Add Foundation update blog post

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+---
+title: "Godot Foundation Update September 2024"
+excerpt: "We've been quietly working on a number of things! Here are a few."
+categories: ["news"]
+author: Godot Foundation
+image: /storage/blog/covers/godot-foundation-update-2023.jpg
+date: 2024-09-30 12:00:00
+---
+
+The Foundation has been working on a number of things behind the scenes that are important for the organization and for
+the Godot ecosystem more broadly. We wanted to take the chance to highlight a few of them in this post.
+
+## Key Policies and Procedures
+The Foundation was formed approximately two years ago, but we have only been operating in a full capacity since last
+summer. We initially adopted the [member project policies](https://sfconservancy.org/projects/policies/) of the Software
+Freedom Conservancy. Doing so allowed us to operate exactly as we had when we were a member project of the SFC, and
+maintain very high standards.
+
+Recently we adopted a modified version of those policies that is more specific to our organization. You can read the
+updated version on the [Godot Foundation website](https://godot.foundation/policies-and-procedures/key-policies).
+
+We are very happy with the policies and we hope you are too. They hold us to a very high standard and ensure that the
+Foundation will always operate in a way that supports Godot. 
+
+## Contractors
+The Foundation has 9 contractors working on the engine directly (5 full time, 4 part time) and 3 contractors
+working on administration + infrastructure right now. We are currently in the hiring process for 1-2 more positions.
+
+Even with 12 people, we feel very understaffed as there is always more work that can be done. Accordingly, we would like
+to continue hiring once funding allows for it.
+
+## Upcoming projects
+The Foundation is working on 4 major projects in addition to working on Godot itself:
+1. An official asset store
+2. An official job board on the Godot website
+3. A public project priorities document
+4. A public trademark policy
+
+### Asset Store
+We have been working towards an initial version of the asset store for a while now. It has taken us some time to get the
+legal aspects into place and a design agreed upon. 
+
+We will have a dedicated announcement soon with more information!
+
+### Job Board
+We aim to have a place for people to post that are looking to hire Godot developers to add to their game team or Godot
+contributors to fix high priority bugs that may be impacting your team.
+
+In addition to a job board, we will be curating a list of service providers who have shown that they offer services in
+the Godot Ecosystem to make it easy to find someone to contract with if you need support or any other services.
+
+Much of the foundational work for this has been finished, but it will likely be released after the asset store so we can
+focus our efforts more on the asset store. 
+
+### Project Priorities
+Soon we will be adding a project priorities page to our website to give the community more clarity on the direction of
+development.
+
+We have avoided providing a roadmap as we don’t want to promise more than we can deliver, or put too much pressure on
+volunteer contributors. However, the Godot Project maintainers have agreed that it is time to at least write down what
+the largest tasks are that we are working towards. This won’t be like a traditional roadmap where we have specific tasks
+with expected dates. However, we believe it will answer a lot of questions that the community has about the future of
+the project.
+
+### Trademark Policy
+We registered the Godot trademark and the Godot logo trademark while still a member project of the SFC. Last year, the
+SFC granted the Godot Foundation ownership over the trademarks. Now we need to have a public policy that says how and
+when others can use the trademarks to protect them.
+
+We are working with our lawyers to craft a policy that is fair to existing users, as permissive as possible, and still
+able to protect our trademark.
+
+We will have a blog post soon with more information.
+
+## The Foundation's role in the project
+
+We also wanted to take this chance to muse about the Foundation's role in the project. In particular, we want to
+contrast the size of the Foundation with the size of the Godot project contributor pool. As explained above, the
+Foundation currently hires 12 contractors to work on Godot, while the total number of contributors to Godot is over
+2,500 (the 4.3 release alone had over 500 contributors)! This large group of contributors is the reason why Godot is
+able to improve so quickly and do so much for a fraction of the funding that the other large engines have.
+
+The Foundation (meaning the Board of Directors and the people hired by the Foundation) does not determine the priorities
+of the project in a top-down way. In other words, the Foundation does not dictate to individual volunteers what they
+should work on. Instead, it influences the project implicitly by making hiring decisions and hiring people for specific
+tasks that aren’t being done by the community.
+
+Ultimately, it is the Godot community that deserves the most credit for the growth and development of Godot. While we
+hope to see the Foundation grow and take on a stronger role in the project, it should be seen as a central pillar of the
+project that volunteers can rally around. Donating to the Foundation is one avenue to contribute, but there are many
+more and Godot needs contribution in all areas in order to continue growing at this pace. Please consider contributing
+however you are able!
+
+## Support
+
+Godot is a non-profit, open source game engine developed by hundreds of contributors in their free time, as well as a handful of part or full-time developers hired thanks to [generous donations from the Godot community](https://fund.godotengine.org/). A big thank you to everyone who has contributed [their time](https://github.com/godotengine/godot/blob/master/AUTHORS.md) or [their financial support](https://github.com/godotengine/godot/blob/master/DONORS.md) to the project!
+
+If you'd like to support the project financially and help us secure our future hires, you can do so using the [Godot Development Fund](https://fund.godotengine.org/) platform managed by [Godot Foundation](https://godot.foundation/). There are also several [alternative ways to donate](/donate) which you may find more suitable.