I believe some operational roles should be paid

@Ed Summers One thing the TWG has going for it is a set monthly budget (which can be raised with a proposal). Maybe TWG could start experimenting with paying members within the existing budget?

Totally support this, but this is also the kind of conversation where it would be really helpful if we had more context at the outset.

What is our current budget and expenditures? How are current stipends for CWG set? Are there any other roles that are paid? How does the size of the existing pool of available funds compare with some benchmark numbers for what we would need to pay based on the number of ops roles and some sort of compensation framework (whether the $5/hour mentioned above, or something else)?

@Dynamic You can see all our income and expenses on Open Collective https://opencollective.com/socialcoop#category-BUDGET The CWG Ops team is paid, largely as an expression of our desire to see Social.Coop move to a more sustainable model:

26.10gbp per monthly on call shift;

7.20gbp for monthly meetings; and

14.40gbp/month for each of the two coordinators.

@Matt Noyes Thank you! And fantastic that we are so transparent about this.

While Im not at all offended by the sentiment I wonder if we cant be a bit more strategic with our limited finances.

I think, mainly, the tech work has been done on an entirely voluntary basis, generally by idealistic white, middle class, bros (not meaning to be derogatory and i may be being a bit presumptive 😁) living in rich countries who have generally also been holding down well paid tech work elsewhere (or could easily get it). They are in a position where any funds we can afford to give would, by comparison, be little more than a token to them and (unless I've missed it) they've largely appeared uninterested in taking such funding when its been suggested they should.

Im involved in an open source software project that has attracted voluntary contributions from, and later been able to fund, what likely amounts to a reasonable livelihood for developers in poorer countries.

I wonder if something similar could work for SC? Im not just (or necessarily?) talking about for tech work.

We could also, and probably more easily, find people already doing valuable organising, community or moderation work in poorer countries and pay them to do some SC stuff.

By providing flexibility we may give them some opportunity/resources that may allow them to continue with the work they are already doing elsewhere? Try and create an enabling rather than what could be considered as exploitative relationship. Ideally they'd also decide to join and become active members in SC!

@DarrenI would love to see this mean skillsharing, dispersing some of that technical knowledge, paid mentee time so that we can broaden the base of people that can do this kinda work to ppl who wouldn't normally be able to, eg. sit in a voice call with an idealistic FAANG engineer and troubleshoot a server or whatever.

I think this important discussion should happen on the basis of a larger discussion of strategy, so that we can put resources where they are most needed, according to our objectives.

Think it would ideal for the payments to be distributed among as many members as practical by splitting the tasks into as small parts as is practical.

Another thought, from @Matthew Cropp, is to think in terms of budgets for each working group, which the members of the group can decide how to use.