Gentoo Archives: gentoo-nfp

From: Daniel Robbins <drobbins@××××××.org>
To: gentoo-nfp@l.g.o
Subject: [gentoo-nfp] nomination
Date: Fri, 01 Feb 2008 20:14:04
Message-Id: de7adc5e0802011213y615a47e1r59719b0a3b0c66b4@mail.gmail.com
1 On 2/1/08, George <cokehabit@×××××.com> wrote:
2 > Although he has already said no I hope to convince him to say yes by
3 > nominating him again:
4 >
5 > Daniel Robbins
6
7 Hey George,
8
9 One of the reasons I wanted to come back in the manner I initially
10 suggested is because I have limited time. To work as a trustee,
11 particularly to do what I would hope to do, would require a very large
12 investment of time to work within the structure that currently exists.
13
14 I don't have the amount of free time required to do that, so I would
15 either need to choose to have a stressful and overly busy life and
16 succeed with improving Gentoo or to be disciplined about not investing
17 too much time in the project but then not getting much done as a
18 trustee, in which case you would probably be disappointed in me as a
19 trustee. Coming back to Gentoo as a trustee as it currently operates,
20 for me at least, would basically be a 40-hour-a-week full-time job.
21
22 One of the benefits of moving away from a purely democratic model is
23 that having people who can simply make decisions is *way* more
24 efficient in terms of time. Yes, people can always disagree and leave
25 the project if you don't get them on board with your ideas, but that's
26 life. I don't see Linus taking polls and reading tea leaves because he
27 worries that he might alienate some Linux developers by a decision
28 that he makes. Competent people won't make decisions in a vacuum and
29 will consult with the appropriate subject matter experts first. Often,
30 the "experts" are the users and other members of the community.
31
32 If the structure stays pretty much the way it is, I think there might
33 be some need to have a full-time and competitively paid President or
34 Chief Architect position so some skilled and experienced person could
35 actually devote their efforts full-time to improving Gentoo. I am
36 aware that this is out of the realm of possibility right now, so that
37 leaves the option of streamlining the efficiency and effectiveness of
38 the organization to better match up with peoples' real-world time
39 commitments as volunteers.
40
41 That may involve scaling back ambitious plans in terms of joining
42 various other NFP entities and simply running the Foundation as it
43 currently exists, filing paperwork on time (which is not hard), etc.
44 The time wasted on investigating SPI and other entities far exceeds
45 the time that is required to actually run the Foundation as it exists.
46 I realize that this leaves some aspects of the Foundation's goals
47 unrealized. I think as long as this is communicated to the community
48 clearly, then this is OK for the time being. First things first. Get a
49 track record of getting the critical things taken care of - things
50 like getting a registered agent for the existing organization so that
51 the Foundation has a valid mailing address when its charter is
52 renewed, ensuring that the NM records are up-to-date and reflect
53 reality, etc. There is more than enough money to get an experienced NM
54 lawyer to help that can take care of this quite easily.
55
56 For the project, steps need to be taken to reduce bureaucracy without
57 harming the quality o the Portage tree, to improve efficiency and
58 streamline decision-making mechanisms and reduced centralized decision
59 making when possible.
60
61 Anyway, I'm getting off-topic. So I hope that gives you some more
62 insight into why I chose to decline the nomination. My initial offer
63 is what I determined I could personally handle while balancing other
64 commitments. (Note that I'm not secretly hinting that my initial offer
65 is still available, it isn't.)
66
67 Today, actually, I was planning to unsubscribe from -nfp due to other
68 commitments, which will probably happen in a few minutes.
69
70 -Daniel
71 --
72 gentoo-nfp@l.g.o mailing list