[Board] motions from June 18 meeting - making OSGeo Charter membership more exclusive

[Cameron Shorter]

OSGeo board,
As an OSGeo Charter member, I request that the following motion (see 
below) not be passed without first discussing publicly on the OSGeo 
Discuss email list.

The current process for joining OSGeo Charter Membership [2] was 
specifically refined to be more inclusive than before, in order to make 
it easy for all passionate people within the OSGeo community to join, 
while aiming to protect against the now relatively unlikely possibility 
of a hostile takeover.

Based on the proposal below, 11 out of 64 of last years successful 
nominations would be rejected under the  proposed new rules. I suggest 
this is not in OSGeo's interests.

It is possible that some of these 11 people are not very involved in 
OSGeo, and maybe haven't contributed much since being nominated, but is 
that a bad thing? Have any of these 11 people been actively detrimental 
to OSGeo while being an OSGeo Charter member? Note, the only official 
duty of a charter member is to vote for the board. However, being 
recognised as a charter member is useful for many of our members looking 
to gain OSGeo credibility, such as when presenting at conferences.

If we are more inclusive, and add 10 new non-active/non-disruptive OSGeo 
Charter members, then I'd argue that it is worth it for the 1 passionate 
Charter member we also gain.

I remember a quote from Jeff which rang true with me, and which I think 
is applicable here:
/
//"I once heard an interview with a legendary lead singer of a band, who 
said his goal each concert was to make the kid sitting in the very back 
row to feel like he's as much a part of the concert as the kid sitting 
in the front row, and this is exactly how I focus my community work for 
OSGeo."/
http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/discuss/2014-August/013498.html

Warm regards, Cameron Shorter

On 20/06/2015 5:29 am, Vasile Craciunescu wrote:
> Dear all,
>
> Please also vote for motion below.
>
> 5) For the new charter members elections, change the threshold of 
> required YES votes of charter members from 5% to 50%. See Jeff's 
> e-mail [1] for detailed explanations and the rationale of this change. 
> If needed, also check the Membership Process [2].
>
> My vote is +1.
>
> Best,
> Vasile
>
> [1] http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/board/2015-May/012863.html
> [2] http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Membership_Process 


On 26/05/2015 2:18 am, Jeff McKenna wrote:
> 3. Decide on 2015 Selection Process
> -----------------------------------
>
> To refresh everyone's memory, last year we (Board) modified the 
> selection process[3] for Charter members; but in my opinion we made a 
> mistake with the voting change of "Each candidate with more YES votes 
> than NO votes, and greater than 5% of voting charter members voting 
> YES for them, will be included as new charter members."
>
> What I saw was, for the first time in OSGeo history, strategic 
> nominations by certain projects, for relatively unknown community 
> members; the result was that all 64 nominations were accepted as 
> Charter members.
>
> For 2015, I am proposing we make 1 change, instead of the 5% 
> acceptance, change that to 50% or greater voting YES.   Such as:
>
> ***
> Each candidate with more YES votes than NO votes, and greater than or 
> equal to 50% of voting charter members voting YES for them, will be 
> included as new charter members.
> ***
>
> I have checked the 2014 results again, and with those new 50% rules, 
> we would have accepted 45 nominations versus all 64 nominations.  I 
> believe this is much better.
>
> But of course this needs to be decided by the Board and community.  I 
> am merely kicking off the process   So please speak your mind, or edit 
> the 2015 Elections wiki directly.
>
> Yours,
>
> -jeff 

-- 
Cameron Shorter,
Software and Data Solutions Manager
LISAsoft
Suite 112, Jones Bay Wharf,
26 - 32 Pirrama Rd, Pyrmont NSW 2009

P +61 2 9009 5000,  W www.lisasoft.com,  F +61 2 9009 5099

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