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On Sun, Aug 14, 2011 at 10:42 AM, Roy Bamford <neddyseagoon@g.o> wrote: |
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> The Council is elected by the members of the community holding a |
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> @gentoo.org email address. Thats a very small subset of the Gentoo |
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> community ... but maybe we should open voting to the entire Gentoo |
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> community ? |
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> |
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> There are practical problems with that of course. |
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My main concern with that is that ultimately it is the developers that |
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make Gentoo go, and the focus of the Council tends to be on the |
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governance of the developers anyway. |
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If all of the devs want to do thing, and all of the users want to do |
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something else, then in the end the distro will end up going with the |
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devs, one way or another. The only way volunteer projects go anywhere |
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is for volunteers to do the work. You can't really give orders to |
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volunteers, but you can inspire them to follow through example. |
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That isn't to say that devs are the only ones who do anything for |
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Gentoo - there are staff who aren't devs, and I'm fine with them being |
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members of the Foundation. The Council tends to stay focused on |
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matters that deal with the developers, so self-oversight is probably |
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fine. |
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I do hear what you're getting at though. It sounds good to me in an |
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ideal world, but I am concerned that it might not work well in |
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practice. |
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> I see the council members as officers of the Foundation, not directors |
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> of the Foundation. The two roles are different and should be spilt. |
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Well, that's the whole two-headed monster bit. They're not really |
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officers or directors of the Foundation, and "Gentoo" the distro and |
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Gentoo the Foundation aren't actually the same entity by our odd |
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organizational design. Maybe you could call the Council the |
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leadership of the employee union. :) |
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Long term it wouldn't hurt to change this. Short-term I'd like to let |
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the Trustees continue to focus on getting the Foundation itself in |
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better shape. |
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Rich |