[Osmf-talk] Zusammenfassung der Antworten der Kandidaten und ihrer Wahlprogramme

Sun Dec 8 04:12:29 UTC 2019

I've read the summations by Westnordost and Christoph Hormann (imagico) and thank them for their work and time they put into it - although my voting will neither copy nor flip their preferences wholesale.

A lot of the critique is interesting, but what Christoph is looking for seems to be a lot more than the question itself entails, so most people get a minus there for simply answering the question - somewhat unorthodox approach to evaluation.

I'm troubled for example to see Christoph fundamentally misunderstanding how entities and their governance works.

First in the "Your time" section he agrees that "Being a board member is quite a commitment". He then completely forgets it as we enter "Are you willing to attend a Board face to face meeting?"

He is not happy that the candidates "consider themselves clearly to be an elite within the community" for having the gall of having a face-to-face meeting paid by the community of an otherwise mostly distributed project. He also wants to see "documentation of measurable benefits" of having these meetings.

Having served on various boards and working groups myself, both representing an employer or in private capacity (as a parent, enthusiast, activist or other) both in face-to-face meetings as well as remote, there is no doubt that face-to-face meetings offer a lot of intangible benefits like smoother interaction between the members. For example meeting Christoph in person would probably alter my view of him as opposed to the picture I have in my mind of him based on his writing, likewise he could possibly view me in a more positive light than my words here could give him reason to.

As social creatures we are so much more than our words, and words can be misunderstood based on intent, inflection, severity and other things which a keyboard or even a video can not provide. As for the meetings being paid for by the organization they are representing then that is seldom an issue as long as it is able to provide such financial renumeration. My time on some boards is free for the organization but paid for by some - when we get into travel of this scale it is really a no brainer if we want to ensure equal opportunities for board members to participate.

So as Christoph asks why the board decides to put itself on an elite status and is looking for an answer to "what warrants this status" then we have a simple answer for him. This status is earned by the board members by being voted on the board by the members of the OSMF. It can not be simpler or fairer. The elevated role that a board serves for any project or organization or company means that it is indeed some sort of an elite, but we have a fair system as it is voted in by the members. Christoph's argument here makes no sense.

Regarding discriminating aspects that can hinder a face-to-face meeting then we have just found out that spending OSMF money on it lessens the discrimination that board members will suffer from their financial status, this is particularly important for non OECD (as an example of high purchase power nations) countries where the pound from OSMF goes further and helps more. So we then look at disabilities or phobias - if a board member requires for example a helper due to a disability I'm sure that OSMF would find that warranted and make sure to pay for that - throwing money at some problems does help them go away. As for phobias then we come to a similar thing as made in the first point - do you have the time? Only now the question is if you can travel and interact with people to be able to fulfill the obligations you took upon yourself?

It is not for everyone to be in a social setting, interacting with people, disagreeing or agreeing with them and debating, but it is a requirement for being an effective board member - of OSMF or any other board. I myself am averse to large crowds and when in school was able to find lots of things to do backstage during theater performances to avoid being in the limelight. However that approach doesn't work if you are putting yourself out there to set a course for an entity - you need to overcome these phobias enough to be able to function or accept that you can be more useful in a different capacity in the community or project. I myself am now more capable in such situations than I was decades ago.

For the last point about discrimination we find ourselves in a pickle about countries with practical travel restraints although perhaps there OSMF can be used as a tool to ease those restraints for the board member, as far as I know such things have been encountered for various SOTM* attendees.

We are now at the final thought Christoph has in this section on travel which wasn't even included in the original question. Sustainability of seven people travelling at least once a year. If sustainability of OSM as a whole is now his main concern there are faster ways to work on it, we can start by shutting down every tile server, leaving only a mapping server. Or we can shut down the project because clearly the amount of energy we use, both at home, on hosting sites, on electrical and internet infrastructure and traffic and of course the energy use of the gadgets contributing to or using the map is clearly unsustainable for a hobbyist project.

However I can aid Christoph in mentioning that carbon offsetting a round trip for 7 people from Washington DC to Calcutta comes at 739 Euros (using a long travel as example), so it would not break the bank [1].

Now if you have made it this far you might be losing track so I'll summarize:

* Being a board member takes time and effort!
* Who made the board an elite? The members did when they voted.
* How about those that can't travel due to disability? Money usually helps to make it a possibility.
* How about those that can't travel due to phobia? You signed up for a responsibility, make sure you can handle it just like you need to make sure you have the time.
* Where are the measureble benefits? The benefits of face-to-face are usually intangible but you do notice the difference and the functioning of the board should improve.
* Where are the results of the meetings? I'd hope at least minutes of the meetings are published, but in my experience the time between meetings if often even more important as we mingle.
* How about sustainability? Easy to carbon offset if you are into that, also there are bigger fishes to fry for the project if we want to take this all the way.

Christoph has many more items he discussed, some of which I can agree with and many I do not. I have now written over 6.500 characters (and counting) worth of thoughts on just a tiny piece which I found displayed a lack of big thinking that a board needs to focus on, I hope people don't use his window of the world exclusively as they cast a vote because it seems it should be a lot bigger.

I thank all of the candidates for offering their time (our most valuable resource) and wish them well. I also hope that they do not take Christoph's words too close to heart, his assertion that these are his views of the candidates, not the people, ring hollow when he does in fact infer that they can not be trusted to use their best judgement and are instead puppets of paymasters - that hurts on a personal level.

--
Jóhannes / Stalfur 

[1] https://co2.myclimate.org/en/flight_calculators/new

7. desember 2019 kl. 22:56, skrifaði "Frederik Ramm" <frederik at remote.org>:

> Hi,
> 
> On 12/7/19 21:36, Michael Reichert wrote:
> 
>> wie in den Vorjahren fasse ich auch dieses Jahr die Antworten der
>> Kandidaten und ihre Wahlprogramme in deutscher Sprache zusammen.
> 
> There's also an English-language attempt by user Westnordost to
> summarize candidates in one table row here:
> 
> https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:Westnordost/AGM19_Cheatsheet
> 
> And Christoph Hormann has evaluated the candidates' statements in
> English here:
> 
> http://blog.imagico.de/2019-osmf-board-candidates-analysis-and-recommendations