Candidacy: Behdad Esfahbod

[Behdad Esfahbod <behdad cs toronto edu>]

Email: behdad gnome org
Website: http://behdad.org/

Affiliation: Sharif FarsiWeb, Inc.
to change soon, but none of R, N, S, or any other GNOME company.


What I like to see the board doing in the coming term:

* Continue focusing on areas that are less fun than hacking, like keeping the
  website alive, marketing, etc.

* (More) Proactively looking for sponsors and other sources of income, to
  support the community.

* Commit to the 10x10 plan.  Support massive marketing plans to get the word
  out.  Stickers, free CDs, tshirts, getting the word to the LUGs, etc.  Like
  the Ubuntu guys are doing.

* Building a team-oriented community.  Ad hoc teams are good, but documented
  teams make it easier for newcomers to join in.  Both long-term teams like
  current release-team and membership committee, and short-term teams to solve
  an specific problem at hand.  Look at the Ubuntu launchpad for example.

* Make each foundation member a voice of GNOME.  Lead activities in the
  community, making a more socially active membership.  Support programs like
  bug-fixer of the month, documenter of the month, etc, again, with real
  prizes sent out.


Who I am:

I've been a member of GNOME foundation since 2001, but never called myself a
GNOME developer until recently, when I found myself well inside, and I believe
I am here to stay.  I started as a hacker, but found a great family that is
much more valuable than the sum of the parts.  So I'm trying to get more
involved in other aspects of the project.

I am a Fedora user and have been following the Fedora marketing team since it
was formed.  Like everybody else, I was observing how Ubuntu rose, and
admired that.  Earlier this month I had the opportunity to attend the Ubuntu
Below Zero conference.  Unfortunately I couldn't make it to GUADEC so far. :(

I am an internationalization expert in Free Software, and GNOME specifically.
I hack on and co-maintain Pango, gucharmap, and dasher.  I have been an active
member of the Persian, Arabic, and Hebrew free software communities via email,
and recently discovered the Toronto community as well.  I have been
evangelizing the GNU and GNOME projects since 2000.

I'm from Iran, moved to Canada in 2003.


--Behdad Esfahbod
  November 14, 2005