On Saturday 03 October 2015 08:56:20 Robert Schweikert wrote:
I think this is a bit too simplistic. By casting a vote for the board elections the voter has a certain influence on the direction of the project, and we can argue about this as part of this discussion. Thus, with a large number of inactive "openSUSE Members", per the member definition, the problem arises is two fold.
Voting for the board does not influence the direction of the project as by our guiding principles the board does not direct the project: "The board should provide guidance and support existing governance structures, but shouldn't direct or control development, since community mechanisms exist to accomplish the goals of the project."
b.) If everyone votes then one can argue that those that are generally inactive have an undue influence over the direction of the project by casting their vote.
Do you seriously think that this is a problem? Is there any evidence that people who do nothing than voting change the outcome of votes in any way? To me this sounds like a very theoretical argument.
The problem does not necessarily need to be solved by culling the membership list. Other approaches may be feasible.
Exactly. The other approach is to just let it be. It doesn't create real problems and our energy is much better spent on taking care of the active people and get things done in what we want to deliver to our users.
Anyway as Richard pointed out, a change in governance model needs a vote by "openSUSE Members" which brings us back to the original problem. Of course we can choose to change the governance model with the current voting structure.
There is no change in our governance structure needed.
There is no quorum defined for board elections, so the number of inactive
voters doesn't change the results of the election in any way.
Additionally there are no rules defined for any other votes by the members.
Our community is an informal one governed by the open source process, where
consensus and decisions by those who do the work govern the project, not
formal votes. It's simply not true that changes to the governance model need a
vote. That's not how the openSUSE community is built.
Our community is governed by doing, by communication, and by the values
outlined in the guiding principles.
The board would be well advised to follow its mandate to support the
community, its values, and the structures which are there. There is no need
for erecting formalities which are neither supposed to be there nor helpful.
Better spend your time and energy on wholeheartedly supporting what the
community does.
And I'm sorry if this discussion drifts into the meta regions of discussing
governance of the project. These discussions are harder to do productively and
they can't easily be concluded compared to when you just can write a piece of
code solving the problem. But they are important, as they help to create
clarity about how the community is understanding its values. This is what
guides how we work.
--
Cornelius Schumacher