[Local-chapters] Starting Over

[John Smith]

While OSM-F is worried about loosing control they are loosing groups
of people genuinely interested in furthering the cause at a local
level.

Because of in decisive responses in the past it even gave rise to
doubt as to even using the OSM name in a local entity.

All this to me can only be detrimental to OSM, even if only temporary,
but this could have a knock on effect well into the future.

On 1/26/10, jamesmikedupont at googlemail.com
<jamesmikedupont at googlemail.com> wrote:
> I second that John,
> Really the meetings are out of my reach. But on the issue of Money,
> I don't have any to donate to anything, have to pay alot of taxes. But
> I have time to donate.
> We are working on getting a server online for Kosovo atm, and
> recruiting members for the Balkans.
>
> The progress is great because the OSM is serving as a hub for people
> who are donating data. If we had our own server, we could just dump
> all the data into it, as its own layer.
>
> That is what I would like to see happen in osm, better ways for local
> layer servers in osm format. That way we can import data and just turn
> it on and off.
>
> mike
>
> On Tue, Jan 26, 2010 at 9:12 AM, John Smith <deltafoxtrot256 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>> From: John Smith <deltafoxtrot256 at gmail.com>
>> Date: Tue, 26 Jan 2010 18:11:43 +1000
>> Subject: Re: [Local-chapters] Starting Over
>> To: Ulf Möller <osm at ulfm.de>
>>
>> I don't know why people are demanding so many phone calls, if points
>> were discussed here we wouldn't need minutes either
>>
>> On 1/26/10, Ulf Möller <osm at ulfm.de> wrote:
>>> 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
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Local-chapters mailing list
>>>> Local-chapters at openstreetmap.org
>>>> http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/local-chapters
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Local-chapters mailing list
>>> Local-chapters at openstreetmap.org
>>> http://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/local-chapters
>>>
>>
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