Re: A Question for New Candidates
Thanks to everyone for your answers. That was useful information. Allan On Sat, May 25, 2013 at 8:38 PM, Sriram Ramkrishna s...@ramkrishna.me wrote: Sorry for my late response. I've been at a conference all of this week and I was not able to focus on the question. On Tue, May 21, 2013 at 3:12 AM, Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com wrote: Hi everyone, Big thanks to everyone who has put themselves forward as a board candidate. It's really awesome that you are willing to spend time on the foundation. It's also fantastic that we have so many fantastic new candidates this time around, and I have a question for you. One thing I find myself asking is: what do you think you will personally bring to the role if you are elected? In other words: why do you think that you will be a good board member? Every once of us brings their set of skills and experience that will make us good members. For myself, I've been on the project for a long awhile as a volunteer. I've never been a coder but satisfied myself as doing a lot of non-coding related things like articles, bug reports and the like. The GNOME Journal was one of the projects that I worked on for many years. The years have also given me familiarity with everyone in the project as well as outside. I'd like to think that people take me seriously when I weigh in on an issue. When I do talk about an issue, I try to be careful in making sure that my comments are carefully written and moves conversation forward while continuing to be polite. I'm careful not to weigh in on things that I can't make a positive contribution on. I have stellar reputation outside of GNOME coming from recent years of advocacy on GNOME's behalf. In those times I have gained experience in community management from countless hours of discussions in forums, mailing lists, and social media. I've stated that I want to work on community management, and working with external organizations. I feel these skills I have gained in the past couple years will be valuable being on the board. I don't expect an essay here, btw. :) Thanks again, Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A Question for New Candidates
Hi Allan On 21 May 2013 11:12, Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com wrote: […] It's also fantastic that we have so many fantastic new candidates this time around, and I have a question for you. One thing I find myself asking is: what do you think you will personally bring to the role if you are elected? In other words: why do you think that you will be a good board member? Besides the obvious necessities of time and commitment, I realise that a large part of the board work is not particularly glamorous yet is essential to the continued existence of the Foundation and the community which it supports. As you probably noticed, I did not put myself down for any specific role when I sent in my candidacy. I think that I would be well suited to take on the role of treasurer from Shaun, who has been doing an excellent job, as I have experience in the area through my current and previous work. In my candidacy statement, I listed some specifics, such as improving the events workflow, and I think that a position on the board would allow me to achieve this effectively. Kat ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A Question for New Candidates
- Original Message - From: Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com To: foundation-list foundation-list@gnome.org Sent: Tuesday, May 21, 2013 6:12:45 AM Subject: A Question for New Candidates Hi everyone, Big thanks to everyone who has put themselves forward as a board candidate. It's really awesome that you are willing to spend time on the foundation. It's also fantastic that we have so many fantastic new candidates this time around, and I have a question for you. One thing I find myself asking is: what do you think you will personally bring to the role if you are elected? In other words: why do you think that you will be a good board member? I think I'd be a good board member because I have * willingness to reach out to people - both newcomers and people in the wider Free Software / technology community * insight into the design and development process of GNOME * attention to detail * ability to come up with new solutions, plan things out, and follow through I don't expect an essay here, btw. :) Thanks again, Allan Thank you, Marina ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question to the candidates
On Sun, 2012-05-27 at 11:21 +0200, Gil Forcada wrote: Hi all, First of all thanks for running for this critical role on GNOME! My question is about hardware and contacts: The average user is not going to ever install its own operating system by itself, for them hardware and software come together and they die together, so a new version of Windows means a new laptop and so on, a new iPhone OS means a new iPhone hardware... So the crucial part here are ISV, contacting them, engaging with them and finally making them ship our great software to the end user. Note that in my view is lack of such a well supported context for businesses in the GNOME community what led to the switch from Gtk+ to Qt during the Fremantle to Harmattan platforms at Nokia. Now its history of course, but reflecting on it wouldn't be a bad exercise. In mobile and embedded is Qt in high demand. Here you can find a Qt job quite easily. I can effectively name 3 or 4 companies that are looking for a C++/Qt developer nearby Brussels and Antwerp. None for Gtk+. Of course with Nokia more or less stopping with Qt is demand for Qt also lower as before. But Gtk+ isn't filling up the gap. I rather notice that commercial activity in mobile and embedded is going back to the Windows platform, to Android and to iOS. Even Flash is more often used on embedded than Gtk+. How bad can it get? You can have all the ideologies about freedom and free software you want, and it seems to be the only though question being asked to the candidates this year, but without enough commercial activity around the GNOME platform like we had during the 770, N800, N810 and N900 will the amount of people working on it, will students lose interest and will future innovation in it be low. I think this is GNOME's bigger-picture problem: its hostility towards ISVs and commercial activity. Is that something that you both find important and also will try to pursue if you are elected? Cheers, -- Philip Van Hoof Software developer Codeminded BVBA - http://codeminded.be ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
Andy Wingo wi...@pobox.com wrote: On Mon 28 May 2012 11:53, Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com writes: I would personally like to see the board be a more proactive organization, where the needs of the GNOME project are discussed, and initiatives intended to benefit it are instigated and managed. I'd like there be less 'we need someone to organise GUADEC' and more 'let's come up with ways to make GNOME an attractive place for hackers to work'. This would inevitably lead to more visibility and greater engagement by the wider community. Why do you need a board for that? These needs can be fulfilled without relying on hierarchy. Heh. There might well be other vehicles for this; it'd be cool to hear other ideas. But for me, the board is a good fit. Members make a time commitment for the year (very important), are experienced contributors, and the annual vote gives people a stake in what they are doing, as well as giving a bit of legitimacy and influence (the last bit might not be essential, but it does help). Also, the board's existing activities (helping with hackfests, talking to partners, allocating funds) would work with what I'm suggesting. Allan -- IRC: aday on irc.gnome.org Blog: http://afaikblog.wordpress.com/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question to the candidates
On 05/27/2012 11:21 AM, Gil Forcada wrote: My question is about hardware and contacts: The average user is not going to ever install its own operating system by itself, for them hardware and software come together and they die together, so a new version of Windows means a new laptop and so on, a new iPhone OS means a new iPhone hardware... Yes, I think that is crucial to spreading of free software. As we don't yet have any kind of image with a base OS, so that is currently up to the distributions. OSTree is a good step in this direction. The KDE Vivaldi initiative seems interesting and something that I think is worth investigating further, but I don't think it's worth doing quite yet until we have other pieces of the stack ready. So the crucial part here are ISV, contacting them, engaging with them and finally making them ship our great software to the end user. Our story for allowing ISV's get their software in the hands of users currently sucks (say I want the newest GIMP on release day, but...no). Things like glick, extensions.gnome.org and Xan's webapp work is a step in the right direction and I think it would be worth some foundation money to do a hackfest around this. - Andreas ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
On Mon 28 May 2012 11:53, Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com writes: I would personally like to see the board be a more proactive organization, where the needs of the GNOME project are discussed, and initiatives intended to benefit it are instigated and managed. I'd like there be less 'we need someone to organise GUADEC' and more 'let's come up with ways to make GNOME an attractive place for hackers to work'. This would inevitably lead to more visibility and greater engagement by the wider community. Why do you need a board for that? These needs can be fulfilled without relying on hierarchy. [Anarchist] Andy ;) -- http://wingolog.org/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Board meeting minutes - was (Re: A question for the candidates)
Emmanuele: On 05/28/12 12:06 AM, Emmanuele Bassi wrote: [just a bit of backstory, here, also to help out eventual other candidates in case I'm not elected] the meeting minutes are written down during the meeting itself by using a collaborative editor, so that everyone on the meeting can actually review in real time what's being written (this also helps in case I could not hear or understand what was being said, or when I am talking about some topic/action item, in which case I cannot really take notes). It was Vincent's idea to use a collaborative editor, and something we started really using in my first term as director. I think it does make minute taking a lot easier. Since Karen, Zana, and multiple directors tend to help with the note-taking, the notes end up better written. after the meeting is over, the minute is published on the Foundation's restricted wiki space, for further review, in case I missed a private section, or I was being overzealous with one, as well as for clearing up some of the action items. after some time pass, the wiki page for the minutes is copied over to the public section of the Foundation's wiki space, and the contents are sent using an email. none of this is automated: Brian was just exceptionally good at sending out minutes every two weeks. :-) I can confirm that our process is not very automated, and putting together good minutes is time consuming. I would say the work Emmanuele has done compares well with the work done by other GNOME Foundation secretaries. While they have not been as timely as they could be, the quality of the content has remained high. During my two terms as secretary, I did most of the work of preparing the agenda even though agenda preparation is really the role of the president. This year, since I have been acting as president, I have been preparing the agendas. The last week's minutes (whether made public or not) are used as a template to build the agenda for the next meeting, which is also on our internal wiki. While preparing the agenda, I will fill out the Discussed on the mailing list section and many of these topics feed into the new agenda. In this regards, the process has been working very well in the past year. I think the job of putting together the minutes works best when the President and Secretary work together like this. So this is an area of improvement. my main two issues as serving as secretary this year were being overzealous with people reviewing my note-taking (not a native english speaker, and the conference call phone line can be pretty messy at times), as well as reviewing the private sections. the first issue can be ascribed to me being in my first term; As I am putting together the agenda, I review and update the minutes when I notice ways to improve it. I think many board members do the same. Your English is quite good, and I rarely find myself correcting it. Meeting minutes seems crucial to run a public discussion between the board and its members as Germán has highlighted and it's not because no one asked that no one thought it was not important anymore. I agree with you, and if I'm serving as secretary on the next term, I'll make a point of addressing my obvious shortcoming of this term. It was ambitious of you to take on an officer position in your first term, and I think you should better recognize the good work you have been doing even in the face of constructive criticism. Brian ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
hi Allan; thanks for the question. On 25 May 2012 08:21, Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com wrote: Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. Is this a problem, in your view? If it is, what do you think can be done about it? I think that, given the role covered by the Board (and by the Foundation itself), some detachment ought to be expected. what needs to improve, and I put myself down to being one that has to improve his own role, is better feedback to questions coming from the community. in the past year, the Board tried to be very proactive: Karen sent her agenda and reports on Planet GNOME, we held IRC meetings, and we are always listening on bo...@gnome.org. we had mixed results with those, sadly. the lack of stable minutes publishing can be a contributing factor, but that explains lack of feedback up to a certain point; even without minutes, the IRC meetings have been pretty sparse in attendance, and few points have been brought up for the IRC specific agenda. I guess it's a case of a negative feedback loop: we give out fewer talking points, the community participates less, we get less feedback so we have less to give back, and so on, and so forth. interrupting the cycle may just be a matter of increasing throughput from the Board, and trying to get more people involved. I can only say that, as far as I'm concerned, I can try and keep up with minutes publishing (and I assume that people will pester me more to keep my in line :-)). other than that, do other people have ideas on how to increase the feedback from the community at large? ciao, Emmanuele. -- W: http://www.emmanuelebassi.name B: http://blogs.gnome.org/ebassi/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
[jumping into the thread at random] Dave Neary dne...@free.fr wrote: ... So I would try to have the minutes sent around ASAP. But as far as I could see, nobody was suffering enough yet to publicly ask whether it'd be possible to make things more (timely) public. I don't know if I count or not, but I have asked publicly several times this year about the status of things being mentioned in old board minutes - specifically the situation for 2013 and GUADEC/Desktop Summit. ... Thanks for all the responses. I agree with Emmanuele that some separation is to be expected, and I'm also happy to see the recent changes wrt Planet GNOME and Foundation membership. I'd really like that process to continue. Aside from what has already been mentioned, more blogging by the board could be one other way to increase its visibility. For me, the other thing that has come come out of this discussion is that visibility and integration is a product of the scope and mandate of the board. Right now, it feels like the board is largely in caretaker role - it does day-to-day administration, keeps things running and makes sure that essential tasks are taken care of. (Maybe I'm wrong about this - tell me if I am.) In that respect, it is unsurprising that the board isn't very visible. I would personally like to see the board be a more proactive organization, where the needs of the GNOME project are discussed, and initiatives intended to benefit it are instigated and managed. I'd like there be less 'we need someone to organise GUADEC' and more 'let's come up with ways to make GNOME an attractive place for hackers to work'. This would inevitably lead to more visibility and greater engagement by the wider community. However, I suspect that it is difficult for the board to adopt this role without more resources, since the essential routine tasks do need taking care of. Are there some routine tasks that the board could delegate? Does it need more in the way of administrative support? Allan -- IRC: aday on irc.gnome.org Blog: http://afaikblog.wordpress.com/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
On Fri, May 25, 2012 at 9:21 AM, Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com wrote: Hi all, Thanks to all the candidates for stepping forward. It's fantastic that you are interested in doing this important work. A question for you: Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. Is this a problem, in your view? If it is, what do you think can be done about it? Thanks! Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list Hi Allan, Thanks for the great question. Before I give you an answer, I would like to empathize what great work the board has been doing in the last years. From raising funds and our financial capital to organizing hackfests and events, as well as pushing for programs to get more contributors to GNOME, all this requires a big amount of dedication and discipline. So I think a divorce from the project is not the right description. That being said, I understand where you are coming from. From a personal point of view it seems to me that the board is so focused on *increasing* our financial and social capital, that sometimes *maintaining* the social capital is neglected. This leads to the observation of some that the board as an entity not directly involved with the community and community problems. To put it similar words to yours: It feels sometimes, that they are divorced from the community (not from the project) The board has been helping the community increase its social capital. Getting new contributors takes time and effort to get them integrated, this is where initiatives like OWP help alot. But the board needs to focus a bit of its time and efforts on *keeping* new and old contributors in the GNOME. This starts with the board getting involved in community related issues and help fascilitate solutions to ongoing disagreement. The board has been voted by the community, so I think they represent a subset of the community that we trust. Take the mailing-list from the last month. While some board members jumped in to help solve the disagreements, I think it could have been solved much quicker if the board had a meeting discussing the problem internally and studying a way to solve the issue at hand. As Bastien said before, it is not the board's responsibility to decide on technical issues, or what application gets in or not. However I think the board should step in when things seem to be rough and help *detect the source of disturbance in the force*. By stepping in I mean, suggest having a meeting, and then getting the parties involved to make a *clear* plan on how the problem can be solved. Ofcourse this can't be a long term responsibilty of the board. This is why if I am elected, I will push for the formation of a community task force, that would work on solving ongoing issues and negotiate between the parties involved, as well as maintain a healthy communication atomsphere within the community. KDE already does this pretty successfully with its community working group. This group is a point of contact for any community problem that might arise in KDE. They've helped solve quite a few problems, among them the split of KOffice and Calligra. Thanks to them they managed to keep both parties inside KDE and the bad press around it was kept to a minimum. It took quite some time but they managed to find a solution that worked for the whole community without too much damage. Cheers Seif ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question to the candidates
Hi Gil, Perhaps this link is relevant: http://makeplaylive.com/ I would add this questions to your thread: Do you think a similar venture for GNOME would make sense? How do you think this, or a similar project, can happen without leaving us bankrupt? Thanks! :-) Diego On Sun, May 27, 2012 at 4:21 AM, Gil Forcada gforc...@gnome.org wrote: Hi all, First of all thanks for running for this critical role on GNOME! My question is about hardware and contacts: The average user is not going to ever install its own operating system by itself, for them hardware and software come together and they die together, so a new version of Windows means a new laptop and so on, a new iPhone OS means a new iPhone hardware... So the crucial part here are ISV, contacting them, engaging with them and finally making them ship our great software to the end user. Is that something that you both find important and also will try to pursue if you are elected? Cheers, -- Gil Forcada [ca] guifi.net - una xarxa lliure que no para de créixer [en] guifi.net - a non-stopping free network bloc: http://gil.badall.net planet: http://planet.guifi.net ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question to the candidates
2012/5/27 Gil Forcada gforc...@gnome.org: Hi all, First of all thanks for running for this critical role on GNOME! My question is about hardware and contacts: The average user is not going to ever install its own operating system by itself, for them hardware and software come together and they die together, so a new version of Windows means a new laptop and so on, a new iPhone OS means a new iPhone hardware... So the crucial part here are ISV, contacting them, engaging with them and finally making them ship our great software to the end user. Is that something that you both find important and also will try to pursue if you are elected? With the provisio that the board doesn't actually have a say in the technical direction. For GNOME OS to become a success we definitely need to get ISVs on board. To do that though we still have a long way to do. We will need a compelling, well documented SDK, development tools (MonoDevelop e.g. would be a nice place to start) and likely a whole bunch of additional tools like emulators. Aside that we'll need a means of deployment such as an app store and good packaging tools (glick and bockbuild seem close to being able to provide this, I know Banshee has used it to create deployable bundles on Linux and OS X). Relying on GNOME OS to package and make available every single application on a scale that can compete with the iOS App Store or Google Play would simply be madness so enabling ISVs to do that, and do it easily, would definitely be needed. This is going to be radically different from the model we are used to and I suspect we will have a lot of learning to do as well as some new friends to make to succeed. I think we still are years from deploying GNOME OS in any state that ISVs will be able to work with, but we can cultivate relationships already and get input as well as help to build all the foundations. So yes, I would start talking to select ISVs to get buy-in for deploying on GNOME as well as input to the kind of tools they would like to see. ISVs are also not just going to deploy on GNOME OS but across a range of systems and luckily we have friends that have experience with these challenges such as Xamarin, I think it would be wise to learn from them how to form a strategy that will ensure success long term. We are still a long way from competing with Android or iOS in this respect and I think it is to early to start a massive push. I would also happily raise funds to run more hackfests towards building the required foundational elements. I think it is important that we get an idea of what exactly it will require of us to become big players here and how we can get there. I think this is the most exciting part of GNOME right now and I would love to invest myself in making it happen to the full extend of the boards mandate. It's going to take years but I think GNOME is in a great place to offer a superior experience to users and ISVs alike. - David Cheers, -- Gil Forcada [ca] guifi.net - una xarxa lliure que no para de créixer [en] guifi.net - a non-stopping free network bloc: http://gil.badall.net planet: http://planet.guifi.net ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
I'm going to reply here, because I really don't know how to answer the original email. On Fri, 2012-05-25 at 18:33 +0100, Allan Day wrote: Bastien Nocera had...@hadess.net wrote: ... Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. I don't quite understand the question. The Board is not where technical decisions are made, it's not where applications or new dependencies are made. Yet it is still a governance body, and it is the only democratic one within GNOME. Only the Board can actually claim to represent the GNOME community. As the only democratic governance body in GNOME, I absolutely agree that, if push comes to shove, it's the board's responsibility to make the final decisions. But the board intentionally does not want to have to involve itself in most decisions. The board empowers other groups like the release team to work with the community and make decisions. If there is a serious dispute, then the board needs to act. But we should strive to have a working community where the board doesn't need to act. What were your expectations of the Board doing, and that they don't deliver on? My question was not guided by personal expectations. I'm interested in how the Board can enhance our community. I suppose I don't see the problem on this end, and if you don't have any personal expectations, it's hard for me to know what to address. I think the board members are largely active in the community in one way or another. I do think we could do better at being seen *outside* our community. We need to work better with partner organizations and vendors. We really ought to have good working relationships with companies that can put GNOME devices into users' hands. Why do you think the Board of Directors is divorced from the project? I personally don't hear or see very much of what the board gets up to, and I don't feel like Foundation membership provides me with much in the way of additional influence. As a member of the board, you might be in a position to change that. If membership of the GNOME Foundation starts and ends with an annual vote, then it doesn't mean very much. If it is synonymous with membership of our community, and if it enables me to have a relationship with GNOME that I couldn't otherwise have, then it means a great deal. Is that something you care about? I tried for a while to continue the regular Foundation meetings. You were one of the very few people that regularly attended. Unless we had an interesting agenda item (e.g. future of the Desktop Summit), people didn't attend. I assume it's because they didn't have anything pressing to say. That's OK. I didn't have anything pressing to say either. In terms of what membership gets you, we've been trying to tie more privileges to Foundation membership, in part because it means we have more consistent rules for who can get what. I don't like looking at Foundation membership as something distinct from community membership. The Foundation is the community. We're just required to have a formal membership process for voting to abide by the laws that let us keep our non-profit status. -- Shaun ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question to the candidates
On Sun, 2012-05-27 at 11:21 +0200, Gil Forcada wrote: Hi all, First of all thanks for running for this critical role on GNOME! My question is about hardware and contacts: The average user is not going to ever install its own operating system by itself, for them hardware and software come together and they die together, so a new version of Windows means a new laptop and so on, a new iPhone OS means a new iPhone hardware... So the crucial part here are ISV, contacting them, engaging with them and finally making them ship our great software to the end user. Is that something that you both find important and also will try to pursue if you are elected? Hi Gil, I find this extremely important. It's what I talked about when I ran for the board last year. Clearly, not much has happened since. I do want to help make this happen, but I'm not sure where to begin. And I don't want to make promises I can't keep. -- Shaun ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
Bonjour :) On 25.05.2012 09:21, Allan Day wrote: Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. Is this a problem, in your view? If it is, what do you think can be done about it? I wouldn't say I see a divorce. I'd say it feels a bit sluggish, based on what others already said: late minutes or lack of visible response. And yes, it is unpleasant if one doesn't know what is happening and thus being able to take influence. So I would try to have the minutes sent around ASAP. But as far as I could see, nobody was suffering enough yet to publicly ask whether it'd be possible to make things more (timely) public. Generally though, I consider it to be a good thing if the Board is not terribly visible as I consider the Board as something that keeps the community (and thus the Foundation) alive and moving and as long as it doesn't need to stir things up, it's running well, I'd say. Cheers, Tobi ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Board public IRC meetings - was (Re: A question for the candidates)
On 05/28/2012 05:59 AM, Shaun McCance wrote: Unless we had an interesting agenda item (e.g. future of the Desktop Summit), people didn't attend. I assume it's because they didn't have anything pressing to say. I have made an effort to attend those meetings and my problems at the times were numerous: - meetings badly announced if ever. Maybe making use of foundation mailing list and planet gnome systematically would help to get more people) - agenda not defined and seldom in line with what the board was discussing at the time. Not getting board meetings didn't help for sure - when questions were asked we would usually get of is not here so we don't know or oh, this is confidential so we cannot tell you. Trust that after a while you quickly lose your motivation to attend. I believe IRC meeting are an important part of the board communicating to its community and an effort must be made to announce and run those meetings regularly. Adding items to the agenda that the board is working on at the time will also definitely help raise attendance as well. Just the feeling of one foundation member. Fred ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Board meeting minutes - was (Re: A question for the candidates)
On 05/28/2012 07:29 AM, Tobias Mueller wrote: ne doesn't know what is happening and thus being able to take influence. So I would try to have the minutes sent around ASAP. But as far as I could see, nobody was suffering enough yet to publicly ask whether it'd be possible to make things more (timely) public. Again I guess we were spoiled by former board secretary in the previous years who was automatically emailing the meeting notes 2 weeks after the meeting. This year (2011-2012) minutes were published as follows: - Meeting of July 26, 2011 - publish on August 23rd : 1 month later - Meeting of August 9th, 2011 - published on October 18th: 2+ month later (publish together with 4 other meeting minutes). I personally even thought meetings were not happening anymore and considering the reactions I get when asking questions to the board I have just given up on asking for the time being. Note that I feel sending minutes is a board problem and not necessarily the secretary alone. I believe in getting things done rather than blaming individuals. One question was eventually asked when getting those minutes and the answer was _topic_in_question_ should be marked as private - again a typical sorry we can't tell you answer which I got quite often during public foundation IRC meetings. So at this stage you may start to understand why some members of the community feel that somehow the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project whereas GNOME project can mean its own community. Your mileage may vary. Meeting minutes seems crucial to run a public discussion between the board and its members as Germán has highlighted and it's not because no one asked that no one thought it was not important anymore. I will just quote Randy Pausch from his last lecture to conclude (Randy Pausch style, not mine): When you're screwing up and nobody says anything to you anymore, that means they've given up on you. Maybe that's something that both the current and new board should think about. Fred ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Board public IRC meetings - was (Re: A question for the candidates)
I meant not getting board meeting MINUTES below. Sorry. On 05/28/2012 11:44 AM, Frederic Muller wrote: On 05/28/2012 05:59 AM, Shaun McCance wrote: Unless we had an interesting agenda item (e.g. future of the Desktop Summit), people didn't attend. I assume it's because they didn't have anything pressing to say. I have made an effort to attend those meetings and my problems at the times were numerous: - meetings badly announced if ever. Maybe making use of foundation mailing list and planet gnome systematically would help to get more people) - agenda not defined and seldom in line with what the board was discussing at the time. Not getting board meetings didn't help for sure - when questions were asked we would usually get of is not here so we don't know or oh, this is confidential so we cannot tell you. Trust that after a while you quickly lose your motivation to attend. I believe IRC meeting are an important part of the board communicating to its community and an effort must be made to announce and run those meetings regularly. Adding items to the agenda that the board is working on at the time will also definitely help raise attendance as well. Just the feeling of one foundation member. Fred ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Board meeting minutes - was (Re: A question for the candidates)
hi; On 28 May 2012 05:03, Frederic Muller fr...@gnome.org wrote: On 05/28/2012 07:29 AM, Tobias Mueller wrote: ne doesn't know what is happening and thus being able to take influence. So I would try to have the minutes sent around ASAP. But as far as I could see, nobody was suffering enough yet to publicly ask whether it'd be possible to make things more (timely) public. Again I guess we were spoiled by former board secretary in the previous years who was automatically emailing the meeting notes 2 weeks after the meeting. This year (2011-2012) minutes were published as follows: - Meeting of July 26, 2011 - publish on August 23rd : 1 month later - Meeting of August 9th, 2011 - published on October 18th: 2+ month later (publish together with 4 other meeting minutes). yes, this is my definite fault. [just a bit of backstory, here, also to help out eventual other candidates in case I'm not elected] the meeting minutes are written down during the meeting itself by using a collaborative editor, so that everyone on the meeting can actually review in real time what's being written (this also helps in case I could not hear or understand what was being said, or when I am talking about some topic/action item, in which case I cannot really take notes). after the meeting is over, the minute is published on the Foundation's restricted wiki space, for further review, in case I missed a private section, or I was being overzealous with one, as well as for clearing up some of the action items. after some time pass, the wiki page for the minutes is copied over to the public section of the Foundation's wiki space, and the contents are sent using an email. none of this is automated: Brian was just exceptionally good at sending out minutes every two weeks. :-) my main two issues as serving as secretary this year were being overzealous with people reviewing my note-taking (not a native english speaker, and the conference call phone line can be pretty messy at times), as well as reviewing the private sections. the first issue can be ascribed to me being in my first term; the second issue is the result of messing up a couple of times. I honestly didn't realize that there would be this many private discussions going on for multiple meetings. if somebody plans to be the secretary: be aware that it could happen. I personally even thought meetings were not happening anymore and considering the reactions I get when asking questions to the board I have just given up on asking for the time being. Note that I feel sending minutes is a board problem and not necessarily the secretary alone. I believe in getting things done rather than blaming individuals. again, it most definitely was my fault. One question was eventually asked when getting those minutes and the answer was _topic_in_question_ should be marked as private - again a typical sorry we can't tell you answer which I got quite often during public foundation IRC meetings. private topics surprised me as well; obviously, choosing the new ED has been a private topic in the past and even from the outside I knew that. I was unprepared at the time at the amount of sensitive topics that the Board is actually handling - it made me much more appreciative of the role of the Board. sadly, given the nature of these topics, releasing them in the public minutes (even after a longer embargo) may definitely not be possible; there are privacy concerns, as well as business concerns. other private topics have only an issue of timing: they could be moved to the public minutes after the discussion is over - though it'd require modifying the published minutes and then announcing the delta. Meeting minutes seems crucial to run a public discussion between the board and its members as Germán has highlighted and it's not because no one asked that no one thought it was not important anymore. I agree with you, and if I'm serving as secretary on the next term, I'll make a point of addressing my obvious shortcoming of this term. ciao, Emmanuele. -- W: http://www.emmanuelebassi.name B: http://blogs.gnome.org/ebassi/ ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: Board meeting minutes - was (Re: A question for the candidates)
On Mon, 2012-05-28 at 06:06 +0100, Emmanuele Bassi wrote: On 28 May 2012 05:03, Frederic Muller fr...@gnome.org wrote: On 05/28/2012 07:29 AM, Tobias Mueller wrote: ne doesn't know what is happening and thus being able to take influence. So I would try to have the minutes sent around ASAP. But as far as I could see, nobody was suffering enough yet to publicly ask whether it'd be possible to make things more (timely) public. Again I guess we were spoiled by former board secretary in the previous years who was automatically emailing the meeting notes 2 weeks after the meeting. This year (2011-2012) minutes were published as follows: - Meeting of July 26, 2011 - publish on August 23rd : 1 month later - Meeting of August 9th, 2011 - published on October 18th: 2+ month later (publish together with 4 other meeting minutes). yes, this is my definite fault. [just a bit of backstory, here, also to help out eventual other candidates in case I'm not elected] the meeting minutes are written down during the meeting itself by using a collaborative editor, so that everyone on the meeting can actually review in real time what's being written (this also helps in case I could not hear or understand what was being said, or when I am talking about some topic/action item, in which case I cannot really take notes). after the meeting is over, the minute is published on the Foundation's restricted wiki space, for further review, in case I missed a private section, or I was being overzealous with one, as well as for clearing up some of the action items. after some time pass, the wiki page for the minutes is copied over to the public section of the Foundation's wiki space, and the contents are sent using an email. none of this is automated: Brian was just exceptionally good at sending out minutes every two weeks. :-) Indeed. That is the reason I blamed myself for not pestering for making them public (and not you). It was also your first term as director and secretary. If you become re-elected and keep the role as secretary, I will set a recurrent activity in my calendar to pester you every other week :-) -- Germán Póo-Caamaño http://people.gnome.org/~gpoo/ signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
On 05/25/2012 09:21 AM, Allan Day wrote: Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. Is this a problem, in your view? If it is, what do you think can be done about it? Having been off the board for a year, I can definitely say it sometimes looks like the board is doing nothing in the community, although it's actually does a lot, but one does not always notice. All the hackfests, conferences and fundraising have all at some point gone through the board. It's like a silent force of volunteers. I agree that we need to make the rest of the foundation be more active than just once a year when voting (apart from the volunteers not on the board that are involved with conferences, hackfests and fundraising), but apart from keeping up the foundation meetings on IRC (that very few people attend), I have few ideas on how to achieve that. On a related note, I'm very happy that two important pieces of whip and carrot have been introduced in order to make as many GNOME contributors as possible to become foundation members. The travel policy and the Planet GNOME aggregation. I think we can come up with more of these. - Andreas ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
On Fri, 2012-05-25 at 08:21 +0100, Allan Day wrote: Hi all, Thanks to all the candidates for stepping forward. It's fantastic that you are interested in doing this important work. A question for you: Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. I don't quite understand the question. The Board is not where technical decisions are made, it's not where applications or new dependencies are made. What were your expectations of the Board doing, and that they don't deliver on? Why do you think the Board of Directors is divorced from the project? ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
2012/5/25 Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com: Hi all, Thanks to all the candidates for stepping forward. It's fantastic that you are interested in doing this important work. Thank you. A question for you: Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. Is this a problem, in your view? If it is, what do you think can be done about it? I think the Board could be more visible, currently being on the outside I recently spent 3 weeks with non-communications with my board contact (Karen) during the late stages of planning a hackfest. Not knowing what to do or what the protocol was proved fairly distressing and I suspect not helpful to GNOME overall if such situations proves widespread. There are some minor things I would like to see, if you contact the board list, getting an acknowledge that your question was received and notification of when the next meeting where there will be time to debate it, if needed, is scheduled would help a lot. Likewise I don't think I have seen breakdowns of how Board members have voted on issues anywhere which I would personally consider valuable in terms of selecting a candidate to vote for (or to hold someone accountable). That being said, I think I would like to observe the Board more closely to see where it can do better in feeling as a more organic part of GNOME before making any big promises or suggestions. I only have some limited personal experience and haven't heard any reports of widespread problems. Perhaps it is an area where we need more input to identify our problems, so I would like to encourage people to step forward and tells us where it hurts. David ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
Bastien Nocera had...@hadess.net wrote: ... Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. I don't quite understand the question. The Board is not where technical decisions are made, it's not where applications or new dependencies are made. Yet it is still a governance body, and it is the only democratic one within GNOME. Only the Board can actually claim to represent the GNOME community. What were your expectations of the Board doing, and that they don't deliver on? My question was not guided by personal expectations. I'm interested in how the Board can enhance our community. Why do you think the Board of Directors is divorced from the project? I personally don't hear or see very much of what the board gets up to, and I don't feel like Foundation membership provides me with much in the way of additional influence. As a member of the board, you might be in a position to change that. If membership of the GNOME Foundation starts and ends with an annual vote, then it doesn't mean very much. If it is synonymous with membership of our community, and if it enables me to have a relationship with GNOME that I couldn't otherwise have, then it means a great deal. Is that something you care about? Allan ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
board/ED contact (was Re: A question for the candidates)
On 2012-05-25 12:54, gnomeu...@gmail.com wrote: 2012/5/25 Allan Day allanp...@gmail.com: Hi all, Thanks to all the candidates for stepping forward. It's fantastic that you are interested in doing this important work. Thank you. A question for you: Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. Is this a problem, in your view? If it is, what do you think can be done about it? I think the Board could be more visible, currently being on the outside I recently spent 3 weeks with non-communications with my board contact (Karen) during the late stages of planning a hackfest. Not knowing what to do or what the protocol was proved fairly distressing and I suspect not helpful to GNOME overall if such situations proves widespread. Since you mention this on Foundation list I'd also like to apologize for this here - your requests came at a time I was dealing with health issues and I should have been more communicative about that. I believe everything was resolved with adequate time but I'm sorry that you found it at all distressing. (On the specific issues at hand, I thought I'd wrapped up the outstanding portion directly with Udesh, but we can definitely talk more about it privately if you'd like.) I know you also say that you haven't heard any reports of widespread problems, but this is a good opportunity to say here to everyone that if there is some request you are waiting on, please do not hesitate to ping me on IRC (I'm karenesq) or to reach out to others if you feel like there's something that's getting dropped. The board's email (with me and Rosanna) is board-l...@gnome.org and you can always cc that, which will get to everyone! For me personally, I prefer more contact - you won't irritate me and I feel terrible when things slip through the cracks :) karen There are some minor things I would like to see, if you contact the board list, getting an acknowledge that your question was received and notification of when the next meeting where there will be time to debate it, if needed, is scheduled would help a lot. Likewise I don't think I have seen breakdowns of how Board members have voted on issues anywhere which I would personally consider valuable in terms of selecting a candidate to vote for (or to hold someone accountable). That being said, I think I would like to observe the Board more closely to see where it can do better in feeling as a more organic part of GNOME before making any big promises or suggestions. I only have some limited personal experience and haven't heard any reports of widespread problems. Perhaps it is an area where we need more input to identify our problems, so I would like to encourage people to step forward and tells us where it hurts. David ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
On Fri, 2012-05-25 at 18:33 +0100, Allan Day wrote: Bastien Nocera had...@hadess.net wrote: ... Sometimes it can feel like the Board of Directors is a bit divorced from the rest of the GNOME project. I don't quite understand the question. The Board is not where technical decisions are made, it's not where applications or new dependencies are made. Yet it is still a governance body, and it is the only democratic one within GNOME. Only the Board can actually claim to represent the GNOME community. What were your expectations of the Board doing, and that they don't deliver on? My question was not guided by personal expectations. I'm interested in how the Board can enhance our community. Why do you think the Board of Directors is divorced from the project? I personally don't hear or see very much of what the board gets up to, and I don't feel like Foundation membership provides me with much in the way of additional influence. As a member of the board, you might be in a position to change that. On one hand, the meeting minutes should be a good way to know to be aware of what the board is doing (or not doing). In my first year, I pestered to make them public as soon as possible (3 or 4 days after the meeting). IMO, late minutes are meaningless. I blame myself for having the time and energy in the last year to pester the new secretary, but definitively that is something that any member can do and influence. The meetings are every two weeks and any member can add topics the agenda. On the other hand, in the last years the board has been trying to empower teams and people rather than centralizing power. For instance, the hackfest organization process is straightforward and it does not have be an activity proposed/organized by the board anymore. The board acts as helper of the contributors who want to do more and a bridge with companies when needed. I think there is room for improvement, but I will not spoil the candidates :-) -- Germán Póo-Caamaño http://people.gnome.org/~gpoo/ signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
Re: A question for the candidates
Hi, On 05/25/2012 09:24 PM, Germán Póo-Caamaño wrote: On Fri, 2012-05-25 at 18:33 +0100, Allan Day wrote: Why do you think the Board of Directors is divorced from the project? I personally don't hear or see very much of what the board gets up to, and I don't feel like Foundation membership provides me with much in the way of additional influence. As a member of the board, you might be in a position to change that. On one hand, the meeting minutes should be a good way to know to be aware of what the board is doing (or not doing). In my first year, I pestered to make them public as soon as possible (3 or 4 days after the meeting). IMO, late minutes are meaningless. I blame myself for having the time and energy in the last year to pester the new secretary, but definitively that is something that any member can do and influence. The meetings are every two weeks and any member can add topics the agenda. I must admit, minute posting has been pretty lax this year. There have been a few occasions when a backlog of 3 or 4 meetings' worth has come out at once. I used to read the minutes every meeting to see if there was anything where I might be able to provide some historical context or help, and I have been doing that less this year, purely because (as you say German) late minutes are useless - by the time you comment on them, the decision's been made, announced, and everyone's moved on. And since the agenda doesn't get posted here before the meeting, it's hard to even know what the board are working on at any given time. Also, with the long actions list on the minutes, it's hard to know where things are moving, where they've been dropped, where they're on standby... for example, we still haven't seen an announcement of what's happening for next year's conference. I think that the transparency of operation is definitely something the next board can work on. Cheers, Dave. -- Dave Neary GNOME Foundation member dne...@gnome.org Jabber: nea...@gmail.com ___ foundation-list mailing list foundation-list@gnome.org https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
