Reactions to Teach-in proposal (Was Re: [Board] So what is the purpose of OSGeo?)

[jo at frot.org]

On Thu, May 29, 2008 at 07:34:08AM -0700, Michael P. Gerlek wrote:
> a Board Member, but the number and tone of emails Paul's proposal has
> raised is surprising to me.

Part of the problem is there was an involved discussion of this on the
board-priv list, a very seldom used list usually touching on
commecially sensitive topics. Paul took an initial sounding there, 
to gauge response before taking the proposal to a wider audience.

Thus for a "first response" my comments may have seemed to be jumping
at the throat of the proposal :/ After already having said in private
at least once what Arnulf recently stated in public - supportive of
such efforts, but wanting to see more consideration of the impact on
the community at large and the other conference/workshop activities.

>    (1) trying to spread the message of the Foundation,
>    (2) willing to assume the financial risk,
>    (3) pay OSGeo some money, and not incidentally
>    (4) try to make a living by promoting open source.
> 
> In return, they are are asking OSGeo to provide its moral blessing by
> allowing the use of the logo, brand, etc.

I appreciated Jeroen's suggestion, that the event go ahead but not use
the "brand name" OSGeo as part of the name of the event or ask for the
*condition* that it be promoted as an OSGeo event. Their business
entity could become Foundation sponsors in the normal way, and gain
public feedback from that. 

> There seems to be some concern that this might draw away from annual
> conference: okay, that is a clear tangible issue which can be reasonably
> discussed.

Right, I proposed on the conference list that we conduct a user survey
of past and potential future FOSS4G attendees which would provide a
chance to ask some more questions about FOSS4G's pricing and scope,
and could help with the clearer statement of a conference policy.
Cameron (point-person for FOSS4G 2009) expressed a lot of interest but
doesn't have the time. 

This is really my main concern, that conference policy has been a
"grey area" with very little consensus amongst the Board, and rushing
into a commercial arrangement presented as a considerable OSGeo
venture would push the conference policy one way or another.
http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/OSGeo_Conference_Policy - i pasted in some
of Jeroen's notes on the subject, to make a start to this.
 
> However, there seem to be other, larger undercurrents of concern being
> voiced by some of the board members -- but which I'm not able to readily
> understand.  Maybe I missed a mail somewhere along the way, but it'd be
> nice to see a succinct statement of opposition that can be argued
> for/against.

This situation is not so clear-cut as to yield to a dialectical approach.
I can try to write up a short proposal-like document, bsaed mostly on
what Jeroen and Markus have already suggested, in time for the next
Board meeting. But bear in mind that i don't have a significant financial 
incentive here :)


jo
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