I thought I had answered this question in the other thread on Enlightenment, but you disagree, so I will give a few more explanations on my point of view here. For me, the GNU Social Contract is a first step towards defining a governance model for the GNU Project.
That governance model is already defined, in the form of RMS. Have you discussed how RMS wants to govern? It summarises the main purpose of the project, and as such, as you rightfully noticed, its content should not come as a surprise. I think it should be a necessary (but not sufficient) condition for stakeholders in the GNU project to take part in its governance. You still do not answer how exactly it is different from the documents that we already have. You have still not annswered why you have come up with your own paragraph for "The GNU Project welcomes contributions from all and everyone" instead of what is already part of the guidelines that the GNU project already has. The term "social contract" seems to lead to confusion. So let me repeat that it is not meant as a contract in the sense of civil law, signed by two parties; but as a moral engagement of people invested in GNU (maintainers, web masters and so on) in their relationship to each other, As has been explained numerous times before, and is getting tiresome by now -- maintainers and web masters only agree to a technical position, they do not have to have a moral engagement in any shape or form. but also to the outer world (for instance, users of the GNU system must be sure that they are getting only free software from the project). How is this not already explained by the various web pages, guidelines, philosophical texts, etc, etc, etc, that we have? What part of them makes it unclear what the goals of this project are? Be it to people participating in the GNU project, or people looking from the outside? How is this different from the dub email that you get when you become a maintainer? Your summary doesn't really add anything in this regard, and the current documents that exist explain it in better detail. When you mention the GNU manifesto, it is a much longer text, rather of historical interest, and also a personal account. It is not something you can give to people and tell them "look, this is our project, and these are the points you are expected to heed when you join us". That is what we did when the the project was started, that is what we did for many many many years after. That is infact how I learnt what GNU was, does, how to get involved, and more importantly _why_ (something your summary completely lacks). How has that changed so fundamentally that the founding document of this project is now something you cannot give people to read? That it is a personal account, is because it was a personal call, and important to mention -- since that is the basis of the four freedoms, they are for the user, that makes it personal. Yet again you say that GNU contributors must heed to its philosophical nature, this is not true. Of course, it is no coincidence if you have a déjà vu feeling when looking at the proposed GNU Social Contract. It is intended as a base for going forward with the GNU Project, but of course it takes the existing into account. I do not see how it does anything of the sort, it is a partial summary of the project. It doesn't bring anything new to the table, or moves anything forward, so far it is a TL;DR note...