[Strategic] Hello world
Andy Robinson (blackadder-lists)
ajrlists at googlemail.com
Fri Jun 18 10:27:13 BST 2010
Hi folks,
I've been keeping an eye on discussions here, great to see the enthusiasm. I
purposely didnt want to get drawn into the discussions till now, partly
because I'm standing down from the board soon and partly because I'm in some
respects too close to what has gone before and this group is all about what
comes next.
For those who don't know me personally you can check out my wiki page:
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/User:Blackadder
So not wishing to wade in I just wanted to make a couple of comments about
certain threads.
1. Financial
OSMF has always had sufficient funds to meet its day to day needs. This has
been supplemented with some targeted fundraising drives as these are a very
effective method of supplementing the coffers. These drives only really work
though when it is for something the community wants. It works less well for
something that the OSMF thinks is a good idea.
For the last three years SOTM has delivered a surplus which effectively
provides working capital for the following year (along with ongoing
donations that come in). This year's conference will probably be the most
expensive and I suspect will make less margin, though its very encouraging
to see the level of sponsorship we have received, the SOTM organising group
are to be commended for that.
Funding of the OSMF (and by extension any local chapter formation support)
should in my view be focussed on what the community would like OSM to be in
5 years time, albeit that I personally would not wish the project to move
away from its broad stated aims. Mainly because they are defined and simple
to follow. Anything extra just dilutes the cause.
I see the main task to cover is that of procuring professional facilitation.
We have enough volunteers to work on working groups, come up with ideas, and
in many cases see ideas through to fruition. What we lack is commitment for
some of the mundane tasks in facilitating the cool things to happen. Putting
in professional support to permit volunteer groups to do what they enjoy is
perhaps a way forwards. By professional support I'm talking primarily about
administrative support roles and in some cases management functions to help
guide a specific group or activity. Management still under the control of
the volunteer group though, not the other way around.
Everything for local chapter support, media, outreach and legal
representation, volunteer management and recognition processes,
implementation of modern business management practices and I'm sure many
other areas could be looked at.
These functions would need real long term funding and each would need to be
carefully budgeted to see what long term continuing funds would be required
to enable them to be formed and maintained. We might be talking of £0.5M and
upwards very quickly. This would probably need strategic funding partners,
which in turn would bring additional obligations on the OSMF and the project
as a whole.
SOTM:
As Frederick suggests, SOTM may not be sustainable and I'm with him in that
running an annual international SOTM may not be the best way of bringing our
wider community together in the longer term. I've seen it in plenty of
business sectors where the annual conference and exhibition is preaching to
the converted.
A better longer term example is that of the Spring Fair where lots of
"businesses" come together under one roof to promote their wares and discuss
trade amongst their diverse business groups. I'd like OSMF to adopt a
similar approach and run a lot more local region conferences piggybacked off
another conference or event, either an open source or GIS one perhaps but
there may be other opportunities too. Just think for instance what might
happen if we did something linked to an educational conference, an outdoors
one, transport etc etc. In this way we can meet the needs of the local OSM
community and also reach out to other communities who may have a common
interest. The international event would still be needed periodically, but
perhaps just aligned with the conference of a local chapter. I've seen this
as a successful format in business.
Enough for now. I'll go back to lurking ;-)
Keep up the great discussion.
Cheers
Andy
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