[Osmf-talk] Use of osmfoundation.org email addresses and role of opengeodata.org

[Frederik Ramm]

Hi,

    yesterday, there was a post on opengeodata.org (not 
blog.osmfoundation.org) titled "Google IP Vandalizing OpenStreetMap" 
(http://opengeodata.org/google-ip-vandalizing-openstreetmap), and signed 
by (quote)

Mikel Maron, OSMF board member, mikel at osmfoundation.org
Grant Slater, OSM Sysadmin, grant at osmfoundation.org
Steve Coast, OSM Founder, chairman at osmfoundation.org

(end quote).

The post doesn't directly accuse Google of corporate malevolence but is 
written in a way that could easily be interpreted as such, drawing a 
parallel to another recently publicized instance of alleged Google 
misbehaviour. The post is, to put it mildly, not an example of good 
diplomacy skills.

In the comments section, our own Tom Hughes writes that he considers 
this post "grossly irresponsible and wholly inappropriate", a sentiment 
to which I feel compelled to agree, and that "The board of OSMF are 
making mountains out of tiny pimples here."

Immediately afterwards, he later writes: "I am told that this posting 
was in fact made in a personal capacity and as such any suggestion on my 
part that it represents an official position of the OSMF board is 
incorrect and should be disregarded."

I am happy to hear that this posting was not endorsed by OSMF. This is a 
good thing. But if even someone as involved with OSM as Tom 
misunderstands that - then how many people on the outside will now think 
badly of OSMF because of a post like that? If you read the P.S. then you 
get an idea of the kind of feedback this must have generated.

I would like to suggest that, if any of our board members want to 
publish their personal opinion in the future, they use their personal 
e-mail addresses and not their osmfoundation.org function aliases. On 
opengeodata.org, it is unusual to sign one's posts with name and e-mail 
at all, and *if* one chooses to sign with name and e-mail *then* uses 
one's @osmfoundation.org e-mail address, then any reader must assume 
that this is some kind of official OSMF statement.

I think that, to avoid confusion, @osmfoundation.org e-mail addresses 
should only be used in OSMF business and not when signing private 
publications.

Further, I would suggest that we immediately stop making any "official" 
postings to opengeodata.org, to make it absolutely clear to the public 
that opengeodata.org is a blog where anyone can publish their opinion of 
something without necessarily being endorsed by OSMF. For example, the 
blog recently carried posts like "We will go to Tokyo State of the Map 
2012", or a call to participate in the OSMF fund raising drive; such 
posts create the impression that this was somehow an "official" news 
outlet rather than the private ramblings of a couple of geo geeks.

To be clear: opengeodata.org never claimed to be in any way official; it 
is just the nature of the posts appearing there that may make it look 
like it was official in the eye of an outsider.

Bye
Frederik