Minutes of the Board meeting of November, 28th, 2017



= Foundation Board Minutes for Tue, November 28th 2017, 17:00 UTC =

Next meeting date Tue, December 5th 2017, 18:00 UTC

Wiki: https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoard/Minutes/20171128

== Attending ==

 * Nuritzi Sanchez
 * Alexandre Franke
 * Meg Ford
 * Cosimo Cecchi
 * Neil McGovern
 * Rosanna Yuen

== Regrets ==

 * Carlos Soriano
 * Allan Day

== Missing ==

== Agenda ==

 * GUADEC & GNOME.Asia dates
 * GNOME.Asia committee & Board membership
 * Flathub update
 * Review outgoing items

== Minutes ==

 * GUADEC & GNOME.Asia dates
  * Proposed dates: either July 6-11th or 13-18th, the former being preferred
  * This is Spain and the later we get in Summer, the hottest it’ll get and the least bearable it’ll be.
  * It will also cost more to sponsor people to come because of the school holiday.
  * Neil is not available for the first two weeks of July, he’ll be available from July 16th on
   * We think it’s important for the ED to attend
  * ACTION: Nuritzi to write up an email to the board with a summary of the discussion and gather input from everyone before we vote

 * GNOME.Asia committee & Board membership
  * Nuritzi is considering joining the organizing committee, to be the board liaison
  * Other directors can think about it and eventually join too

 * Flathub update
  * We need a process for people to be able to take stuff down if needed
  * No reason to revisit our decision to let Karen draft it

== _Ongoing_ ==

'''This section includes items which have seen an update in the last 30 days. Format is "YYYY-MM-DD, action|discussion|abstract" for this and subsequent minutes sections'''

 * Follow-up on "Reviving Free Software Macedonia"
  * Monthly rental fee for the place where they meet (€300)
  * They seem to have a lead for sponsors, but would like us to help bootstrap
  * Not clear what their ask is.
  * We recommend they come up with a clear plan and specific outcomes for GNOME, then take it to the engagement budget holder

 * Check in about budget and policies roll out
  * Blocking on a couple action items from Neil, hopefully sorted out today
  * Neil will then announce it, as well as TransferWise being an option
  * 2017-11-14:
   * Waiting for Nuritzi to come back from her trip so she can review drafts before they are sent out
   * (draft at https://etherpad.gnome.org/p/budget-spending-transferwise-mail)

 * Conference spending policy updates
  * The current policy would allow organizers to spend money they haven’t raised yet, which could lead to a loss
  * Carlos suggested to approve two complementary budgets
   * a part that can only be spent if raised 
   * a part that can be spent even if not raised, to make sure the conference happens
  * Organizers are expected to make a profit, but a small loss would not be a problem
  * The main goal should be to make a good conference
  * How does the organizers forecast the amount they’ll raise?
  * How does the newly appointed sponsorship committee tie in with that?
   * Coordination between the two is expected
  * VOTE: approve new policy with 2 budgets for conferences (minimal + extras depending on money raised)
   +1 Carlos, -1 Allan, Meg. Abstained: Alexandre. VOTE DOESN’T PASS
  * VOTE: conference organizers should be required to have a new budget approved by the board if they raised less than 70% of their budgeted income
   +1 Allan, Meg, Abstained: Carlos, Alexandre. VOTE PASSED
  * 70% by what time? The problem is that conferences often don't know what their income is going to be until very late - sponsors are often confirmed at the last minute.
  * VOTE: invalidate the previously passed vote (let's give this more time to see if we can find a good solution)
   +1 Alexandre, Allan, Carlos, Abstained: Meg. VOTE PASSED
  * 20171031 - Neil suggests new rule that allows to limit the loss and gives organizers a bit of leeway, taking into account the evolving nature of account balance
   * ACTION: Allan to prepare a new proposal to revisit this at a later meeting

 * Privacy campaign funds
  * 2016-09-27
   * Draft is out for the Board to review and give feedback
   * ACTION: Cosimo to try and form a committee to review internship proposals
  * 2016-10-26
   * We are aiming for an internship round in spring 2017
  * 2017-07-26
   * Carlos and Zeeshan are taking this over -- the plan is still to do internships
    * 2017-10-14
     * Carlos created wiki page at https://wiki.gnome.org/Internships

 * Name for internships for privacy funds
  * If there is no contract it is not technically an internship
  * Discussion needs to continue on list
  * 2017-10-24
   * GSoC are not called internships and there is no contract with the student
    * The organising entity also does not have authority over the participants, the project entity does
   * Outreachy on the other hand is called internship and there is a contract
    * Same kind of relationship
   * We could try and reuse the contracts from Outreachy
   * ACTION: Zana to get a copy of the contract
    * Done
   * ACTION: Neil to ask Karen
    * 20171031 - Done, karen says steal away.
   * ACTION: Carlos to prepare a version for us
    * You can check at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ew2nW5EJfCERFWsOM11_BoPPO5B8sWjugPpXLaX4Jno/edit?usp=sharing

 * Payment authorization policy
  * https://wiki.gnome.org/FoundationBoardPrivate/Budget#Payment_authorization
  * VOTE: approve the new Payment authorization policy as specified on the private budget wiki page
   * +1 Allan, Nuritzi, Carlos, Cosimo, Meg, Alexandre, Zeeshan - VOTE PASSES
  * ACTION: Allan to make the page public (with ACL to prevent modifications from anyone else than the board)
   * 2017-10-08 - page has been made public but Allan isn't certain what to do about the ACL
  * ACTION: Nuritzi to ensure that this is announced to the Foundation

 * Intention to create marketing committee
  * To dispense money for small events and marketing line items
  * In the meantime, we would have an individual budget holder
  * VOTE: appoint Nuritzi as the temporary budget holder
   * +1 Nem con. VOTE PASSES
  * There are concerns about the correct course of action.
  * ACTION: Nuritzi to come up with a charter for the proposed committee

 * Zazzle store
  * We have a link on the page where we list vendors
  * Andreas confirmed that Stormy is the one with access
  * ACTION: Allan to try to reach out to Stormy
   * 2017-10-08 - Allan got in touch with Stormy and got some login information, but he still can't access the account. More followup is required.
  * ACTION: Nuritzi to assess the quality and check whether we want to continue using them

 * Using TransferWise or some other payment system
  * This has been recommended to us as a good alternative to Paypal that is cheaper and works in certain countries where Paypal does not work
  * 2017-09-19
   * Since Rosanna and Neil would be the main users of this, a good next step would be for them to review options and report to the Board
   * ACTION: Neil will look into this and coordinate with Rosanna when she's back
  * 2017-10-08
   * This is now set up
   * Need to put this into travel sponsorship form
   * ACTION: Alexandre to talk to the travel committee to add this to the options
   * ACTION: Nuritzi to add this option to the small events reimbursement page
   * ACTION: Rosanna to test if it works well
     * 2017-10-24 - DONE. Tested two separate payments that both went through
   * ACTION: Nuritzi to announce it to foundation-list

 * Looking for sponsorship for GitLab runners
  * To increase our Continuous Integration capacity on the GNOME GitLab server, we'll need to provision some more servers, as we migrate more projects there
  * We could ask for help to our Advisory Board, or use our network to ask for support from other companies
   * It would make more sense to ask for hardware/cycles directly, rather than fundraising, since server bandwidth is a recurring cost
  * 2017-10-08
   * Neil is waiting for verification before this can proceed further
   * 2017-10-31 - we're verified! Neil to talk to sysadmin
  * ACTION: Neil to talk with Andrea Veri about this
  * ACTION: once done, Neil to announce it

 * Calls with committees
  * Twice a year with each committee, once after the board elections (end June/early July and then late November-early January).
  * The call is a touch point - a way of checking in. Needs to stimulate ongoing conversations and ad hoc problem solving. Committees will be invited to calls with the whole Board to problem solve around specific things.
  * One board member and the ED meet with each committee (or a board member and the director of operations if there's no ED).
  * Where possible the same board member should be consistent.
  * Board representatives then feed back to the rest of the board.
  * 2017-10-08
   * First meetings in the sequence to happen in November. Should focus on collaboratively setting goals and identifying issues.
   * Once the 
   * ACTION: Carlos to meet with membership committee, see if we should update committee charter https://wiki.gnome.org/MembershipCommittee
   * ACTION: Alexandre to meet with the travel committee, see if we should update committee charter https://wiki.gnome.org/Travel/Committee
   * ACTION: Cosimo to meet with the sponsorship committee

 * Foundation support for Flathub
  * 2017-05-09
   * The Board voted to try and use some of our pro-bono counsel time towards the Flathub legal framework, provided our lawyers agree
   * ACTION: Neil to connect to Luis
  * 2017-05-16 - Exact questions to ask Luis are being worked up
  * 2017-06-06 - Questions sent to Luis, being looked at.
  * 2017-09-05 - Being passed to Karen now, discussions have stalled a little, Neil chasing up
  * 2017-10-08
   * Neil and Rob are going to meet Karen at Freenode Live and try to talk about this
  * 2017-10-31 - Rob got sent to Indonesia, Neil to set up call with Karen/Rob to discuss
  * 2017-11-14 - Prodding email sent
  * ACTION: Neil to send another email to Luis and check if he’s available.
  * ACTION: Meg to ask Karen whether she can recommend someone
  * 2017-11-21 - Karen came back, call set up for next week

 * Hackfest process documentation
  * 2017-02-14
   * ACTION: Nuritzi to take a stab at updating the documentation for the process to request a hackfest and responsibilities between Board and TC
  * 2017-05-02
   * Nuritzi will work on this by end of May, check in then
  * 2017-09-05: Nuritzi updated the wiki about a week ago but we should go over this in Berlin.
  * 2017-10-08
   * Part of this was done at the hackfest, we'll need to update the wiki page
   * Another part is pending reply from Pam about how an event can use the GNOME wordmark
   * ACTION: Nuritzi to update the wiki page, including Alexandre's proposed statement about openness of hackfests

 * Friends of GNOME
  * 2016-08-10
   * ACTION: Allan to get in touch with Tobi and the sysadmin team to migrate the FoG infrastructure over to GNOME
  * 2017-03-07
   * Allan will pass this on to Neil, and connect him to Tobi
  * 2017-04-18 - Neil has CRM working (ish) on the gnome website, we're looking at how to move the PayPal IPN to CiviCRM
   * At sysadmin meeting at GUADEC
  * 2017-10-31 - Should happen around december

=== Ongoing but stalled ===

'''This section includes items which haven't seen an update in the last 30 days.'''

 * Dropping dates in copyright claims on our websites
  * 2016-12-06
   * ACTION: Alexandre to send an email to foundation-list with a proposal for discussion
  * 2016-12-20
   * Next step seems to be to reach out to Creative Commons to get advice on what exactly can and should be done
  * 2017-01-24
   * Alexandre reached out to Creative commons
  * 2017-02-28
   * Alexandre will try alternative channels
  * 2017-05-02
   * We got a reply, Alexandre to follow up
  * 2017-05-30
   * Two options
    * Have terms of use on the website that state that linking to a page is sufficient attribution
    * Require contributors to assign their attribution to the GNOME Foundation

 * Paypal Giving Fund
  * Alexandre suggested in december 2015 to get us enrolled in the program
   * That would give us exposure. For example Humble bundle allows to direct the charity part of purchases towards any of their participants
  * Zana tried to get us in sometime before may 2016, we never heard back.
  * 2016-09-06
   * ACTION: Zana to look into it

=== Ongoing but no director assigned ===

'''This section includes items which haven't seen an update in the last 30 days and have no Director assigned'''


== Nice to have ==

'''This section includes items which we would love to see happen at some point but lack the time to effectively become reality'''

 * Contract template for future use organizations for which we handle money
  * Kat to draft this
  * Alexandre took over
  * 2017-07-26
   * This is close to being done

 * Privacy policy for GNOME services
  * Current draft is at https://wiki.gnome.org/Foundation/Privacy
  * Sysadmin Team's NDA should also be covered when dealing with this item
  * Kat or Allan to write up the policy
  * Kat or Allan to write up recommended wording for distribution privacy policies, regarding the behaviour of GNOME software
  * 2017-07-26
   * Allan is still working on this, but with low priority

== Discussed on the mailing list ==


== Completed actions ==

 * Time and day for the board meetings starting December 5th
  * The only day and time that seems to work for everybody is Tuesdays at 18:00UTC
  * ACTION: Alexandre to send confirmation to the list



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