What is the initial scope of the foundation?

[matklad]

The "purpose" question sets the overall direction of the foundation. It would also be useful to mention which specific things will go under foundation umbrella once it created. Something like this:

• Will the foundation fund each and every developer working on rust lang? probably not
• Will the foundation take ownership of Rust's trademark? probably yes

[Mark-Simulacrum]

The central goal of the Foundation is to enable Rust contributors, especially those that are volunteering and not supported by their employer. To that end, the Foundation will offer training, software, and structural support for contributors to the Rust project. Contributors are engaged in all kinds of activities, ranging from writing software code to moderating forums to translation, and each needs a distinct form of support. We expect that the Foundation will be able to start providing support for the activities within the first year. A few examples of ways the Foundation could support contributors:

• Access to a lawyer if a team needs legal advice, such as on how to handle DMCAs for the crates.io team, or resolving licensing questions from the compiler team
• Paying for tools and services a team needs, like a video calls platform for a team that wants to run sync meetings or a helpdesk tool for help@crates.io.
• Supporting efforts to grow and diversify Rust’s leadership, such as Increasing Rust’s Reach
• Running the annual survey to provide insights to the teams on what the wider community wants to see from the project.

To be clear, those are just examples that the future board of directors will need to decide whether to approve or not, and it’s definitely not an exhaustive list. The role of the foundation is to serve the project, not the other way around: Rust contributors should see the Rust Foundation as a helpful resource to empower their work. If a team needs something they’ll be encouraged to reach out to the foundation to solve their needs.

In terms of assets, the Foundation will own and steward the trademarks. It will also own crates.io and the project’s infrastructure, but the operations and decision-making for those will continue to be in the hands of the current teams.

[nikomatsakis]

@matklad

Will the foundation fund each and every developer working on rust lang? probably not

I've posted an answer to this part of your question in #13.