Minutes from Foundation Board meeting on April 7

[Malcolm Tredinnick <malcolm commsecure com au>]

Somewhat delayed minutes from the last but one meeting.

Cheers,
Malcolm

 Minutes For Board Meeting: 7 April 2004
=========================================
Present:
    Glynn   (chair)
    Malcolm (minutes)
    Tim
    Dave
    Jody
    Jeff
    Jonathan
    Owen
    Leslie
    Luis
    Bill

Absent:
    Nat

Meeting started: 21:09 UTC

Action Items:
-------------
    ACTION: Owen to invite Mozilla foundation to attend a meeting to
    discuss their ideas about the future of Mozilla. Also to invite
    Marco.

    ACTION: Tim to forward details about credit card processing
    agent deal to board-list when they arrive. Want to be in a
    position to make a decision next meeting.

    ACTION: Luis to send minutes from March 10 meeting to
    foundation-list.

    ACTION: Dave to put roadmap up on the web somewhere and notify
    maintainers to get signoff on final version.

    ACTION: Luis to respond to GUADLEC organisers.

    ACTION: Tim to get final agreement from lawyers about agreement
    with T-shirt merchant and forward to board-list after clearing
    with merchant.

    ACTION: Jeff to send proposal to board-list about possiblity of
    having national organisations who can collect funds on behalf of
    the GNOME foundation.

    ACTION: Malcolm to write the first draft of a white-paper
    describing where GNOME is being used at the moment. Draft should
    go to marketing list for community input and finalisation.

    ACTION: Tim to send invitations to GUADEC advisory board
    meetings to advisory board members.

    ACTION: Leslie to prepare a press release for the GNOME 2 book.

Items from previous minutes:
----------------------------
    (a) Credit card merchant
         - Tim and Malcolm had a meeting with the proposed
           merchant on April 6. The proposed agreement seemed
           reasonable and we are seeking more information. The
           merchant will send contract details to Tim and the
           board would like to be in a position to make a go/no
           go position at the next board meeting.

    (b) Selling GNOME 2 book at GUADEC
        - A link has been made from the registration form (which
          will go live this week) to allow people to
          pre-purchase the GNOME 2 book at 10% discount when
          they register for the conference.

    (c) Voting procedures
        - The membership committee are underway planning for a
          referendum on changes to the board election
          procedures. Jody has been providing liason for this
          and the proposed plan for the referendum looks
          reasonable.

    (d) Roadmap
        - Dave did another draft of the roadmap incorporating a
          recent bunch of suggested changes, both from the board
          and advisory board. It is now at a point where
          releasing it will be a good idea, particularly as we
          are at the start of a new release cycle. Dave will
          alert the various module maintainers to the new draft
          and check that their ideas and plans are still
          relevant before we do a more publicised release.

New business:
-------------
    (a) Chariman:
        - We need to elect a new permanent chair, since Nat is
          often unavailable during meeting times and selecting a
          chair with no notice is hard on the person who has to
          do the job.

    (b) GUADLEC:
        - We received a proposal about a conference in South
          America along the lines of GUADEC. The board supports
          the idea, but cannot offer any financial support. We
          will provide advice and assistance in other
          appropriate ways whenever asked, though. 

    (c) National agents
        - Jeff brought up the idea of having some national
          bodies (one in each appropriate country) who could
          collect money on behalf of the GNOME foundation. A
          similar situation is already in place for the Debian
          project. This seemed like a good idea and the board
          asked for more details. Jeff will send such details to
          the mailing list for consideration.

    (d) GUADEC
        - Tim reported that everything was moving along,
          although the Norwegians were on Easter break at the
          time of the meeting.  Discussions nearing conclusion
          with an airline who might be able to offer discounts
          on flights to Norway. Details will be made available
          when finalised. Registration page for GUADEC will be
          going live within a couple of days.

Meeting closed: 22:02 UTC

Next meeting: 7 April 2004