Danny:
In many non-profit organizations in the US--but
not the WMF--Board
membership is actually contingent upon making a significant donation to the
organization.
One of the reasons I have my reservations about the US leading the world by
example is how they often seem to fail to separate money and politics.
Should I comment on how a US presidential candidate also has little change
to serve his country if not backed up by millions of dollars to get his
message across? The world can learn a lot from some of their core values,
but they could learn from those of others. The notion that people would have
to buy into non-profits is pretty detrimental and extreme to me. I would
expect rich people who give a generous donation to be honoured for it. I
would not expect in most cases they are the experts per se on how to spend
it well for the cause at hand.
We may well meet a big cultural difference between usa and europe here :-)
It seems to be indeed frequent that in the usa, someone giving a big lot
of money to an organisation, is offered to have an eye and hand on how
it is spent, through the seat in the organisation board. Jimbo several
times mentionned that.
What would we do if B. Gates Foundation gave us 1 000 000 dollars ?
(that's a serious question)
Ant