yes, the software workflow available to Michael as Treasurer and Josh as
Assistant Treasurer is very inadequate. The software available formerly to Josh
as Treasurer and especially me as the preceding Treasurer was even more so.
While we need professional bookkeeping help, both their work and the Treasurer
volunteers' work will be much more streamlined with better software.

- Jimmy Kaplowitz
jimmy at spi-inc.org