[OSGeo Oceania] Fwd: OSGeo Oceania Board Terms of Reference Update for Review

[John Bryant]

Hi,

Adam has pointed out a couple of the changes, which sound positive to me.
But there is another significant change I'd like to bring up, which might
not be obvious.

In the "Communication" section, the new proposed Terms of Reference says:





*The Board aims to operate transparently.Board discussions are held in a
dedicated mailing list (oceania-board at lists.osgeo.org
<oceania-board at lists.osgeo.org>). In some cases itmay be appropriate to
hold a discussion in a private space, for example if it relates to specific
individualsor commercial-in-confidence matters. In these cases, the person
beginning a thread should state why itshould be kept private.*


This is fairly similar wording to before, but this:

*The board will establish a new public mailing list, where discussion and
decision making will occur.*

has changed to:

*Board discussions are held in a dedicated mailing list
(oceania-board at lists.osgeo.org <oceania-board at lists.osgeo.org>).*


It isn't immediately obvious that the oceania-board list is a *private* list,
not available to the community. The prior commitment was to discuss and
decide in public by default, but it appears this has been dropped.

I find the proposed new text to be somewhat unclear in its meaning. The use
of "*In some cases it may be appropriate to hold a discussion in a private
space...*" sounds like it's intended to identify exceptions to the use of a
public list, but as a qualifier to the use of a *private* channel, it
doesn't really make sense.

I would dearly love to see OSGeo Oceania reaffirm its commitment to
operating transparently by using a public list for discussion. In my
opinion, it's an effective and efficient way for community members to stay
up to date and find ways to participate, and it works passively, requiring
little or no extra volunteer effort. It's a commonly used practice in OSGeo
and OSM communities, we've done it successfully before, and as a community
based on principles of openness, I feel it powerfully demonstrates
commitment to these principles at all levels.

But if that's not possible, the text should be modified to make it clear
that board discussions are held in a private space, so there can be no
misunderstanding about the change.

Thanks

On Fri, 28 Aug 2020, 10:02 am Martin Tomko, <tomkom at unimelb.edu.au> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> I would like this discussion to not be lost, too.
>
> I believe Trish has been looking at the update of the ToRs, cc-ing here.
>
> Martin
>
>
>
> *From: *Oceania <oceania-bounces at lists.osgeo.org> on behalf of Adam Steer
> <adam.d.steer at gmail.com>
> *Date: *Monday, 24 August 2020 at 6:27 pm
> *To: *John Bryant <johnwbryant at gmail.com>
> *Cc: *"oceania at lists.osgeo.org" <oceania at lists.osgeo.org>
> *Subject: *Re: [OSGeo Oceania] Fwd: OSGeo Oceania Board Terms of
> Reference Update for Review
>
>
>
> Hi John
>
> Responding as an individual board member, mainly because these requests
> should never sit idle for more than a few days:
>
> Thanks for sparking a fresh ToR discussion among the board. My feeling
> about the changes between v1 and proposed v2 are driven by a move from 'we
> are setting up...'  to 'we are operating...'.
>
> I think the most important addition is a reference to a specific code of
> conduct we apply to operations of both the board and things we support (the
> Berlin Code of Conduct [1]). Another key change is a lot less proscription
> about the mechanics of how conference LOCs work ( we no longer say how an
> LOC should organise, just that we will support...)
>
> Personally, I could and should have definitely paid more attention to TOR
> alterations this past 6 months. It's nearly coming time for an election,
> which will put a burner under us to get over a fire-and-covid-induced
> languor and make sure a few things get packaged up.
>
> Regards
>
> Adam
>
> [1] https://berlincodeofconduct.org/
>
>
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