[Local-chapters] Starting Over

[Ulf Möller]

Thanks Serge.

The board has concluded it is still too early to set up a concrete local 
chapters framework. In moving ahead I think your thoughts are very helpful.

One of the things we need to think more about is how to deal with 
potential problems between the Foundation and local chapters. On the one 
hand the Foundation has to protect the integrity of its name and of the 
project. On the other hand the agreement must be balanced and not give 
one party excessive powers - clearly we'd have a problem if local 
organizations felt that they were better off not becoming a local chapter.

We can't get people from America, Australia and Europe on one conference 
call, so in my opinion meeting minutes and e-mail are extremely 
important. As far as I know the plan is to schedule the next meeting for 
the morning US time/evening European time. Would that work for you?

Ulf


Serge Wroclawski schrieb:
> I heard through the grape vine that the local chapters agreement was
> not accepted by the OSMF board.
>
> I'm sure that the people who worked on the agreement are very
> disappointed (to say the least).
>
> I'm hoping, though, that we can take this situation and see it as an
> opportunity.
>
> A number of people on and off this list had serious concerns about the
> agreement and the process. I count myself as one of those.
>
> I'm hopeful that the local chapters working group can see this
> situation as a chance to take feedback from proto-chapters and create
> a new agreement hand-in-hand with these groups.
>
> Some general thoughts on this, and I apologize in advance for this
> mail being so long (and probably quite boring):
>
> 1) Selling the Local Chapters Idea
>
> I think one of the main issues missing from the previous LC agreement
> was the idea that OSMF needs to "sell" to these local chapters.
>
> The previous agreement seemed premised on the idea that local chapters
> would want to be associated with OSM and thus created a structure
> around that. It reminded me a bit of a franchise agreement.
>
> The fundamental difference here is that we (the local chapters) are
> not selling anything.
>
> Wikimedia actually distributed money to its chapters. If OSM can't do
> the same, then it needs to provide some other tangible benefit to its
> local chapters (and not just the use of trademarks).
>
> 2) Transparency
>
> My main complaint about the process has been the lack of transparency.
> This agreement seemed to come out of nowhere.
>
> I know the term transparency can be vague, so here are some concrete
> actions I'd like to see:
>
>   a) More discussions happening on this mailing list.
>
>   b) Draft agreements should get input from the (proto) local chapters
> before being sent to other
>   bodies, especially if the local chapters are going to be expected to
> follow them.
>
>   c) Meeting minute should be complete and cover all reports,
> discussions, votes, etc.
>
>   d) Meeting times should possibly be changed. As several of us in the
> US have said, your
>       current meeting time of 3am on a weekday is nearly impossible
> for us. That ends up being
>       8am GMT, and 9/10am in Europe. Can an alternate time be
> proposed? I'd suggest using
>       doodle.com to find out the times which would work best for the
> constituent parties and
>       working from that list. In the US we've did that and shifted our
> meeting day accordingly
>       after getting feedback that the meeting time was unworkable for people.
>
> 3) Separation of Interests between Local Chapters and the OSMF
>
> The original LC document had all LC members being OSMF members. I
> understand the desire to increase OSMF participation, but I'd like
> these two issues to be separated.
>
> Even if there wasn't the issue of fees collection (which turned out to
> be a huge sticking point), I think this was the catalyst for the
> request for all membership information from the local chapter, which
> several folks found to be a problem.
>
> If the LC chapter members aren't OSMF members, then this issue should go away.
>
> 4) All requirements by local chapters need to be very specific.
>
> Statements such as "need to provide services" put local chapters in a
> difficult bind. How can one agree to something when we don't know what
> that agreement is?  Any requirements by the OSMF need to be spelled
> out- or if that's unworkable, then procedures for working with the LC
> need to be worked out if, eg a local chapter is involved in
> wrongdoing.
>
>
> I'm sure others on this list will have similar input, but those are
> just my feelings.
>
> Thanks for reading this.
>
> - Serge
>
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