[Evergreen-governance-l] Notice of Evergreen Foundation Committee Meeting; April 30, 2011 (Proposed Message to Evergreen Community)

Wed Mar 16 18:01:01 EDT 2011

Amy, 

Dan's clarification took care of my questions about the relationship between DIG and Governance, so I don't really see that as an issue any more. My only remaining concern is that the Governance meeting not get sidetracked from the large and complex issue of ... governance. The Governance committee has been poring over these issues for a year now, but for many of the people attending this will all be brand new so I imagine there will be a lot to talk about. If mentioning DIG as an example of how Governance will work with existing community groups or how grassroots efforts can succeed would help clarify things, then go for it. But I'm not sure a DIG report is necessary to accomplish that, and I'd hate to draw focus from the main purpose of the meeting. That said, if the governance committee decides that a DIG report would be helpful, I'm not opposed. 

Thanks, 
Karen 

----- "Amy Terlaga" <terlaga at biblio.org> wrote: 

>DIG has been a fantastic example of what can be accomplished at the grassroots level. I'd love for there to be a >short report from that committee for just that reason. 

Karen, correct me if I’m wrong on this, but I think that the concern over having DIG present during the Governance open meeting had a lot to do with the possible perception by attendees that they were somehow under Governance or answered to Governance or somehow affiliated with Governance. (Again, my apologies, that’s not how I meant it when I suggested it.) 

So if there were to be a short report (and I’m thinking that it’s not a good idea at this point), we would have to be careful/clear in how we introduced it. 

From: evergreen-governance-l-bounces at list.georgialibraries.org [mailto:evergreen-governance-l-bounces at list.georgialibraries.org] On Behalf Of Lori Bowen Ayre 
Sent: Wednesday, March 16, 2011 3:24 PM 
To: Dan Scott 
Cc: Evergreen Governance 
Subject: Re: [Evergreen-governance-l] Notice of Evergreen Foundation Committee Meeting; April 30, 2011 (Proposed Message to Evergreen Community) 

I concur with Dan's interpretation. Not only did he make that clear in the rules of governance that he drafted, but I asked some questions about that very thing on this list, and since there was no disagreement expressed with the current draft...I assume we all completely agree! 

The board has a very specific and limited role at this point. I suppose it could change some day. But right now, it should in no way be seen as any kind of authority over community members who find new and useful ways to contribute. I think everyone wants to encourage that kind of organic growth. 

DIG has been a fantastic example of what can be accomplished at the grassroots level. I'd love for there to be a short report from that committee for just that reason. 

Lori 

On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 12:07 PM, Dan Scott < dan at coffeecode.net > wrote: 

Hi Karen: 

On Wed, Mar 16, 2011 at 12:44:01PM -0400, Karen Collier wrote: 
> As an afterthought to my earlier email... 

Which, by the way, mirrored a number of my own thoughts... To answer one 
question, about copyright, I see no reason why members of the DIG would 
assign copyright to the Software Freedom Conservancy (the legal entity 
that the Evergreen Oversight Board plans to join), just as there's no 
reason for individual developers to assign copyright for their code to 
the Conservancy. 

And like you, I see the monthly Community Meetings as the place for 
working groups to report on progress and identify areas where help or 
collaboration is required. 

> I've lost track of whether existing volunteer groups in the community 
> are being officially subsumed within the new entity that Governance is 
> forming or if that decision is being left for later. My two cents is 

The Rules of Governance "Authority" section states: 

""" 
The Board is the central administrative body of the Project. The Board 
is responsible for the overall policy and direction of the Project. The 
Board does not generally implement practices, but instead relies on the 
recognized community leadership within the Project – including but not 
limited to the Documentation Interest Group, the Communication 
Committee, and the Developer Team – to do so. 
""" 

Rather than a top-down governance organization, the Evergreen Oversight 
Board is intended to be a body of last resort for decision making. This 
philosophy is reinforced by the "Responsibility" section: 

""" 
The issues discussed by the Board generally fall into these categories: 

(a) Issues escalated from a committee or other subgroup in the Project 
that has reached an impasse but requires a decision by informed consensus; 

(b) Issues that do not fall into the purview of any of the established 
committees or other subgroups, but requires a decision by informed consensus; 

(c) Issues of strategic, as opposed to tactical, importance for the 
Project that require leadership and vision from above the team or subproject 
level to achieve; or, 

(d) Sensitive legal or personnel issues which require research and 
discussion to protect the interests of the Project. 
""" 

As you can hopefully see (where I'm hoping that I've written those two 
sections relatively clearly - but might have failed), the goal is for 
the community to continue to function as a "do-ocracy" where interested 
people can contribute to the Evergreen project in areas about which they 
are passionate without having to ask for permission from the Board. The 
Board's primary concern should be managing assets (including funds and 
the usage of the Evergreen trademark, logo, domains, etc) if/when those 
are contributed to the Conservancy, earmarked for the Evergreen project. 

> that it would make sense for Governance to figure out what "rules" go 
> along with being a committee within the Governance organization and 
> then offer that option to existing community groups like DIG. The 
> memberships of those groups could then vote on whether to become a 
> committee or stay independent. I'm not suggesting that DIG or other 
> existing groups wouldn't want to be part of this Governance movement, 
> only that offering the choice could help with getting buy-in from 
> current participants. Thoughts? 

Given the current Rules of Governance document, I don't think there is a 
meaningful distinction between being a committee or staying independent. 
The Conservancy will see the Evergreen Oversight Board as the official 
representation of the Evergreen project for purposes of taking direction 
on the management of its assets, so if/when an effort requires funding 
(examples might include future conferences, or for buying a new domain 
name), then the Board needs to direct the Conservancy to cut a cheque 
accordingly. But with the possible exception of centralizing project 
asset management, the goal I had when I wrote this draft of the Rules of 
Governance was to avoid the disruption of those decentralized 
results-oriented practices that had proven successful within the 
Evergreen project so far - and the DIG is one of the examples of 
successful efforts. 

Does that make sense? 

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Lori Bowen Ayre // Library Technology Consultant 

The Galecia Group // www.galecia.com 

(707) 763-6869 // Lori.Ayre at galecia.com 

Specializing in open source ILS solutions, RFID, filtering, 

workflow optimization, and materials handling 

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