[Board] Resurrecting the Eclipse discussion

Tue Jun 12 09:16:59 PDT 2012

The board motion I proposed earlier was to encourage our projects to work with the Eclipse Foundation where it made sense to do so. It was intended to be a simple and relatively mild proposal as a first step towards working together in the future. Unfortunately, the reaction to this was negative and in some (off-list) cases downright hostile.

Given that reaction, I suspect it unlikely the Eclipse Foundation would be willing to sponsor OSGeo at this time. I'm certainly not willing to re-enter the fray without strong support from others in OSGeo.

_mpg

-----Original Message-----
From: board-bounces at lists.osgeo.org [mailto:board-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Seven (aka Arnulf)
Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2012 7:39 AM
To: board at lists.osgeo.org
Subject: Re: [Board] Resurrecting the Eclipse discussion

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Mark,
this is a good summary, thanks.

In my understanding we already decided to go ahead with continue talking to the Eclipse Foundation. But we need a primary contact on our side who leads this effort and maybe Michael is frustrated enough to not want to take the lead here (Michael, can you chime in please?).

My proposal was to ask Eclipse to become a strategic sponsor - and work out together with them what this will exactly "buy" them. I would be happy to explore this together with someone from Eclipse but as I am in Europe and most of the rest of the board is in Northern Americas it might make more sense to have someone else take this on. Ideas?

Best regards,
Arnulf

On 11.06.2012 15:58, Mark Lucas wrote:
> OSGeo future and Eclipse?
> 
> Sorry I haven't gotten back to this earlier.
> 
> I hope this won't be misinterpreted so let me emphasize a couple of
> points:
> 
> I believe the OSGeo is the global leader in open source geospatial 
> development We have the top projects as members, we have 
> infrastructure that supports development, we host great international, 
> regional and local conferences. I am also very impressed with the 
> caliber of the committees and board members
> 
> I would like to see us preserve all of that an enhance it.
> 
> There is always room for improvement and areas of concern, maybe some 
> of those could be addressed through a relationship with another entity 
> - such as Eclipse.
> 
> 1) We have no staff 2) Our president is stepping down - who is the 
> face of OSGeo? 3) We spend much more time discussing how we spend the 
> little money we have then how we raise more funding 4) There is not 
> any real focus on open source business models 5) Many of the ex 
> Directors, open source geospatial companies,  and key contributors are 
> focusing on other avenues (DM Solutions, OpenGeo, Autodesk, 
> RadiantBlue, ESRI, Oracle just off the top of my head). 6) I'm worried 
> how we sustain and grow the organization
> 
> Please don't take this as a doom and gloom forecast.  We have success 
> and inertia behind us, as the board we have the obligation to guide 
> the organization.  Now is the time to think about the way ahead.  I'm 
> all for exploring a relationship with Eclipse if we believe it 
> preserves our strengths and helps to address my concerns.
> 
> Mark
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Jun 11, 2012, at 9:12 AM, Jo Cook wrote:
> 
>> Hi All,
>> 
>> I have been chatting to someone who it turns out is peripherally 
>> involved in the Eclipse LWG and is going to be in on a conference 
>> call with them on Thursday. He has a small open source GIS project, 
>> and they have offered to put it under their banner. He is ambivalent, 
>> but I've asked him for some more background on what they offer, and 
>> any process that projects would need to go through. I'm hoping that 
>> this will fill in some of the gaps that those of us (me in 
>> particular) had about what Eclipse are offering, so that we can 
>> kick-start the discussion again- hopefully a bit more positively this 
>> time with the additional background.
>> 
>> I hope that's useful, and that people feel the discussion is worth 
>> kick-starting- I certainly do. If so, I'll report back towards the 
>> end of the week when I have some more information.
>> 
>> All the best
>> 
>> Jo -- ***Jo Cook* Astun Technology Ltd, The Coach House, 17 West 
>> Street, Epsom, Surrey, KT18 7RL, UK t:+44 750 095 8167 iShare - Data 
>> integration and publishing platform <http://www.isharemaps.com/>
>> 
>> *****************************************
>> 
>> Company registration no. 5410695. Registered in England and Wales. 
>> Registered office: 120 Manor Green Road, Epsom, Surrey,
>> KT19 8LN VAT no. 864201149.
>> 
>> _______________________________________________ Board mailing list 
>> Board at lists.osgeo.org <mailto:Board at lists.osgeo.org> 
>> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________ Board mailing list 
> Board at lists.osgeo.org http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board

- --
Exploring Space, Time and Mind
http://arnulf.us
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.11 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org/

iEYEARECAAYFAk/XVKAACgkQXmFKW+BJ1b1ahgCeJ4fO3W6w0eSf7Yz0JBd1wskj
DF4AnApJ+kzW9TKe7YHGxRFbvS7nWg2w
=0fN9
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
_______________________________________________
Board mailing list
Board at lists.osgeo.org
http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board