[Board] UNOFFICIAL minutes from yesterday's meeting

Wed Feb 27 14:14:48 PST 2013

Michael,

I am not entirely clear how much value there is in capturing fragments
of the conversation as they exist in your notes. It does not capture
the full discussion at the time, and leaves lots of room for
confusion, particularly since most of it is not conclusions.

I'd prefer relatively minimal minutes that captured motions, action
items and topics of conversation in broad terms.

If we are going to draft a do's and don't list or principles from the
discussion I'd almost prefer they be a separate document that could be
refined and that we might then reach (and possibly vote on) consensus
on.

That said, I don't feel too strongly about this point.

Best regards,
Frank

On Wed, Feb 27, 2013 at 8:22 AM, Michael P. Gerlek <mpg at flaxen.com> wrote:
> Below are the lightly edited notes I took.
>
> Please check to see if I quoted you incorrectly or anything. I'll post the real minutes to the wiki in a couple days after I get feedback.
>
> -mpg
>
>
>
>
>
> [10:20] call to order
>
> roll call
> - Cameron - Au
> - Daneil - Canada
> - Frank - US
> - Jacym - Cz
> - Jeff - Ca
> - Michael - US
> - Anne - Italy
> - (Hobu and Matt Wilkie lurked)
>
> [10:23] review of minutes from Jan 17
> - motion to approve - 1/Frank, 2/Cameron 2nd, all +1
>
> [10:26] on to regular business
>
> geotools new contribution agreement
> - motion to approve - 1/Cameron, 2/Jeff, all +1
>
> Anne to be GSOC mentor
> - motion to approve - 1/Frank, 2/Daniel, all +1
>
> [10:32] open discussion about osgeo priorities
>
> - http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/board/2013-February/010516.html
>
> - mpg: do what osgeo members want to do and will do, and do not try / wring-hands over other things
> - mpg suggests 4 lists: "I+" (where income comes from), "I-" (where income not expected from), "E+" (planned expenses), "E-" (expenses we don't want)
> - I+: conference income primary source
> - E+: expenditure to main & regional conferences
> - mpg: "accept, but not chase" spnsorships
> - cameron: size of risk/income/expense should all be in proportion
> - jeff: small regional confs unsure if they can come to osgeo proper for support? - yes, they can - need to make this explicit
>
> - cameron: minimum suggested amount in bank - 50-80K?
> - mpg asks: how much return on investment for events?
> - cameron: suggests 1.10x, i.e. $1K investment ideally yields $1.1K return
> - jeff: does this mean each foss4g must generate 100K?
> - cameron: worst case scenario to break-even -- get back what we invested
> - cameron: codesprints supported by excess funds, different category from events
> - noted that "codesprint is a pure loss-making activity"
> - all generally in favor of "matching funds" policy
> - noted that these are principles and guidelines, not strict rules
> - jeff: "we're here to support"
>
> - cameron: we should not be paying for booths
> - frank (on IRC) clarifies: I think the idea is that paying for booth space at tradeshows can be very expensive and not a particularly good use of our funds.
> - jeff: line item for 'advocate travel' -- still valid? -- if they want us, they should pay for us
> - mpg/daniel: distinguish between "advocate" travel and "board business" travel
> - (anne speaks, but audio is poor - can't transcribe much)
>
> - frank: speaks of our "corporatist" beginnings, via Autodesk, but moving now towards grassroots
> - mpg applauds this sentiment
> - various terms suggested: "cheap", "scrappy", "spunky", "lean", "minimalist"
> - anne notes: would like to see more cooperation among projects and osgeo funding the meetups of osgeo projects' communities
> - mpg wonders aloud what mlucas and pmbatty would say to these discussions
> - aghisla: foss4g barcelona was not appealing for developers, more for presenting technologies and make a great "show" - forgive the term
> - frank: we are not all things to all people
>
> - jeff: "an environment in which osgeo service providers could thrive"
> - cameron: if the service provider effectiveness was important, how come no one has stepped up to fix it?
> - mpg: is SPD a core priority for us?
> - various: go to discuss list, throw a little money at it, have a contest, kill it, ...
>
> - cameron: livddvd at conferences
> - mpg: support for communities that already exist… or support incubation of new ideas w/o a community yet?
> - cameron: livddvd aimed at value to users, which means projects already extant
> - jeff: traveling for educational purposes... "osgeo labs"...  big success, goes back to an MOU with ICA
> - anne speaks to the value of Suchith's work - http://nottingham.academia.edu/SuchithAnand
> - mpg - points to osgeo labs as model if success -- low $ but high visibility, and no work from board to date
> - frank: "we just have to be supportive", stay out of their way (which is not to imply that we have been in their way)
> - jeff: we are farther than just "…and we support education too"
>
> - discussion turns to local chapters
> - mpg: LCs are low overhead for board, but big impact - another example of how ogee foundation is a win
> - mpg notes half his dev team came out of local chapter, promises to write some stuff about value & benefits of LCs
> - anne: speaks on osgeo journal, asks about value of the local chapter reports
> - anne: italian chapter was created long before becoming osgeo local chapter and connection is still weak
> - jeff: gets asked "why create a chapter?"
> - various: local events, networking, language affiliation, ...
> - cameron: note no need for overhead, funding, etc
> - daniel: local chapter "precursor" can be helped to perceive when it's appropriate to form a formal local chapter
> - anne points to local chapter mailing list to share experiences on how and why to establish local chapters
> - frank points to http://www.osgeo.org/content/chapters/guidelines.html
>
> [12:15pm] on to budget discussion
> - budget draft: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Av9Xf1ehZXz-dHJRdGhXZlo4ako2b21qd2lXbVVMdGc#gid=0
> - (did not caputre details of line-items discussions)
> - noted that "co-contributing" == "matching funds"
> - cameron noted that livedvd featured at ~40 events, jeff thinks that is low(!)
> - daniel asks: should we support the DVDs or the Projects?
> - cameron: ~150 people contributing
>
> - Q: should the board be paid travel expenses to the annual mtg?
> - mattw: "as an outsider, I think board members should be helped/encouraged to make the annual FOSS4G's, and funded to do so."
> - and what about conference registration expense?
> - frank says this is anti-scrappy
> - straw poll taken (I did nto record votes, sorry)
>
> - agreed to take rest of issues to mailing list and/or next meeting
>
> [1:20] adjourn
> _______________________________________________
> Board mailing list
> Board at lists.osgeo.org
> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board

--
---------------------------------------+--------------------------------------
I set the clouds in motion - turn up   | Frank Warmerdam, warmerdam at pobox.com
light and sound - activate the windows | http://pobox.com/~warmerdam
and watch the world go round - Rush    | Geospatial Software Developer