Python Foundation Donations Surge After Rejecting Grant - But Sponsorships Still Needed (blogspot.com)
- Reference: 0180019674
- News link: https://developers.slashdot.org/story/25/11/09/2017240/python-foundation-donations-surge-after-rejecting-grant---but-sponsorships-still-needed
- Source link: https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/connecting-the-dots.html
"It doesn't quite bridge the gap of $1.5 million, but it's incredibly impactful for us, both financially and in terms of feeling this strong groundswell of support from the community."
> Could that same security project still happen if new funding materializes? The PSF hasn't entirely given up. "The PSF is always looking for new opportunities to fund work benefiting the Python community," Nicholson told me in an email last week, adding pointedly that "we have received some helpful suggestions in response to our announcement that we will be pursuing." And even as things stand, the PSF sees itself as "always developing or implementing the latest technologies for protecting PyPI project maintainers and users from current threats," and it plans to continue with that commitment.
The Python Software Foundation was "astounded and deeply appreciative at the outpouring of solidarity in both words and actions," their executive director wrote [3]in a new blog post this week , saying the show of support "reminds us of the community's strength."
But that post also acknowledges the reality that the Python Software Foundation's yearly revenue and assets (including contributions from major donors) "have declined, and costs have increased,..."
> Historically, PyCon US has been a source of revenue for the PSF, enabling us to fund programs like our currently [4]paused Grants Program ... Unfortunately, PyCon US has run at a loss for three years — and not from a lack of effort from our staff and volunteers! Everyone has been working very hard to find areas where we can trim costs, but even with those efforts, inflation continues to surge, and changing U.S. and economic conditions have reduced our attendance... Because we have so few expense categories (the vast majority of our spending goes to running PyCon US, the Grants Program, and our small 13-member staff), we have limited "levers to pull" when it comes to budgeting and long-term sustainability...
While Python usage continues to surge, "corporate investment back into the language and the community has declined overall. The PSF has longstanding sponsors and partners that we are ever grateful for, but signing on new corporate sponsors has slowed." (They're asking employees at Python-using companies to [5]encourage sponsorships .)
> We have been seeking out alternate revenue channels to diversify our income, with some success and some challenges. [6]PyPI Organizations offers paid features to companies (PyPI features are always free to community groups) and has begun bringing in monthly income. We've also been seeking out grant opportunities where we find good fits with our mission.... We currently have more than six months of runway (as opposed to our preferred 12 months+ of runway), so the PSF is not at immediate risk of having to make more dramatic changes, but we are on track to face difficult decisions if the situation doesn't shift in the next year.
>
> Based on all of this, the PSF has been making changes and working on multiple fronts to combat losses and work to ensure financial sustainability, in order to continue protecting and serving the community in the long term. Some of these changes and efforts include:
>
> — Pursuing new sponsors, specifically in the AI industry and the security sector
> — Increasing sponsorship package pricing to match inflation
> — Making adjustments to reduce PyCon US expenses
> — Pursuing funding opportunities in the US and Europe
> — Working with other organizations to raise awareness
> — Strategic planning, to ensure we are maximizing our impact for the community while cultivating mission-aligned revenue channels
>
> The PSF's end-of-year fundraiser effort is usually run by staff based on their capacity, but this year we have assembled a fundraising team that includes Board members to put some more "oomph" behind the campaign. We'll be doing our regular fundraising activities; we'll also be creating a unique webpage, piloting temporary and VERY visible pop-ups to python.org and PyPI.org, and telling more stories from our Grants Program recipients...
>
> Keep your eyes on the [7]PSF Blog , the [8]PSF category on Discuss , and [9]our social media accounts for updates and information as we kick off the fundraiser this month. Your boosts of our posts and your personal shares of "why I support the PSF" stories will make all the difference in our end-of-year fundraiser. If this post has you all fired up to personally support the future of Python and the PSF right now , we always welcome new [10]PSF Supporting Members and [11]donations .
[1] https://developers.slashdot.org/story/25/10/28/211237/python-foundation-rejects-government-grant-over-dei-restrictions
[2] https://thenewstack.io/psf-gets-a-donor-surge-after-rejecting-anti-dei-federal-grant/
[3] https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/connecting-the-dots.html
[4] https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/08/the-psf-has-paused-our-grants-program.html
[5] https://www.python.org/psf/prospectus2026/
[6] https://docs.pypi.org/organization-accounts/pricing-and-payments/
[7] https://pyfound.blogspot.com/
[8] https://discuss.python.org/c/python-software-foundation/9
[9] https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/02/where-is-psf-2025-edition.html
[10] https://psfmember.org/civicrm/contribute/transact/?reset=1&id=1
[11] https://psfmember.org/civicrm/contribute/transact/?reset=1&id=2
I find it quite strange... (Score:3)
Most of the "AI" userland seems to run on python yet nobody from the "AI" big names have stepped in to help even for the pittance that is (for them) 1.5M US.
What an ungrateful bunch.
What does this foundation do? (Score:3)
It's not clear from the article what the foundation does or why it exists.
It seems to give out grants. Why?
Re: (Score:1)
I think you're confusing it with the Give Out Grants Foundation.
Re: (Score:2)
They have an impact report on their website. The 2024 one is here: [1]https://s3.dualstack.us-east-2... [amazonaws.com]
I just read it. Mostly they run pypi, they own the license to cpython (like fsf does for many projects). They run a conference: pycon. They have a couple of developers. They give out grants to make python better.
They have a budget of about 4M. So it is a reasonnably small organization.
[1] https://s3.dualstack.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/pythondotorg-assets/media/files/2024_PSF_Annual_Impact_Report.pdf
Re: (Score:2)
I was just asking what they do. I don't give a shit about their dei activities.
Re: (Score:2)
I think you might be responding to the wrong comment. I just pointed out the activity report which highlight what it is the do...
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know. I took it as a real question.
Maybe because I asked myself the question. Though I took the time to google it when GGP didn't and posted instead. (Which I also do that sometimes.)
Isn't it fair that public money (Score:2)
shouldn't be used for irrelevant political issues? I am not claiming there is no problem with discrimination against minorities, and such issues should be addressed, but not from an organisation and grants focused on software. Just as climate organisations shouldn't all the sudden use their grants fighting for Palestine....
Re: (Score:3)
The public money was for nothing but security work - specifically tools for automatically checking new Python packages for malware.
What was irrelevant was the new-this-year requirement that even different work (not funded by any public money) would now also have to stop if (in the administration's view) it promoted inclusion.
Re: (Score:3)
Possibly. But that is not relevant here.
The grant requirement was not that the grant money can't be used for DEI. But rather that while the grant is active, the institution can't have any DEI activity (regardless of how they are funded).
And personnally, I don't think the government should do that. (Even though, I am aware, that a LOT of the way the federal government implements policies is through these "if you take this money, then you can't do that other unrelated thing")
Celebrate your country's independence by (Score:1)
blowing up a small portion of it.
In a similar vein:
Achieve inter-ethnic harmony by dividing people along ethnic lines, assigning moral worth to ethnicity, and then doling out punishments and rewards using ethnicity as a criterion.
Remember folks: the alternative to racism is *not* "anti-racism" but simply "not-racism." Which DEI as practiced is decidedly not.
Yeah Trump 2 is about as disappointing as Trump 1. Along the dimension of to DEI or not to DEI, he's not wrong.
Indirect impact (Score:3)
Perhaps these requirements to drop DEI were not so much about DEI but about savings and getting the job done. In my experience, DEI programmes can be pretty expensive, can slow down hiring, and politics of any kind always obstruct the path to the goal. So perhaps it's not about being anti-DEI but about efficiency and getting the job done at a tight budget.
Re: (Score:2)
> In my experience
And what, I might ask, is your experience, exactly ?
Anti-DEI people have all kinds of pseudo-rational justifications for their stance, but one that comes up often is that it prevents enterprises from hiring based on merit and qualification. Well guess what ? Enterprises never hired based on merit and qualification.
People are racist pigs, period. DEI is an imperfect solution for an imperfect, shitty, defective-by-design species.
If anyone has a better solution, I'm ready to hear it.
Re: (Score:2)
> all kinds of pseudo-rational justifications for their stance
What makes opposition to racism pseudo-rational? It is very rational and moral. DEI is racist, end of story. Now go and try to rationalize that racism against white people somehow doesn't count.
Re: (Score:2)
If someone wants to argue merit then I have a long list of cabinet members who are grossly unqualified for their positions.
Re: (Score:2)
You're talking about efficiency in the same breath as the guy who is currently building a $300 million whitehouse ballroom while the government is shut down? [1]https://www.pbs.org/newshour/p... [pbs.org]
The same guy who spends 25% of his time golfing? [2]https://didtrumpgolftoday.com/ [didtrumpgolftoday.com]
[1] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/whos-paying-for-trumps-300-million-ballroom
[2] https://didtrumpgolftoday.com/
Re: (Score:1)
DEI is advertised by its proponents as "anti-racism". And as such, it's to racism as antimatter is to matter: weighs the same, behaves the same, looks the same, has some colors flipped, acts violently when in contact with its counterpart -- but as long as all of the flipped "colors" remain flipped, indistinguishable from it.
So here's a math exercise: assuming a normal distribution (which is incredibly "infectious" as long as the scores have multiple different causes), generate a population of scores for gr
Re: Remember kids (Score:2)
What you're saying here is that no one should ever try to remedy the evils of the past.
That's stupid shit.
Fuck that stupid shit.
Re: Remember kids (Score:2)
Ending DEI in federal agencies without a substitute policy is a violation of rulings related to the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Preventing private businesses, universities, and individuals from applying DEI-like policies in their own hiring practices is a violation of the First Amendment.
Not that anyone is going to stand up to a court dead set on creating the first Unitarian Executive in US history.
America voted the way they did because they wanted the government ran like a business with a CEO holding absolute