Minutes of the Board meeting, 2006/Mar/01

[Federico Mena Quintero <federico ximian com>]

Late minutes, sorry.

GNOME Foundation Board Meeting, 2006/03/01
==========================================

Attendance:

Anne
Dave (+30 mins)
Federico (minutes)
Jeff
Luis
Vincent

No attendance:

Jonathan (regrets)


PREVIOUS ACTIONS
================

* Jeff to organize and contact people in various countries and regions
  to act as local press contacts. (ongoing; he contacted various
  people and is following up)

* JRB to finish job description for administrative needs. (ongoing,
  sort of done)

* Anne to start process for GUADEC 2007 selection (DONE)

* Federico to organize next call at Novell (NOT DONE; to be done for
  the next call)

* Luis to mail boston-social gnome org to look for volunteers to
  represent us at Boston Usenix and Boston LWE (ongoing)

* Anne to send her draft program to foundation-list and put it up in
  the web page (need to try again because of moderation issues)

* Dave to be our liaison with marketing-list to set up the basic
  structure of the new www.gnome.org (ongoing as Dave was not in the
  call)

* Federico to ask Rodrigo what we got Killermundi to sign (DONE)

* Luis to help marketing-list prepare a press release for the
  GNOME/W3C SVG anouncement (NOT DONE)

* Dave to formally invite the Software Freedom Law Center to be a
  member of the Advisory Board (DONE)

* JRB to send out mugs and mouse pads to outstanding donors, and
  thank-you notes as well (ongoing, as JRB was not in the call)

* Luis to find business card template and send it to board-list (DONE)


NEW ACTIONS
===========

* Dave to request a contract from Quim.

* Quim to write a formal letter of invitation for the people who need
  to get visas.  Quim to find someone in Spain to contact the ministry
  of foreign affairs.

* Jeff to start writing an agenda for the Advisory Board meeting
  (DEADLINE: March 08).

* Federico to write his paper for the Advisory Board (DEADLINE: March
08)

* Federico to mail advisory-board-list about what members would like
  to get out of the Foundation. (DEADLINE: March 08)

* Jeff to ask the Advisory Board about funding GNOME through OSDL, or
  funding it directly.

* Jeff to write a proposal for the technical project meeting.

* Dave to resurrect German contract from last year so that we can use
  it for Axis Inform�ca.


AGENDA
======

Hiring an administrator:

	- JRB was not in the call, so we'll postpone this.


GUADEC:

	- Travel budget: 20K euro is set aside for sending people to
          the conference.

	- Credit card / handling cash advances: postponed until we
          have Quim on a call, or on the mailing list.

	- Sponsorship: we have Nokia on board as cornerstone sponsor;
          further progress to be confirmed with Quim.

	- Visa requests: we need someone from Spain to contact the
          ministry of foreign affairs.  We need a formal letter of
          invitation.

	- Travel requests: need update from Quim.

	- In general, we request that Quim send a status report one
          day before each Board meeting.

Advisory board call:

	- We don't have a date yet.

	- We don't have an agenda.

	- Federico to get off his lazy ass and finish writing up the
          requirements.

	- Jeff to start writing an agenda for the Advisory Board
          meeting.

	- Federico to mail advisory-board-list about what members
          would like to get out of the Foundation.

	- Idea is to have the adv. board call in two or four weeks
          from now; we obviously need the agenda first.

OSDL participation:

	- Companies are starting to perceive funding GNOME vs. funding
          OSDL as an either/or proposition, but OSDL could act as a
          pipeline to fund projects or conferences related to free
          desktops.

	- We need to ask the OSDL steering committee for funding.

	- This should be raised with the advisory board.

	- Jeff to ask the Advisory Board about funding GNOME through
          OSDL, or funding it directly.

Technical project meeting idea:

	- Jeff to write a proposal for the technical project meeting.

Exhibition materials:

	- Anne is working on printing out materials for Linux Forum in
          Copenhagen.  Anne needs links to extra materials.  Dave
          suggests http://live.gnome.org/MarketingTeam/MarketingMaterial

Axis Inform�ca wanting to sell products with the GNOME logo:

	- Dave to resurrect German contract from last year so that we
          can use it for Axis Inform�ca.

Trade shows:

	- Dave contacted Aaron Seigo about participating in Open
          Source Development Workshops; he's okay with that.

	- We should ask the Advisory Board for funding so that we can
          send the right people.

	- Novell is interesting because we can position GNOME + Mono
          as a good platform.

Getting back in touch with our legal representation:

	- Luis has contacted Wilson Sonsini for information on status
          from them, but our contact is traveling right now. We can't
          switch to Harvard, per se, but we will (starting in late
          March) get trademark advice from them.

Other things:

	- We got an invitation to participate in the IDABC Open Source
          Expert Group in Prague.  As a follow-up of the 2005 LinuxTag
          Event the workshop will focus on concrete aspects of
          collaboration: "Implementing Open Source Softtware in Public
          Administration:  Problems and Solutions".  Anne would like
          to attend as she did last year. We will cover her travel
          costs.

	- EU is doing a report on Representation of Women in Free
          Software; numbers are very sad --- under 1.5%
          participation.

	- Jeff wants to bring up GNOME Certification again.