[Osmf-talk] AGM and board elections

[Randy Meech]

On Sun, Sep 21, 2014 at 5:20 AM, Simon Poole <simon at poole.ch> wrote:
> Formal membership in an organisation is simply slightly at odds with the
> basic premise of OSM.

Possibly, but in fact there is an organization and it has remained
largely static over the years. This seems more at odds with a large
global project, to say nothing of how unsafe it is to have board seats
won with so few votes on such a valuable project.

> As said above at least from a pure legal pov some of the hurdles are now
> gone. We don't have a good solution wrt the membership fees which at
> least for some regions are a big hurdle, but I'm a tiny bit optimistic
> that we may have something this or next year (it is again one of those
> issues that have been on the table since 2007).

There could be a multi-year plan with membership targets and
accompanying price reductions. For example, double membership in 2015,
cut the fees in half. Or something like that with the goal of raising
roughly the same money from many more people.

As for other hurdles, removing them is great but I believe the real
problem is lack of knowledge about the OSMF and what it does among the
general OSM user base.

> If we take it as a given that increasing membership is a good idea, the
> question is what should the board or more specific: I, do about it? This
> might seem like a rhetoric question, but isn't.

Some ways to do this:

1. Put up a notice on the website (like the one for SotM in Buenos
Aires right now) with a message & a link to this:
http://wiki.osmfoundation.org/wiki/Join

2. A yearly email to all registered users seems reasonable. Could have
a few versions depending on user activity. For inactive users,
reminding them about the project and pointing out improvements in
editing tools since they joined could be good. For active users,
educating them about the existence of the OSMF, what it does, how the
working groups need help (per Paul's message on this thread), how to
get involved, join, vote, etc.

3. Reminder emails to OSMF members as their memberships expire per
Michal's other email on the topic.

I'd be happy to write up some of this if people think it's helpful. I
talked to Harry about joining the CWG but haven't done much yet.

-Randy