Acknowledging financial support to Perl core developement

Hi,

Following some discussion with the PSC and others, here's a proposal
to acknowledge (and therefore encourage) financial support to Perl 
core development.

----

# Acknowledging financial support to Perl core developement

## Introduction

Perl Core Development has two main issues:
* there are not enough core devs
* there is not enough money to support those currently paid for their
  work on the core

Growing more core developers is a hard problem.

Finding money is a less hard problem, and it's a more readily available
skill than Perl core development.

## The Perl Core Development Fund

The Perl and Raku Foundation maintains the Perl Core Development
Fund[1], which is used to financially support the work of several Perl
core developers (three at the time of writing).

The Perl Code Development Fund is the largest program run by the Perl
Foundation, accounting for 54% of its program expenses in 2025[2].
Considering that the Foundation has been running at a deficit since 2013
(except in 2014, 2016, 2017 and 2025)[3] there is a real risk for the
Perl Core Development Fund to run out of money.

In fact, the continued funding of those developers was endangered in
2025 by the Foundation's low cash position.[2]

This proposal aims to support the new fundraising efforts started by
TPRF in 2025, as finding money for this fund helps ensures the continued
development of Perl.

Sources:
[1] The Perl Core Development Fund
    <https://perlfoundation.org/perl-core-development-fund.html>
[2] The Perl and Raku Foundation Annual Report 2025
    <https://perlfoundation.org/documents/The_Perl_and_Raku_Foundation_Annual_report_2025.pdf>
[3] Understanding TRPF's Finances, 2026 Edition
    <https://blogs.perl.org/users/makoto_nozaki/2026/01/understanding-tprfs-finance-2025-edition.html>

## Rationale

We want to ensure that the Perl Core Development Fund continues to be
funded in the future.

To that end, this proposal offers a new perk for potential sponsors,
that the Perl and Raku Foundation can promote when fundraising, to
incite donors to contribute directly and specifically to the Perl Core
Development Fund.

## Proposal

Add, at the end of the current "Acknowledgements" section in
perldelta.pod and the release announcement email, a few paragraphs that
recognize financial contributions to the Perl Core Development Fund.

These paragraphs would consist of a quick description of the "Perl Core
Development Fund" and list all significant contributors to the fund
during the development cycle.

The rules for inclusion would be the following:
* as part of the sponsorship negociations with TPRF, the sponsor asked
  to be added to the list
* the PSC received the request from TPRF's fundraising team and approved
  the placement of the sponsor on the list
* all or a significant part of the donation to the Perl and Raku
  Foundation was earmarked specifically for the Perl Core
  Development Fund
* the portion earmarked to the Perl Core Development fund is over a
  predefined minimum amount

As a minimum amount for inclusion, we propose the equivalent of one
month of full-time Perl core development work, at the TPRF's current
rate (i.e., 8 × 20 × the hourly rate).

The list of donors will be updated during the development cycle, and the
final version included in the release announcement email and the stable
release's perldelta.pod. (The perldeltas for the developement releases
will contain the list as of the time of release.)

After the full program freeze development release, new contributors to
the fund will be counted for the next cycle.

Ordering of sponsors: by donation amount and contribution date (higher
contributions first, and when tied, earliest contributions first).

The text would be added to the output of Porting/acknowledgements.pl and
documented in the Release Managment Guide. I volunteer to do the update,
if this proposal is approved.

## Example

The Perl Core Development Fund, managed by the Perl and Raku Foundation,
financially supports the work of several core developers.
https://perlfoundation.org/perl-core-development-fund.html

During the development cycle leading up to Perl 5.x, the following
organizations each contributed the equivalent of one or more months of
full-time core developer work to the Perl Core Development Fund:

Company A <https://www.a.com/>, Company B <https://www.b.com/>.

We would like to thank them here for their support to the continued
development of Perl.


-- 
 Philippe Bruhat (BooK)

 A substitute is never as good as the genuine article.
                                    (Moral from Groo The Wanderer #67 (Epic))