[OSGeo-Discuss] Nomination for Cameron Shorter

[Cameron Shorter]

Thank you all for the board nomination, and kind words.

I should point out what I believe is important in an OSGeo board, which 
in turn will guide how I'd like to behave as a board member.

* I believe a board should listen to the community, work out what is the 
best for the community, then vote accordingly.

* We need to recognise the limited time constraints of (already busy) 
board members. If most decisions are deferred to an 8 member board, then 
we are wasting the potential of the 1000s of OSGeo volunteers, and 100s 
of OSGeo charter members. So primarily, a board's role should purely be 
a job of oversight, validating decisions made in OSGeo's various 
committees and projects.

* It is important to discuss ideas, but even more important is to follow 
through with solid actions, and I believe it is important to look for 
opportunities to enable volunteers to make a difference. It is important 
to work out ways to collate our volunteer efforts effectively and 
efficiently to make something much bigger than one person can do on 
their own. Effectively, a role of OSGeo Chair and Board positions is 
about help OSGeo volunteers help themselves.

* It is good for a board to have a breadth of experience and opinions, 
but even more important is for a board to be able to work together 
effectively to make decisions. This means that at times, each board 
member will need to compromise, because a compromise is almost always 
better than making no decision at all.

* Lastly, we should have members of the board who are prepared to travel 
and this is something I won't be able to fulfil due to my family 
situation. And as I live in Australia, I work the graveyard shift of the 
rest of the world, which means awkward meeting slots for some. Before I 
take on a board position, I will need to ask other board members if they 
are in a position to work around this.

On 29/07/2012 5:08 PM, Roald de Wit wrote:
> On 29/07/12 15:00, Michael P. Gerlek wrote:
>> I am pleased to nominate Cameron Shorter to be a member of the OSGeo 
>> Board.
>>
>> Followers of this list will no doubt already be familiar with 
>> Cameron: active in this foundation since the very beginning, he 
>> chaired the 2009 FOSS4G conference, has served on various OSGeo 
>> committees, and has worked on the OSGeo-Live project, among many 
>> other contributions.
>>
>> He would surely make a great addition to the board team for the next 
>> two years.
>
> I'd like to second this!
>
> Here are my reasons for supporting Cameron's nomination:
>
> Cameron has been active in the OSGeo community since its inception.
>
> You may remember Cameron as one of the core developers behind 
> Community Mapbuilder, GeoTools and OpenLayers. More recently he 
> chaired the successful FOSS4G 2009 Conference in Sydney and now he is 
> one of the driving forces behind the OSGeo-Live community.
>
> He is a founding charter member of OSGeo and his active participation 
> in many of the OSGeo committees and mailing lists (Discuss, Marketing, 
> Education, FOSS4G, Conference, Incubator, Live-Demo and more) shows 
> his ongoing dedication to OSGeo.
>
> I have had the pleasure of working for and with him in a both a 
> professional context, as well as being members of the Community 
> Mapbuilder, OpenLayers and OSGeo-Live projects. His commitment to the 
> community and and open standards are exemplary.
>
> Cameron's experience, vision and dedication would make him a great 
> addition to the board.
>
> Regards,
>
> Roald
>
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-- 
Cameron Shorter
Geospatial Solutions Manager
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
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