[ecshafer]

Mozilla and Wikipedia for example are causes I support. But why would I give money to them if they are going to turn around and give money to some cause I don't support (OR am actively against)? These non-profits love to shuffle money around to unrelated causes. As a non profit, supporting open source software, I think expecting a large percentage of the donation to go to engineering and not admin, social causes, etc. is a reasonable expectation.

[antiframe]

Yes that's all reasonable but the comparison is paying for (or giving them other revenue) corporations who also love to shuffle money around and can support causes you are actively against. The point being made was that people give causes trying to improve society more scrutiny than they give for-profit mega corporations who have in the past shown that they use their money for a lot of things detrimental to society.

[tracker1]

Assuming there is a healthy market, then you have alternatives you can purchase your products and goods from. These alternatives may have other trade-offs and in fact, there may well be open and closed alternatives as well as hybrid options.

Some people simply want the "best fit" solution for a product. IMO, this used to be Outlook+Exchange, hands down... M365 scaling has enshittified the bundle in a lot of ways leaving a wide gap for alternatives. Google's GMail is a leading alternative that is a closed service. Thunderbird is an open solution that solves part of the problem (shared calendars/contacts only having half the solution).

When you pay for a product, you often are able to give feedback and request for features... the expectation is that you are getting value for what you are paying and that the company continues to do so while adding features that add more value in time.

When you donate to an open-source project, and that project redirects funds to have a multi-million dollar marketing event that only benefits middle managers and seeks to add revenue with features the majority of donors oppose, then someone who would otherwise support the development might rightly feel a bit betrayed or choose not to donate altogether, much like someone might not purchase a given product or service from a company that does what they feel are bad things.

It's not dramatically different, it's just when/where the individual might expect a level of transparency, value or direction. A purchase is against existing value... a donation is against future value.

[antiframe]

I think we're talking past each other. I am not saying that people shouldn't be upset that if they donate to an organization that a large portion of that money might go to things they rather that organization not do. Like a $100 donation might have $20 of overhead or waste.

What I don't get is why people don't think the same for for-profit enterprises. If I spend $120 a year on some SaaS, I don't ask what portion of that goes into the CEOs pocket who might use that money to buy politicians to advance tax policy they prefer, or government contracts against the public interest, etc.

It's not about the expected value of a product, it's about what else your money funds when you hand it over to a corporation that people rarely consider. They should consider it just as much as they consider donations to non-profits.

Also, the assumption of a healthy market is not one I would take. A lot of corporate money is spent on regulatory capture and other ways to prevent a healthy market. Funded by customer spend. A purchase is against future value in the same way that past purchases are what allow companies today to make markets less healthy.

[tracker1]

While I get what you're saying, I think it's exactly in that the expectations are different between a donation and a payment for product/service.

You pay for an existing product/service and expect that product/service to be fit for a need... that's generally it as far as expectations go... some may actually care about a company being a bad actor and boycott etc, but that's secondary in and of itself. You immediately get the product or service that exists.

A donation, is against expectations for results... though there may be other reasons to donate to a cause/charity.

[TiredOfLife]

No donations to Mozilla go to engineering or Firefox in any way.