It would be easier for me to justify investing a bit of money here, if I 
were better able to make it known that I am a resource in the NetBSD 
world.  I build firewalls based on NetBSD with some (I think) inovative 
software.

I've tried several times to have myself added to the list of available 
engineers on the NetBSD site, but I never receive an answer.  The same 
is true about inquiries I make about adding my products to the list of 
systems that one can find on the NetBSD site.

I'm not saying that I'm receiving an answer I don't like, I'm saying 
that I receive no answer at all.

While the amounts of money are, in the general scheme of things, small, 
they are, to a tiny business like mine, not insignificant.  So perhaps 
more money could be funneled towards the NetBSD project if it were 
easier to show that NetBSD appreciates those who promote the O/S and use 
it in products.

Thor Lancelot Simon wrote:

>There are many upgrades we'd like to make to the NetBSD project
>infrastructure, but which we cannot make because, to be blunt, our
>project is poor.  Not poor in innovation nor poor in developer
>resources nor poor in features -- poor in cold, hard cash, the kind
>we need in order to buy hardware that would let us better serve our
>users.
>
>While other BSD projects have received tens or even hundreds of
>thousands of dollars in donations, either by direct appeal to
>their users (e.g. FreeBSD, when they faced tax status problems
>because too much of their income had come from a single corporate
>donor) or by doing their best to ensure that they received some
>revenue from the distribution of their products (e.g. OpenBSD and
>CD sales) we have always, I guess, been a little embarassed to
>directly and clearly ask our users for money -- whether just as
>plain, simple donations or in return for copies of NetBSD, which
>we do our best to make available free to all on the Net by FTP,
>HTTP, and BitTorrent.
>
>But we do need your money.  We really do.  We need it to do more
>things and buy more stuff that will directly help us serve you,
>the NetBSD users, our "customers".
>
>Often we're asked if people can donate hardware instead of
>money.  The unfortunate fact is that while individual NetBSD
>developers may be able to put donated hardware to use, we have
>standard hardware packages for the TNF servers and our
>administrators' lives become very hard if we just add donated
>components to them.  Also, we try to buy all new systems in
>complete form from vendors we've successfully done business
>with in the past.
>
>However, if you'd like to donate to NetBSD, and see your donation
>go towards hardware to do things like speed up automatic builds
>of NetBSD (so you can always download the latest binaries from
>the branch you want for the hardware you need them for) or ensure
>fast and reliable AnonCVS service, what you *can* do is donate
>money to us and request that we devote it to that purpose.  We
>can't make hard guarantees (we have no need, for example, for 73
>new disk drives) but we will do our best to put your money to
>use in the way you intended it to be used.
>
>So, if you'd like to "donate hardware" to us, please see the attached
>list of what we pay for the parts of which kind of system.  If you
>send us an appropriate amount by PayPal to paypal@netbsd.org, we will
>quickly put it to work to improve NetBSD, and the availablity of
>NetBSD, for you.
>
>Clicking on the "PayPal donate" logo on the front page of our web
>site will of course also direct your donation to The NetBSD Foundation.
>
>You don't need a PayPal account to donate; you can donate directly using
>your credit card, which PayPal will process on our behalf.
>
>Of course, donations of any size are always greatly appreciated; and
>donations to The NetBSD Foundation, a 501(c)3 charity, are tax deductible
>under U.S. law.
>
>PARTS LIST #1: Standard NetBSD Foundation Build System
>
>ITEM				QTY	PRICE	TOTAL
>
>Acme 8176T 1U Server		1	$685	$685
>Chassis Rail Set		1	$ 45	$ 45
>1U 64-bit PCI Riser Card	1	$ 19	$ 19
>AMD Opteron 244			2	$252	$504
>WD Raptor 74GB SATA disk drive	2	$196	$392
>512MB PC3200 DDR ECC REG RAM	4	$ 78	$312
>Labor, assemble & test		1	$ 25	$ 25
>Shipping (approximate)		1	$ 40	$ 40
>
>Total for system:	$2022
>
>The more of these we can buy, the more we can speed up autobuilds for you.
>
>PARTS LIST #2: Replacement Anonymous CVS Server
>
>Acme 8177T 1U Server		1	$799	$ 799
>Chassis Rail Set		1	$ 45	$  45
>1U 64-bit PCI Riser Card	1	$ 19	$  19
>AMD Opteron 242			2	$201	$ 402
>WD Raptor 74GB SATA disk drive	4	$196	$ 784
>1GB PC2700 DDR ECC REG RAM	8	$138	$1104
>Labor, assemble & test		1	$ 50	$  50
>Shipping (approximate)		1	$ 40	$  40
>
>Total for system:	$3203
>
>Thank you, in advance, for what I hope will be your very
>generous support.  We will put your money to work -- and
>quickly -- to help NetBSD better serve you.
>
>Thor
>
>
>  
>