Open Collective Foundation (OCF), our fiscal host that allows us to receive tax-deductible donations to pay our server expenses, is shutting down. While we technically have until the end of 2024 to find a new fiscal host, Open Collective will stop processing donations on March 15, leaving us without a funding source—that's just five days from now. They announced the shutdown just last week (more info here).

Here's the critical takeaway:

On March 15 (this Friday), Open Collective will turn off our ability to process donations (along with hundreds of other collectives), and our current recurring donors will receive an email that says their donations have been paused while we find a new fiscal host.

Unfortunately, this is extremely short notice, and the communication from OCF has been rushed. While there are other ways to accept payments, OCF allows us to operate under their non-profit organization, making our donations tax-deductible and providing administrative and legal services. With OCF shutting down, I'll need to find a new fiscal host or create a new organizational entity. While there are other fiscal hosts out there, our collective is so small that we would not qualify for some of them, even if our missions align.

I first announced this on Mastodon when I heard the news, hoping a clear path would materialize. So far, that has not happened, and to be perfectly honest, sorting this out requires more time and investment than I have to give at the moment. For the time being, I'm going to continue to wait and weigh our options. We don't have a large balance remaining at Open Collective, and I've always personally covered our funding shortfalls—and will continue to do so in the meantime.

I really appreciate everyone who has contributed to federated.press since we launched in late 2022; your donations have been essential to our operation. Thanks for your continued support!