GNOME Foundation Board Meeting minutes :: 15/07/2007

[Glynn Foster <Glynn Foster Sun COM>]

Hey,

Here are the minutes from the Board meeting at GUADEC.


Glynn

==

GNOME Foundation Board Meeting (GUADEC), 15th July 2007

Present: Anne, Behdad, Glynn, Jeff, Quim, Vincent
Regrets: Dave, Rosanna

 o GUADEC

   There was only one proposal to host next year's GUADEC, Istanbul. Everyone
   agreed that it was a good solid proposal, and it would be good to get Baris
   sitting down during this GUADEC with Anne, Behdad, Quim and the guys
   from this year, Thomas and Paul. We will announce the new location at
   the GNOME Foundation AGM, and try and get Baris to do a little presentation
   for the closing.

   ACTION: Anne, Behdad, Quim to meet up with Baris and start talking about
           some of the details of GUADEC next year.
   ACTION: Behdad to talk to Baris about doing a presentation during the closing
           ceremony.

 o Board Candidate

   Dave announced his resignation from the board the previous week. The board
   would like to thank Dave for his hard work on the board over the past couple
   of years.

   Glynn suggested that Lucas Rocha would be a good replacement if he had
   time to do it. Jeff commented that it would be good to have a
   youthful, exhuberant and rocking replacement. Anne commented that we
   should use the next person in the election results. Jeff commented that
   we are an elected board and elected to run the organization, and that
   the state we're currently in is now different to the one during the
   election, and it should be a board perogative to appoint someont
   appropriate to that group. Jeff asked the question 'who do we want?'

   The board voted on 5 candidates, and Lucas was chosen as taking Dave's
   place. Quim commented that we should work with Dave to make sure his
   public announcement was timed with the announcement of Lucas as
   successor.

   ACTION: Glynn to talk to Dave about making sure he announces his
           resignation on foundation-list.
   ACTION: Quim to talk to John who was next in line during the election
           results about the situation, and decision.

   The board still needs to elect a treasurer. Jeff commented that he didn't
   feel comfortable doing that, but could possibly work with Rosanna and share
   responsibilities. Quim will take over responsibility of being a contact
   point for Rosanna.

 o Boston GNOME Summit

   Jeff has talked to Chris Blizzard and Max who had organized FUDCON in
   Boston University, and that it might be an ideal place. We're still
   hoping to organize the event for Columbus weekend.

   ACTION: Quim/Jeff to chat with Rosanna post GUADEC about taking on the
           summit organization.

   Jeff commented that an embedded developer summit could be tagged on
   to a conference in Madrid, rather than the Boston GNOME summit, and it
   would be good to pursue this.

 o Committees

   We currently have a number of board endorsed working committees - legal,
   marketing, release, membership and infrastructure. Anne asked if we
   had a clear mandate for these groups. Glynn commented that it would be
   good to write up what we currently have, along with writing up some
   guidelines for how people might go about getting a committee formally
   endorsed by the board and get this down on foundation.gnome.org. Jeff is
   keen to see that website moving over to a wiki. Quim is hoping that himself
   and Murray have time to sit down and discuss the progress of www.gnome.org
   this week.

   ACTION: Various members of the board will write up the status of our
           existing committees -
            Legal - Anne
            Marketing - Quim
            Release - Vincent
            Membership - Vincent
            Infrastructure - Jeff

  ACTION: Jeff/Vincent to upload to foundation.gnome.org

 o Foundation AGM

   Glynn has written some slides for the AGM, and the board collaborated on
   filling in the gaps.

   ACTION: Glynn to request financial details from Dave and Zana
   ACTION: Glynn to send details to foundation-list about the AGM meeting.
   ACTION: Glynn to forward slides to foundation-list.

   The rough agenda should be -
      Quim:  Welcome
             Brief introduction of the board
             Dave's resignation and Lucas as successor
      Glynn: GNOME Foundation Report
      Quim:  Announcement of GUADEC
             Discussion of priorities of the board for the rest of the year

 o By-Laws

   Anne commented that they were unnecessarily long and complicated, and that
   they were starting to show their age. Anne mentioned that it would be good
   to take a more international stance. Anne suggested it would be good to
   get a sub-committee formed to work on a new draft for the membership, and
   that James Vasile (SFLC) would be a good person to help with this.

   Jeff commented that he doesn't think they've posed a problem thus far, and
   suggested that if we do think about doing this, we should talk to the SFLC
   and see what the current template or best practices might be for new
   organizations.

   Glynn commented that by doing this, we potentially open ourselves up for
   people to focus more on the by-laws than the community.

   Quim didn't think it was a big priority for the board, and worried about
   spending a lot of time. He suggested to have a legal review of the current
   document, and find out what the issues might be.

   ACTION: Anne to talk to SFLC and get best practices document/suggestions.

   Jeff commented that the by-laws were the least interesting document right
   now, and that the charter was a lot more important in terms of direction.
   The GNOME Foundation would either strive to be a small organization to
   support large projects, or a large organization that strives for something
   more.

   Quim commented that it might be good to copy and paste the charter in
   live.gnome.org and let people edit it, and see where it gets us.

 o Board Plans for 6 months

   Numerous board members have had a busy 6 months, and haven't had the time
   to dedicate to board tasks. Jeff commented that we should try and recreate
   the energy and passion, rather than try and post-mortem why we haven't
   put in the time as a board. Glynn commented that the GNOME Foundation is
   in a much better position compared to several years ago, and that our
   expectations that we set are far more reaching than ever before, and
   consequently, we should try and focus on a few well defined goals, tackle
   these along with the day-to-day reactionary items that come up on board-list.

   Glynn commented that it might be interesting to produce a play-book for the
   year, detailing the goals for the GNOME Foundation for a year, and the
   board could focus on a few things that meet some of those goals. It would
   also give the opportunity of providing direction to the project for anyone
   else wanting to help out.

   The board decided to focus on 3 things -

      1) Interaction between Communities and Advisory Board members

         We need to understand what the community is about, what the
         Advisory Board is about and what the perceptions are on both
         sides along with the role of the board. Jeff hoped that we
         could publish the position statements of the AB members this
         year.

       2) Foundation Membership

          What is the value of the membership. We don't have enough
          resources for providing swag, so it needs to be about the
          people. How do we want to grow the membership, and provide
          a reason for people wanting to join.

       3) Operational Reporting

          Many people were disgruntled by the publishing of this year's
          annual report. Next time around we want it to be a community
          initiative, and increase the transparency of operational
          reporting in the board.