# NixOS Board Call meeting minutes - Sponsorship Discussion - March 13, 2024
**URL:** https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nixos-board-call-meeting-minutes-sponsorship-discussion-march-13-2024/41475
**Category:** Meta
**Created:** [March 14, 2024, 6:10pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nixos-board-call-meeting-minutes-sponsorship-discussion-march-13-2024/41475 "2024-03-14T18:10:02Z")
**Posts on this page:** 2
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@ajaxbits](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/ajaxbits)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2024, 6:10pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nixos-board-call-meeting-minutes-sponsorship-discussion-march-13-2024/41475/1 "2024-03-14T18:10:02Z")
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# Notes 2024-03-13 (1660 UTC)
## Recap (10min)
- NixCon EU Anduril sponsorship announced by marketting team, leading to “bunch of things”/outcry and venue asked NixCon team to provide additional detail prior to the conference. Sponsor was dropped.
- During and after conference resulted in discussions in Matix and Discourse. [Proposed policy](https://github.com/NixOS/foundation/issues/110) by @tomberek, roughly summarized by requiring legal status.
- Proposed policy does not limit Anduril sponsorhip via host (SCALE), US (location), and Netherlands.
- Nixcon NA organizing team accepted Anduril as a sponsor for the event at the rate of $5000.
- Subsequently, NixCon NA team also accepted.
- This resulted in an [open letter](https://nixos-users-against-mic-sponsorship.github.io/) signed by members of the community.
- A [board meeting](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nixos-foundation-board-meeting-minutes-2024-01-02-2024-02-03/39994#h-2024-01-30-20) discussed this, the decision was to use the ~~existing~~ proposed policy, as outlined [here](https://github.com/NixOS/foundation/issues/110).
# Question period (45m)
- Question: What was the previous policy?
- Question @delroth: "Why was a policy decided upon that clearly did not match the community’s discontent at Anduril’s NixCon EU sponsorship? How is this not a complete slap in the face to the community’s concerns back in early Sept 2023? "
- Question @piegames: “Last time there was the idea to publish the sponsors list beforehand for community discussion.”
- Question @Jo: “Should there be a anonymous sponsorship tier? So no advertising for the supporting company…”
- Topic: donation vs sponsorhip vs endorsement vs advertising
- Question @jonas: What is the context for this sponsorship?
- Question @ajax: What is the exposure provided to sponsors?
- Question @ajax: Risk assessment or branding, image, conflict?
- Question: topic is contentious, open letter.
- Question: “maybe it could also help to reword the policy a bit to make it more clear that the foundation _allowing event organizers some freedom_ does not mean endorsing any of the sponsors? Or did I misunderstand?”
- @hexa: tension between policy and revenue
- Question (@janik): What does the board think about the suggested policy in the open letter of banning any _mic_ company from sponsoring (note: specifically sponsoring not donations)
- Proposals:
- Proposal (@tomberek): Prioritize continuing to write down a policy to escape this “interim policy” situation.
- Question (@tomberek): Is this clarification between what sponsorship/endorsement is, sufficient? Does it address the open letter?
# Action Items (5m)
- Get together on making the policy happen.
- @ron will update the [sponsorship tracks documentation](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nixcon-north-america-sponsorship-tracks/) to include correct, final information
---
### Author:  [@rhendric](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/rhendric)
#### Post date: [March 14, 2024, 8:31pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/nixos-board-call-meeting-minutes-sponsorship-discussion-march-13-2024/41475/2 "2024-03-14T20:31:38Z")
> [@ajaxbits](#):
>
> an organization that always flakes out
Not if you run your conference with `--extra-experim`—\*tackled by security\*