Re: Board of Directors Elections 2014 - Candidacy - Karen Sandler

[Karen Sandler <karen gnome org>]

On 2014-05-20 09:17, Zeeshan Ali (Khattak) wrote:
> Hi Karen,
>
> On Tue, May 20, 2014 at 9:36 AM, Oliver Propst 
> <oliver propst gmail com> wrote:
> On Sat, May 17, 2014 at 4:14 PM, Karen Sandler <karen gnome org> wrote:
> Affiliation: Software Freedom Conservancy. I'm also pro bono General 
> Counsel
> of QuestionCopyright.Org, and an advisor of The Ada Initiative and 
> sometimes
> help other orgs (like the FSF) on legal and other free software related
> matters.
>
> As promised when I left the position of Executive Director, I'd like to
> throw my hat in the ring for the Board of Directors. I think I can help
> bring continuity to the board (Stormy was incredibly helpful on the 
> board
> when I started as ED). Also, as a lawyer I sometimes have an 
> additionally
> useful perspective. I'm still doing volunteer work for GNOME both as 
> pro
> bono counsel and as a volunteer on nonlegal matters for GNOME. I've 
> been
> helping with fundraising, collecting on outstanding invoices and 
> generally
> wherever I can.
> You are a very busy person with many responsibilities, if you get
> elected to the Board do you feel confident that you can spend the
> necessary time on Board work?
>
> While I think you do a lot for Free Software and your passion and work
> inspires many, I'm afraid I do share Oliver's concern here.

I am extremely busy. I was just reading through all of the emails to 
board candidates this morning, as the time I've had in the last few days 
for GNOME I've spent volunteering on time sensitive things that I think 
must be done. This includes following up on outstanding invoices and 
also tracking a GNOME trademark matter. I also reviewed and commented on 
the contract for the GUADEC local organization (there may have been 
other things that I'm forgetting).  And this is all in the last week, 
and not counting recording the voice over for the cool documentation 
video that Bastian is putting together :)

I have to say: being on the GNOME board takes a lot of time. It's not a 
small commitment that the candidates are offering to make! Most boards 
meet quarterly at most, so meeting every other week is really a lot. 
However, I think it's worth the time expenditure. I just recorded an 
oggcast on this topic (what it means to serve on a board of directors 
and whether you should want to do it), which unfortunately won't come 
out until next week.

If elected, I'll probably use my time for GNOME by participating in the 
meetings and working on things like I've been doing as a volunteer 
mentioned above and am less likely than some other candidates to engage 
in lengthy discussions on mailing lists, but I think that's ok provided 
that some of the other board members focus on that important role (I 
will chime in on discussion, it just might not be right away or in great 
detail).

karen