For funders and philanthropy
A public standard for the world’s programmers.
Code is written in English. Most people on earth do not read English. NADA gives the world a neutral, durable, open way to read and write real code in any language — and a non-profit foundation keeps the language data free and open for everyone. We are looking for funders who back lasting public goods, not products.
The public-good case
Some infrastructure should belong to no one in particular.
The way we write text, address the web, and route the internet are not owned by any one company. They are public standards — like Unicode, the W3C, and the IETF — kept neutral so the whole world can build on them. The language of code deserves the same.
NADA is built so that no company can own it. The language data is free for anyone to use, even in a paid product, under CC-BY. The tools that build and check it are open, under AGPL. Anyone may build their own version — but only work that meets the foundation’s standard may carry the NADA name. The result is a standard no single buyer controls.
Distributed, public funding is what keeps it that way: when many supporters back the work, no one of them can capture it.
What your support builds
Funding keeps it free, and keeps it growing.
A paid app at nada.build pays for part of this work, and keeps the language data free for everyone. Philanthropy carries the rest — and decides how fast the rest of the world gets in.
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More languages, to full coverage.
Every language begins from English and is grown until it covers the words used in real code. Funding moves the next languages past usable and on toward completeness — and, because families share roots, fully funding one regional language brings several more online at once.
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The review council.
A language is only right when native speakers say it is. Funding pays for the linguists, educators, and working developers who review each language so the terms read naturally to the people who use them — not as a machine’s best guess.
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The registry.
The open record of which languages exist, how far each one has come, and what meets the standard. Keeping it public and current is what lets anyone — a ministry, a teacher, a rival implementer — verify the work for themselves.
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Governance, kept independent.
A neutral standard needs a steward that answers to no single buyer. Funding sustains the foundation, its board, and the conformance mark — the legal and institutional structure that keeps NADA from being quietly absorbed by any one company.
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The always-fresh dataset.
Software vocabulary moves. New frameworks, new keywords, new idioms arrive constantly. Funding keeps the dataset alive — mined, mapped, and re-reviewed — so the language data stays accurate years from now, not just on the day it shipped.
Where the work stands
Real coverage, today.
This is not a proposal. The standard exists, the tools ship, and the language data is already usable. Funding extends what is here — it does not start it from zero.
Figures as of June 2026. The full, current register is published at nadalang.org →
How your money is protected
Built so no company can take it over.
A neutral standard is only neutral if its steward cannot be bought. NADA is stewarded by a Dutch non-profit foundation (Stichting). The language data stays free under CC-BY, the tools stay open under AGPL, and the NADA name and conformance mark keep the standard from being enclosed. Funding sustains that structure — it does not buy a seat that could redirect it.
The foundation’s governance memo, board, and registration are available on request. [TO CONFIRM: published board roster, registration number, and any charitable / tax-deductible status for funders’ jurisdictions.]
Read how it stays open →The ask
We are looking for funders who back lasting public goods, not products.
Your support keeps this work free and growing: bringing more languages to full coverage, paying the council that reviews them, keeping the registry public, sustaining the governance that keeps the standard independent, and keeping the dataset always fresh. For example — fully funding one regional language brings several more online at once.
We are asking for a conversation, not a number.
hello@nadalang.org · governance memo on request.