[Board] OSGeo is becoming irrelevant. Here's why. Let's fix it.

Vasile Craciunescu vasile at geo-spatial.org
Sun Sep 27 14:37:15 PDT 2015


+1 for a board meeting where all the participants can focus for two 
entire days only on OSGeo matters. I know this is no easy thing on a 
voluntary organization.

Best,
Vasile

On 9/26/15 3:35 PM, Jeff McKenna wrote:
> Thanks for these thoughts Maxi, I too was planning on bringing the new
> board together face-to-face, something that we tried to do with this
> past board, twice; I think this time we will go on with the face-to-face
> even if one or two members just cannot make it.  Simply pick a location
> that has one direct flight for each board member, a hotel with a room
> with a projector and whiteboard, have a set agenda, and discuss big
> picture and goals for the foundation, for 2 days. I am quite excited to
> do this with the new board.  A board sprint.
>
> -jeff
>
>
> On 2015-09-26 3:40 AM, Massimiliano Cannata wrote:
>> Darrel YOU ARE WRONG.... BUT
>> osgeo is a great and successful community and this alone desrve the
>> OSGeo existence.
>>
>> Before we only had project oriented communities (mapserver, grass,
>> etc). But now we have a place in the network to get togheter with all
>> projects and users. Aren't we using stack of softwere instead of a
>> single solution very often?
>> FOSS4G is where we exchange ideas, create innovation and get fun also.
>>
>> Some excellent work is done also in some working groups... incubation
>> and geo4all for example...
>>
>> So you are WRONG!
>>
>> BUT.... i have to agree that things could even be better :-)
>> In my opinion (and this is part of my manifesto even if i still have one
>> more year to serve the board):
>> - we need to redefine objectives of the association cause things have
>> changed (reault framework...)
>> - we need to better promote our valuable software and community
>> (marketing. ..)
>> - we need to review and redefine rules so that they are transparent and
>> clear (communication... )
>> - we need to lower the rates of our international meetings to be more
>> inclusive
>> - we need a plan for investment (investment plan..)
>>
>> So i call for a face2face meeting of 2 days of all the board members in
>> the next months to discuss all these points.
>> Apparently the last board was not able to set a date, but i'm keen that
>> the new board will be able to do it. It will aslo he agood starting
>> point to define our working plan...
>>
>> The i call all of you charter member to help and do things... continuing
>> in shaking the community but also propose and act to make the world a
>> better place. Then if you think the world would be better without
>> osgeo... well... be part of the community is not mandatory :-)
>>
>> Best
>> Proudly member of osgeo
>> Maxi
>>
>> Il 25/Set/2015 21:57, "Darrell Fuhriman" <darrell at garnix.org
>> <mailto:darrell at garnix.org>> ha scritto:
>>
>>     The recent discussion on the board list
>>
>> <https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/board/2015-September/013172.html>that
>>     came out of the question of the 2014 videos has got me thinking
>>     about a few things again, and I want to try to get them out there.
>>
>>     Grab a mug of your favorite liquid and hunker down, because I put
>>     some time and effort into this, and your own well considered reply
>>     is appreciated.
>>
>>     Keep in mind that all of these comments are coming from my personal
>>     perspective, which, like everyone’s, is an incomplete picture of the
>>     whole. Much of what I’m going to say has been rolling around my head
>>     for a while, so I’m just going to put it out there.
>>
>>     I will start with a provocative thesis:
>>
>>     OSGeo lacks visionary unified leadership and without it will become
>>     irrelevant.
>>
>>     Of course, making such a claim requires support. So let me break
>>     down the statement.
>>
>>     “Visionary leadership” is really two things, “vision” and
>>     “leadership.” I will address each in turn.
>>
>>
>>         OSGeo lacks vision
>>
>>     I looked at the list of “Goals” for OSGeo
>>     <http://www.osgeo.org/content/foundation/about.html>. I wonder: when
>>     was the last time these goals were evaluated for both success and
>>     relevancy?
>>
>>     Here is my own opinion of success of some of  these goals. (In the
>>     interest of brevity, I haven’t tried to tackle everything. That’s
>>     left as an exercise to the reader.)
>>
>>
>>           Example 1
>>
>>     To provide resources for foundation projects - eg. infrastructure,
>>     funding, legal.
>>
>>     Allow me to break each of those examples down.
>>
>>
>>             Infrastructure
>>
>>     It’s true that OSGeo provides some infrastructure, such as Trac
>>     instance, Mailman, SVN repos. If the budget is to be believed, we
>>     pay some $3,500/yr to OSUOSL for said infrastructure. I wonder if
>>     such a service is necessary, however. Issue tracking and source
>>     control are much better provided by Github, which is free for
>>     organization such as ours.
>>     I say this because a) that’s money that could be better spent
>>     elsewhere and b) supporting these services burns precious volunteer
>>     time (more on that below).
>>
>>     There are clear cost savings available, which are not taken
>>     advantage of. For example, OSGeo could be hosting FOSS4G
>>     infrastructure: conference websites and registration, a central
>>     location for conference videos (regardless of platform/provider).
>>     This neglect is especially galling given that FOSS4G is OSGeo’s sole
>>     source of income.
>>
>>
>>             Funding
>>
>>     OSGeo does not fund projects. It has provided some funds to pay for
>>     Code Sprints — $15k in 2014 according to the budget
>>     <http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/OSGeo_Budget_2014>.
>>
>>
>>             Legal
>>
>>     I see nothing that has been done on this front recently. Please feel
>>     free to correct me.
>>
>>
>>             Conclusion
>>
>>     OSGeo, where it actually does what it claims, has not adapted in
>>     ways that could save money.
>>
>>     My grade: D
>>
>>
>>         Example 2
>>
>>     To promote freely available geodata - free software is useless
>>     without data.
>>
>>     The geodata working group is dead. As near as I can tell by perusing
>>     the mailing list archives, and the wiki, there has been no
>>     meaningful activity in the past two years (maybe more).
>>
>>     My grade: F
>>
>>
>>         Example 3
>>
>>     To promote the use of open source software in the geospatial
>>     industry (not just foundation software) - eg. PR, training, outreach.
>>
>>     The Board of Directors
>>
>> <http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Board_of_Directors#Packaging_and_Marketing>page
>>
>>     says:
>>
>>
>>             Packaging and Marketing
>>
>>     OSGeo’s marketing effort has primarily been focused around the
>>     packaging and documentation efforts of OSGeo-Live, and to a lesser
>>     extend[sic], osgeo4w. […] It has been entirely driven by volunteer
>>     labour, with 140 OSGeo-Live volunteers, and printing costs have been
>>     covered by local events or sponsors. In the last couple of years,
>>     OSGeo has covered local chapter expenses required to purchase
>>     non-consumable items for conference booths (such as a retractable
>>     banner). In moving forward, OSGeo hope to extend marketing reach by
>>     providing co-contributions toward printing costs of consumable items
>>     at conferences, such as toward OSGeo-Live DVDs.
>>
>>
>>             Local Chapters
>>
>>     Much of OSGeo’s marketing initiates are applied at the local level.
>>     In many cases, this is best supported through as little as an email
>>     list and wiki page. OSGeo also supports local chapters by offering
>>     to pay for an Exhibition starter pack for local chapters. Local
>>     chapters are also usually the coordinators of conferences and
>>     related events, as mentioned above.
>>
>>     Exhibition starter packs almost never happen; OSGeo-Live
>>     explicitlygets no support; and OSGeo struggles to staff a booth at
>>     its own conferenceto say nothing of any other conferences.
>>
>>     Note: Local chapters certainly do do marketing and outreach, but
>>     these efforts are essentially unsupported by the OSGeo Foundation.
>>     In fact, this goal and the Board of Directors webpage seem to be
>>     explicitly contradictory.
>>
>>     My grade: F.
>>
>>
>>           Commentary
>>
>>     I could go on with my own personal evaluations, but I’m not sure
>>     that’s necessary. The only place I see that OSGeo has unquestionably
>>     succeeded in the past few years is the final goal, “To award the Sol
>>     Katz award for service to the OSGeo community”.
>>
>>     So, what’s my point here? It’s simple: there is no longer a coherent
>>     vision for what OSGeo should be. I’ll return to that below, but let
>>     me continue with my other point.
>>
>>
>>         OSGeo lacks leadership
>>
>>     Again quoting the Board of Directors’ page:
>>
>>     The board’s primary responsibility is to efficiently and effectively
>>     make strategic decisions related to the running of OSGeo.
>>
>>     I won’t bore you with the details, but a perusal of the board
>>     meeting minutes would indicate that strategyis rarely, if ever, a
>>     part of the meetings.
>>
>>     The emphasis on consensus-based decision making often leads to no
>>     decisions being made. I can’t count the number of discussions that
>>     have come up on the board list only to devolve into a morass of
>>     nit-picking and eventual lack of action when everyone tires of the
>>     discussion. What action that is taken is often to “delegate” to a
>>     (possibly inactive) sub-committee, then never follow up.
>>
>>     Instead what we have is a great deal of inertia, little interest in
>>     changing things, and no clear indication of what the Board’s
>>     priorities are.
>>
>>     If priorities do exist, they’re lost in a maze of confusing,
>>     incomplete and often contradictory information on the wiki. (Wikis —
>>     like abandonware for documentation.)
>>
>>
>>         On pending irrelevancy
>>
>>     I encourage you to ask some random people in the open source
>>     geospatial community what OSGeo means to them. I would make a bet
>>     that the most common answer is a blank stare.
>>
>>     I would ask the board members to come up with three things, other
>>     than FOSS4G, where the OSGeo membership has shown its importance to
>>     the community as a wholein the last two years. Something where
>>     people say, “Did you hear about[exciting thing]OSGeo is doing on X?”
>>     To be clear, I don’t mean just things that OSGeo has a finger in,
>>     but things that needOSGeo. If OSGeo disappeared tomorrow, would any
>>     of these projects be significantly affected?
>>
>>     I don’t think it can be done. The OSGeo Foundation is sliding into
>>     irrelevancy — and it may already be there.
>>
>>     If anything should be seen as strategic for OSGeo, it’s FOSS4G, the
>>     foundation’s primary (sole?) source of income. Even regarding its
>>     flagship public event, the board is largely absent. Rather than
>>     provide adequate resources and planning, they instead rely on
>>     burning out volunteers, then make post-hoc demands on the way they
>>     shouldhave done it, provide no future support for organizers to heed
>>     those demands, rarely follow up, then go on to repeat the same
>>     mistakes the following year.  Honestly, it’s surprising that FOSS4G
>>     has failed only once. (I think this is a reflection of the demand
>>     for the conference, not the blazing competence of OSGeo.)
>>
>>     Michael Gerlek brought this up
>>     <https://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/discuss/2015-July/014521.html>on
>>     the osgeo-discuss list in July, and probably has a more generous
>>     spin on it. He essentially argues that it’s time to declare mission
>>     accomplished and shut down or rebooted. I agree with his points, and
>>     I’m arguing that OSGeo can have something to offer, but it will
>>     require a major re-think of its mission.
>>
>>
>>         Fixing things
>>
>>     I hinted at this in my recent questions to the board candidates, but
>>     I want to be explicit here: OSGeo needs to evolve or die.
>>
>>     Here’s how I would do it:
>>
>>      1.
>>
>>         The board needs to evaluate all of its goals, as defined on the
>>         About page, to decide if they are still truly goals. Define any
>>         new goals.
>>
>>      2.
>>
>>         Ask the question: “What does it mean to succeed at this goal?”
>>
>>         If the goal is vague, or ongoing, give a timeline: “What does
>>         success look like for this goal one year from now?”
>>
>>      3.
>>
>>         Create measureable objectives for achieving those goals. Ask the
>>         question, “How will we know if we’ve succeeded?”
>>
>>      4.
>>
>>         Prioritize the goals.
>>
>>      5.
>>
>>         Allocate resources to the goals.
>>
>>         Obviously this is a tricky one, but I think we can look at this
>>         a balance between Importance and Effort.
>>
>>
>>         Spend money to reduce to the effort required, more money if the
>>         goal is more important — this might be the hardest cultural
>>         shift. Volunteer time is precious and easily discouraged. Make
>>         sure that you make it as efficient as possible by spending money
>>         when you can.
>>
>>
>>         For example, many of the infrastructure services OSGeo provides
>>         can be easily outsourced to more featureful services that are
>>         more responsive and rely less on volunteer labor.
>>
>>      6.
>>
>>         Close the loop on tasks. When a task is delegated to a committee
>>         or individual, track its progress, both to know that it is or
>>         isn’t happening, and to be able to acknowledge and incorporate
>>         the work when it’s done. Failing to acknowledge people’s labor
>>         or to use the results of that labor will virtually guarantee
>>         that the volunteer does not continue to help.
>>
>>      7.
>>
>>         Evaluate success and failure.  GOTO 1.
>>
>>     Aside: none if this will happen without a strong executive. Whether
>>     that position is paid or not is up to the board, but it’s clear that
>>     there needs to be someone who can make decisions without endless
>>     rounds of fruitless discussions. The board as currently constituted
>>     is not dysfunctional, but it is mostly afunctional.
>>
>>     I’m will go so far as to suggest this: Fly every board member who is
>>     available to a two or three day retreat. Get everyone in the same
>>     room, a professional facilitator to speed the process, then figure
>>     out what OSGeo is going to be and how to get there. Don’t fret
>>     excessively about the expense — this isn’t about saving money, it’s
>>     about saving OSGeo.
>>
>>     If you ask me, irrelevancy is a fate worse than death. Be bold!It’s
>>     better to try to do something big and new then fail than to simply
>>     fade away and be forgotten.
>>
>>     Though my comments above may sound harsh, they are sent with the
>>     very best of intentions. I want OSGeo to succeed, but OSGeo is never
>>     going to succeed if it doesn’t know what it’s try to succeed
>>     at.Without real reform, I don’t see success happening, just
>>     irrelevance. Here’s hoping this gets the ball rolling.
>>
>>     Darrell
>>
>>
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Vasile Crăciunescu
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