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PayPalAbsolutely smashing their goals, the KDE team have managed to have a huge success for the 2025 fundraiser that's currently ongoing. 70% of KDE funding comes directly from users, so it's essential to help fund the free and open source software that you love.
The current total at time of writing has managed to hit a nice €272,256.5. Going by a blog post from developer Nate Graham, a whole lot of it came directly from the KDE Plasma pop-up that they added to remind people to support development:
Donate to KDE’s 2025 fundraiser! It really makes a big difference. Believe it or not, the fundraiser has topped €100,000! And that’s just for the fundraiser itself; the yearly donation pop-up has also raised another €100k in just the past five days (!!!).
It’s kind of amazing. This money will help keep KDE strong and independent for years to come, and I’m just in awe of the generosity of the KDE community and userbase. Thank you all for helping KDE to grow and prosper!
If money is tight, you can help KDE by directly getting involved. Donating time is actually more impactful than donating money. Each contributor makes a huge difference in KDE — you are not a number or a cog in a machine! You don’t have to be a programmer, either; many other opportunities exist.
Really great to see this. I hope that 2026 will see KDE and the Plasma desktop continue to reach new heights. And with the new Steam Machine and Steam Frame launching next year with SteamOS Linux and the Plasma desktop mode - it's going to be a great year for Linux gaming.
I donated to KDE this year, did you?
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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I may not get along with plasma, but there's still a fairly long list of kde stuff that I am using on my xfce installs, from okular all the way down to kupfer.
Recent (for me) high point: kdeconnect.
Last edited by emphy on 10 Dec 2025 at 11:28 am UTC
Last edited by Brokatt on 10 Dec 2025 at 1:23 pm UTC
since the steam deck and soon steam machine, both with KDE they should have a strong interest, that KDE is as good as it can get
i mean 300k is nothing for valve
Gerarderloper 2 days ago
Quoting: mylkahow much is VALVE contributing?Technically Valve don't use Plasma, its just a fallback DE which they could use GNOME or anything else.
since the steam deck and soon steam machine, both with KDE they should have a strong interest, that KDE is as good as it can get
i mean 300k is nothing for valve
Quoting: mylkahow much is VALVE contributing?The Frame uses Plasma too !
since the steam deck and soon steam machine,
Quoting: GerarderloperTechnically Valve don't use Plasma, its just a fallback DE which they could use GNOME or anything else.SteamOS is built with Plasma, it's not a fallback, its their desktop DE of choice.
fizzyizzy05 2 days ago
CyborgZeta a day ago
Cloversheen 12 hours ago
Quoting: chrI haven't donated this year to open-source, since I've been unemployed for almost 2 years and family keeps borrowing from me as well. But I really hope I can give something again next year.Hope luck turns around for you soon. Much love. ❤️
Quoting: chrI haven't donated this year to open-source, since I've been unemployed for almost 2 years and family keeps borrowing from me as well. But I really hope I can give something again next year.You should only give money if you have the opportunity to do so. There are other ways to give back to the community. Like helping people with support or promoting Linux to friends. You and your family comes first. Let's hope next year turns out better yeah?
Quoting: chrI haven't donated this year to open-source, since I've been unemployed for almost 2 years and family keeps borrowing from me as well. But I really hope I can give something again next year.You managed to hit my pity point.
Have you already tried applying for tech support jobs(yes, I just assumed that because you frequent this forum you know english and your way around team viewer)
[Like this one?](https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Jobs/Remote-Support)
Last edited by LoudTechie on 12 Dec 2025 at 2:55 pm UTC
Quoting: mylkahow much is VALVE contributing?[According to KDE no more than 67000$ straight to KDE,](https://ev.kde.org/reports/ev-2024/) which isn't unexpected Valve is rich enough that it can afford to spend the money it spends straight on developers who make just improvements that suit them.
since the steam deck and soon steam machine, both with KDE they should have a strong interest, that KDE is as good as it can get
i mean 300k is nothing for valve
Also Valve is a notoriously opaque organization.
They don't publish investor reports, due to their private cooperation structure.
They don't really talk to the press.
They tend to hire subcontractors to do the dirty and visible work for them. Yes, I'm looking at you Codeweavers.
In KDE's case they hired Igalia to carry the blame for contributing to KDE, but how much of that time is bought by Valve and how much by others is unknown to me.
Last edited by LoudTechie on 12 Dec 2025 at 3:23 pm UTC
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