[Board] Resignation from Board

[xianfeng song]

Dear Michael,

After reading your message,
http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/board/2012-February/009398.html
> As the December board meeting, a motion was passed to send Jeff
> to Beijing to report on the status of the Beijing team's preparations,
> as we had not had much communication with them as compared to
> the process in previous years.  Jeff was unable to make this trip,
> unfortunately.  However, in the past few weeks the Beijing team
> has been sending updates to the conference committee and things
> seem well underway; we're looking forward to a great conference in China.

I have to say, this did not happen magically but as a result of face
to face discussions with Venka and some other OSGeo members in Japan
while I was there for a soil mapping project in late January. It would
also have been great if Jeff could have made it to Beijing by making
his trip too. Communication is important and we always welcome your
suggestions and experiences from past events.

> Jeff's decision to resign from the board and the conference committee
> was his own decision, and I think his two emails covered what needed to
> be said.  This is sad, of course, but Jeff has his reasons and beyond
> that we should respect his privacy.

Sad news about Jeff's resignation. I have known him well since I met
him in Japan in 2004. He also came to us almost one week in 2010 with
the invitation of Prof. Yu at CUMTB, meeting China chapters members,
giving his excellent speech in the Institute of Geography, and
contributing a great mapserver tutorial at China University of Minning
and Technology, Beijing (CUMTB). He did very good jobs these years, I
think.

Best regards,
Song