[gentoo-council] Re: [gentoo-dev] Jun 11th, 2009 Council Meeting Format

[Tiziano Müller]

Am Montag, den 01.06.2009, 23:15 -0500 schrieb Doug Goldstein:
> All,
>
> The current council meetings have gotten completely out of hand for
> weeks meetings have become nothing more then a continuation of the
> senseless bicker-fest that have become the e-mail threads on GLEP54,
> GLEP55, and EAPI-3 without any real progress or sense coming of them.
> It's taken me a little bit to step up and put a stop to it but I fully
> intend on putting a stop to it. The point of the council meetings is
> to bring up a topic and decide on its merits whether it should be
> brought into the Gentoo Project or not. I quote from the first line of
> the Gentoo Council website:
>
> "The elected Gentoo Council decides on global issues and policies that
> affect multiple projects in Gentoo."
>
> We have all collectively failed the Gentoo Project since we have not
> been doing this for the past several weeks. I propose the following
> changes be instituted before the meeting and happen through the
> meeting:
>
> 1) Agenda Topics are posted to the appropriate mailing lists at a
> MINIMUM 7 days prior to the meeting. (That means the agenda must be
> formed by this Thursday).
ACK

> 1a) Any changes to the agenda should be ACK'd by the council members
> (off list via the council alias). Changes can not occur less than 48
> hours from the meeting.
> 2) The #gentoo-council channel become moderated as we had discussed
> several times in the past.
While there were some meetings where this would really have been
appropriate I don't think it should be a general rule.

> 2a) Topics will be brought up and people wishing to address the
> council and the developer body at large should speak to the day's
> appointed moderator. We can take turns or I can do it (maybe it'll
> keep my head from banging against the keyboard as it has in the past
> watching the various non-council members argue completely non-agenda
> items back and forth).
(mostly the discussions where between council and non-council members)

> 2b) Requests are made in tells and honored in turn. The moderator will
> announce to the channel who wishes to speak and the order they are in
> and will efficiently work through the list. If you can not remain on
> topic, you will lose your voice.
I don't think that this way is appropriate since there should be as less
boundaries as possible. And establishing an environment where people get
received in audience (like with a king) can not be the way...

> 3) Once discussion on the topic has concluded, the council members
> will vote on the actions requested by the developer body. That does
> not mean it is time for council members to concoct an entirely new
> plan by the seat of their pants... which leads me to the next topic.
The goal should be to get a common conclusion without having to vote.
Voting should be a last resort measurement in case a decision is needed
and people can't agree.

> 4) Council members will now be expected to ACK the agenda on the
> appropriate mailing lists at least 48 hours prior to the meeting. If
> you can't, let the council know. You should be able to do this without
> relying on your proxy, but your proxy may do this for you as well if
> you have an extended away.
If you want to reorganize how things work, please remove the concept of
"proxies" completely and rather allow council members to miss in total 4
meetings with two of them without announcement. (numbers are examples)
The reason is that proxies will never be as well prepared as council
members (or as council members should be), etc.

> 4a) Failure to ACK the agenda will be noted on the meeting minutes.
Failure to ACK will be counted as missing a meeting since it has to be
assumed that the given council member is unprepared.
And, after all, being a council member doesn't only involve the presency
at the meeting but also some sort of involvement or understanding of the
topics.

> 4b) Council members will be expected to formulate their thoughts in
> reply to the agenda items and to research the discussion they wish to
> have on the mailing list PRIOR to the meeting and not fly by the seat
> of their pants.
But there must still be some room for discussions.

> 4c) "The first I heard of this and I need 4 weeks to research this."
> or any variation of the quoted statement is no longer a valid
> statement. The point of the meeting is to weigh and debate the items
> before us now. Do your research PRIOR to the meeting, not during.
Full ACK.

>
> I know this is a sharp pill to swallow and a firm deviation from the
> past 2 or 3 months of council meetings but this is something the
> council toyed with before and it was successful until we started to
> let it slip to the situation we have today.
>
> I look forward to the current council members ack'ing this e-mail
> (whether it be in parts or in whole) and I look forward to our Gentoo
> developer body ack'ing this e-mail to show support that they want a
> "goal oriented action taking" council and not a "delay and talk"
> council. This council has only a few short weeks remaining and now is
> the time to start reviewing candidates and seeing if they will do for
> you in the coming year what you expect a council to do.
>
> If people like this, great. If people don't, then I can feel comforted
> that I spoke my piece about what I want to see the council become and
> people don't share the same vision as me.



-- 
Tiziano Müller
Gentoo Linux Developer, Council Member
Areas of responsibility:
  Samba, PostgreSQL, CPP, Python, sysadmin, GLEP Editor
E-Mail   : dev-zero@g.o
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