Hi everyone, we’re currently working on the non-profit applications. This post is to check in, get feedback, and get some future planning done.
Give feedback on potential names
Before the main application goes out, we need to apply for and reserve a name. After going through the responses of the previous post, we have picked out a few potential names. If there are some names on this list that you particularly prefer or oppose, please share your thoughts below.
- Federated Comms Canada (
FCC) - Federated Open Comms Canada (
FOCC) - Canadian Federated Platforms (
CFP) - Open Comms Canada (
OCC) - Canadian Federated Comms (
CFC) - Canadian Communities Online (
CCO) - Online Federation Canada (
OFC) - Canadian Open Federation (
COF) - Canadian Federated Agora (
CFA) - Northern Federated Open Forum (
NFOF)
.
If you have any other ideas, (such as variants of the names above) you can share those too. The specific requirements are as follows:
Societies must have their name approved and confirm that it doesn’t conflict with a name already being used by a corporation. This makes sure that the public is not confused or misled by a society’s name. Find out how to choose the right name.
This page is a great resource for thinking of names: Request approval for a business name | Gov BC
Join the non-profit team
We are currently looking at what roles need to be filled. Everyone is welcome (and encouraged) to apply if interested, even if you don’t have experience in the areas listed:
- Administrative: Organization development, project management, legal experience, financial experience, etc.
.
While the non-profit application is being prepared, we will only onboard a few people. Afterwards we will do call-outs for more people, including those with backgrounds in other areas (ex. technical background, community engagement, visuals, grants, etc.) depending on what we will be working on.
To apply, please fill out this form. You can also message [email protected] by filling out the following template:
What skills, experiences, or areas of expertise do you want to highlight?
Is there a specific area that you want to help with?
How much time are you able to commit to the non-profit on a weekly / monthly basis?
Do you have any ideas or suggestions for the non-profit that you would like to share?
Is there anything else about yourself that you think we should know?
Cheers 🍁
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I spent several years as part of the larger non-profit organization KDE e.V. which managed a large open source project with hundreds of members and a budget of about $200k per year (mostly spent on servers, but also an annual in person development meeting). I also professional operated as a sysop in the BBS era, and network admin during the early internet (dialup) days. Hit me up if you want some additional support in any way.
“There are only two hard things in Computer Science: cache invalidation and naming things.” – Phil Karlton
All of the above sound super generic, and maybe that is the goal, but you sound like startup think-tanks, political parties, or lobbying groups. Also, acronyms seriously suck. Also, you want something that is trademark protectable, even as a non-profit, so you can use trademark law as a means to shut down impersonating websites and services that are acting in bad faith.
Thus I counterproposal a bunch of nonsense single word but memorable names. I checked domain availability for each (at least one of .ca, .net, or .org), and google, but didn’t run trademark searches.
Fedican
Nortifed
Librefed
Polecomm
Federom
Tredecim (Latin word for 13, which is surprisingly available, but not likely trademark protectable)
Fedinauts
Canulan
When I named my company, I specifically chose a name that secretly felt like it should be a corporation name in some far future sci fi setting.
From other comments in this thread, I think we need to keep in mind the bilingualism of Canada. Based on your suggestions, FedeCan could be a good candidate.
I like FedeCan. FédéCan en français
Great points and a thing to remember is that creating a unique name makes it searchable, relatable and directs traffic straight to your organization. It’s like painting your sign red when everyone is painting theirs green.
I think the word or a variation of the word Canada should be in there because …
It’s an indigenous word (I’m biased on that because I’m indigenous) (the Huron-Iroquois word actually means village or community which is what this federated group is trying to create)
It’s bilingual
It’s unique to the country in a global perspective
It’s searchable
So variations could use Canada or Kanata, which was historically another version of how it was spelled (I’m not Huron-Iroquois, I’m Cree Ojibwe so I don’t speak their language)
CanFed … FedCan
I like Open Comms Canada the most. It’s general so it’ll allow for a broader range of platforms to fall under it.
Yeah. It allows future networks to be administered by the same group. Like, we could host a Mastodon server too, or similar.
On the flipside, it sounds like a lobbying organization. And I don’t think we’ll want to be that.
Perhaps even more general and less lobbyist - Open Platforms Canada.
Agreed. Also we could say that we do thinks the OCC-y way
I love doing things like the Ontario Chamber of Commerce :D
I share the same opinion. :)
This post says it is an update, but searching through c/main I’m not seeing anything that looks like it laid the groundwork for this. Consequently, I feel like I’m missing information.
- What is the goal/purpose of the not for profit business registration?
- Is status as a registered charity being considered/pursued?
- As another poster asked, why is this being registered provincially instead of federally (I strongly recommend registering federally unless there is some hidden benefit for registering in BC).
- What is the board/governance structure being proposed?
- Are bylaws being drafted at this stage, or are default bylaws (not sure if BC has those, federally NFP’s do) being applied?
We’re going to go through and respond to the other questions soon, but here are some other discussions about this for some background:
- https://lemmy.ca/post/1546127?scrollToComments=true
- https://lemmy.ca/post/3271365?scrollToComments=true
- https://lemmy.ca/post/9993076?scrollToComments=true
- https://lemmy.ca/post/14937054?scrollToComments=true
- What is the goal/purpose of the not for profit business registration?
It’s a part of the non-profit application process, and I think it’s to prevent any confusion with an existing business / organization. See step 4 under “Start a society” in the link below
Societies must have their name approved and confirm that it doesn’t conflict with a name already being used by a corporation. This makes sure that the public is not confused or misled by a society’s name
https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/employment-business/business/not-for-profit-organizations
Thanks for the other questions, we’ll draft up something nicer to respond to those!
If you plan on using the abbreviation a lot, I’d recommend not using Federated Comms Canada as the abbreviation is already commonly known as the US government’s Federal Communications Commission (FCC). It would get confusing and hard to search for. I’d suggest removing any other commonly known government abbreviations for the same reason.
When its Canadian it should be in French, because it sounds cooler, sorry for my google translate:
- Plateformes Fédérées Canadiennes
- Fédération ouverte canadienne
I like Canadian Open Federation (Fédération Libre Canadienne)
Personally I like Communities or Communication(s) over “Comms” because it’s more specific.
Not that I have incorporated hundreds of entities, but isn’t “Canada/Canadian” a protected term in BC because it can imply a link to the government?
I know nothing about B.C., but I do know that it is a protected term in other provinces that are part of the NWP (New West Partnership. A thing where BC, AB, SK, and MB work together to make it easier to run a corporation across all 4 provinces).
The financial statements required when filing the Annual Maintenance of the non-prof, does BC have specific requirements for the qualification of the Auditor (AKA, do you guys need to hire an CPA for your year-end review)?
Is there a reason why you are registering Provincially instead of Federally?
I have incorporated a bunch of small not for profit corporations, and you raise some good points.
- Registration federally is much less complicated than registering provincially, for a number of reasons (legislation to follow, filings, expanding business operations across the country, pursuing status as a charity, etc). I would recommend registering a not for profit federally every time (even if it was the smallest organization operating in one tiny corner of a single province).
- To my knowledge, Canadian/Canada is not a protected term (when registering federally). I have registered a few not for profits with Canada in the name. The organizations did have a Canada-wide scope.
I have recommended Provincial registration for NFP a few times, mostly when I know that it’s the kinda thing where saying “All of the money stays right here in __________” is better for fund-raising.
Or the person is a little nutso about Wexit, but they want to help fund a local children’s sports league.
Oof, point taken. Luckily that hasn’t been among my experiences!
Canadian Unified Matrix?
This place is full of CUX!
