[OSGeo-Discuss] Thoughts on standing down from the Board of OSGeo

[Ravi]

Hi,
1. 'Wave of adopters into advocates and supporters'

Indeed OSGeo converted 'Reluctant users', to 'adopters'
Adopters to active advocates and supporters.

2. 'There is more work to be done for documentation and packaging than there is for code, now. There is a lot to be done in education, convincing people that free software is fine for coursework, that skills transfer'.

Very convincing indeed. There is a welcome deluge of FOSS GIS software and it's evolution. Unless it is kept in pace with Education and very-regional case studies, it is like climbing an escalator coming down faster.

In OSGeo India the maxim 'We can only take the horse to the pond'.. is modified with the addition.. 'We have to make it drink too'.

Ravi Kumar
--- On Fri, 11/9/09, Cameron Shorter <cameron.shorter at lisasoft.com> wrote:

> From: Cameron Shorter <cameron.shorter at lisasoft.com>
> Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] Thoughts on standing down from the Board of OSGeo
> To: "OSGeo Discussions" <discuss at lists.osgeo.org>
> Cc: "OSGeo-Board List" <board at lists.osgeo.org>
> Date: Friday, 11 September, 2009, 9:23 AM
> Thanks Jo,
> This is very useful information for prospective future
> board members. I 
> wonder whether other board members would want to add to the
> list of 
> issues future boards should consider.
> 
> I'm also interested to hear the level of commitment
> involved in being a 
> board member.
> 
> Jo Walsh wrote:
> > dear all,
> >
> > I have been meaning for ages to write a long
> reflective mail on
> > standing down from the board of OSGeo, but realise if
> I don't write
> > something short I'm in danger of writing nothing at
> all.
> >
> > The role I have filled on OSGeo's Board has been an
> amazing learning
> > experience for me. I have felt honoured to be in a
> representative
> > position for such a large and powerful community.
> >
> > FOSS4G is reaching a real maturity; I have seen a
> conservative ops
> > manager decide that this year it's safe to migrate the
> big systems to
> > PostGIS, and rebuild the interface with OpenLayers.
> OSGeo can work on
> > turning the most recent wave of adopters into
> advocates and
> > supporters. There is more work to be done for
> documentation and
> > packaging than there is for code, now. There is a lot
> to be done in
> > education, convincing people that free software is
> fine for
> > coursework, that skills transfer.
> >
> > OSGeo has quite a unique structure now, with the
> flourishing of local
> > user groups and the solid, ASF-like core of projects.
> Decision-making
> > is delegated so comprehensively that a lot of the
> Board business is
> > rubber-stamping. Correspondingly it's been quite an
> activist Board
> > with at least a couple of members on each committee;
> rather than a
> > hands-free advisory style Board attempting to set
> "strategic"
> > direction.
> >
> > The question of how does OSGeo Foundation support
> itself financially
> > has always recurred at Board meetings. This year due
> to the general
> > cuts in sponsorship and marketing budgets we have had
> a significant
> > financial shortfall, and next year may be little
> better. After that,
> > though, the "market" potentially there for open source
> geographic
> > applications will have grown, and OSGeo will be a
> great store of
> > kudos.
> >
> > How can we change OSGeo to sustain its running costs -
> whether we try
> > to generate more income from the conference
> (restricting where it can
> > be held), or we partner to run workshops commercially,
> or do some
> > consultancy work (and on what terms), or seek more or
> bigger sponsors
> > (which has proved precarious) - this is my biggest
> question to the
> > next Board.
> >
> > Recently I've not been as engaged with OSGeo as I
> would like and don't
> > really feel that I am representative now; so I won't
> re-stand this
> > year in the Board elections. I am grateful to have had
> this concern
> > for three years, and will try to stay involved through
> OSGeo-Scotland,
> > OSGeo-UK, and ongoing effort towards open geodata.
> >
> > be well!
> >
> >
> > jo
> > --
> > _______________________________________________
> > Discuss mailing list
> > Discuss at lists.osgeo.org
> > http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> >   
> 
> 
> -- 
> Cameron Shorter
> Geospatial Systems Architect
> Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
> Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
> 
> Think Globally, Fix Locally
> Geospatial Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open
> Source
> http://www.lisasoft.com
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Discuss mailing list
> Discuss at lists.osgeo.org
> http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> 


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