[gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Denis Dupeyron]

Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Richard Freeman]

On 04/17/2010 07:50 PM, Denis Dupeyron wrote:
> Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?
>

Note - I mention Trustees a few times - this policy would of course not 
govern the trustees.  I mention them only to draw contrasts and better 
define the role of the council, which this does define.

I'm not sure this is actually a change, but I think that many would 
consider this a change, so perhaps it should be made explicit:

There is one Gentoo.  The Council heads it up.  There is one Gentoo 
Foundation.  The trustees head it up.  Full stop.

All other positions of leadership/etc exist to facilitate day to day 
work.  All are subordinate to one of these two bodies.  The council may 
be voting enact or revoke policy on behalf of any project/etc, and may 
make administrative decisions regarding project leads/etc.

Of course, the council is encouraged to not do so unless absolutely 
necessary.

The council ultimately represents all Gentoo devs, and so in the event 
of any kind of conflict they ultimately hold the final vote, except in 
matters concerning the foundation.  There the trustees hold a similar role.

Also - neither the trustees nor the council as a whole are required to 
recuse themselves from any decision due to a perceived conflict of 
interest, except where contrary to law.  Individual members of these 
bodies can of course do so at their own discretion.  If, for example, 
the council wants to settle a devrel matter directly, it can be judge, 
jury, court of appeals, and executioner.  Again, this should obviously 
not be the norm.

I know that lots of people seem to think that somehow it isn't good for 
the council to have too much power, but I think that ultimately somebody 
needs to be in charge.  I'd rather it be the council (elected by all) 
than some project head or whatever.  And I definitely don't like all the 
time wasted when everybody second guesses whether anybody is actually 
allowed to do something.  The norm of course should be for the council 
to be the court of appeals and not a day-to-day admin body.

Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Roy Bamford]

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On 2010.04.18 12:58, Richard Freeman wrote:
> On 04/17/2010 07:50 PM, Denis Dupeyron wrote:
> > Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?
> >
> 
> Note - I mention Trustees a few times - this policy would of course
> not govern the trustees.  I mention them only to draw contrasts and 
> better define the role of the council, which this does define.
> 
> I'm not sure this is actually a change, but I think that many would 
> consider this a change, so perhaps it should be made explicit:
> 
> There is one Gentoo.  The Council heads it up.  There is one Gentoo 
> Foundation.  The trustees head it up.  Full stop.
> 
[snip lots of good stuff]
> Rich
> 

Rich,

Thats an interesting concept that I only partly agree with. There is 
one Gentoo. True. The Council heads it up *techncially*. That's 
fairly important. If the council makes a bad decision on behalf of 
Gentoo, its the Foundation that gets sued and ultimately, the trustees 
who go to jail as they have legal responsibility for Gentoo.

Its a little be more subtle than that as the groups represented by the 
two leadership bodies are not the same but the basic idea is unchanged.

So far, there has been no friction between the two bodies and they 
operate well in their apparently isolated areas. As a trustee, I have a 
vested interest in making this arrangement work.

[Note] Its a good idea for anyone making decisions on behalf of Gentoo 
to be a Gentoo Foundation member.

-- 
Regards,

Roy Bamford
(Neddyseagoon) a member of
gentoo-ops
forum-mods
trustees


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Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Roy Bamford]

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On 2010.04.18 00:50, Denis Dupeyron wrote:
> Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?
> 

Yes. GLEP39 needs to state that the council is a proactive body, or 
words to that effect. I have some dim memory of the time it was formed 
that it was to be reactive ... "deciding on things brought to its 
attention" is a phrase that sticks in my mind.

A a proactive body it would determine the Gentoo 'Vision Statement' 
from time to time and set some direction. Individual members of the 
council have set out their stalls at election times but there is not 
much visibility of the elected body following through. 

-- 
Regards,

Roy Bamford
(Neddyseagoon) a member of
gentoo-ops
forum-mods
trustees


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Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Richard Freeman]

On 04/20/2010 02:21 PM, Roy Bamford wrote:
> Thats an interesting concept that I only partly agree with. There is
> one Gentoo. True. The Council heads it up *techncially*. That's
> fairly important. If the council makes a bad decision on behalf of
> Gentoo, its the Foundation that gets sued and ultimately, the trustees
> who go to jail as they have legal responsibility for Gentoo.

I understand what you're getting at.

However, how do you draw the line?

It seems to me that the legal reality is that there is a Gentoo linux 
distribution, which the Foundation graciously allows to use the name 
"Gentoo", which tends to have overlapping membership, but which is 
otherwise fairly independent.

Honestly, in most organizations there would simply be one board of 
directors for the whole thing and that is that.  This board would be the 
final appeal for any matter whether legal, business, technical, human 
resources, etc.  Now, typically the board appoints people to oversee 
these things on a day-to-day basis.  If there are multiple boards there 
is clear delineation of responsibility and authority, and often a 
subordinate relationship.

In any case, my post wasn't really intended to speak to conflicts 
between the trustees and the council.  I was thinking more about 
conflicts between project leads, random developers, etc, and the council.

The trustees and the Gentoo Foundation don't answer to the council. 
However, just about all other aspects of the Gentoo distribution do.  If 
there is not consensus on this then we should make explicit which body 
controls what - EVERYTHING in Gentoo should be subordinate to one of 
these two bodies, and we should expect the appropriate body to deal with 
messes that arise in their domain.

The main reason I wanted to try to make this explicit is that it seems 
like I've seen numerous threads where people essentially argue that the 
council doesn't have the right to decide this or that.  Now, I can see 
the legitimacy of this regarding GLEP 39 since the council does need to 
answer to the dev body as a whole.  However, I don't like the idea that 
the council is somehow limited in how it gets involved with day-to-day 
distribution matters because it is supposed to be a high and lofty body 
that only gets to vote on very specific matters.  Sure, as a practical 
matter it makes more sense for the council to be an appeals court than a 
first-line court, but to go from that to saying that the council can't 
take action until after devrel does, or that the devrel lead can't be on 
the council, or whatever just doesn't make sense to me.  The council 
should try to stay above the fray, but if it needs to step in and get 
its hands dirty they have that authority.  We elect them because we 
think they'll have the discretion to do the right thing.

I also am not a big fan of the whole 
can't-be-on-council-and-trustees-at-same-time bit either, but that is a 
different issue.

I like what you said about being proactive.  I don't see the sole 
purpose of the Council to be voting on GLEPs.  They are the leaders of 
Gentoo, so they should lead.  Of course, being a volunteer organization 
there will be limits to what they can do in this regard.

Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto]

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On 18-04-2010 11:58, Richard Freeman wrote:
> On 04/17/2010 07:50 PM, Denis Dupeyron wrote:
>> Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?
>>
> 
> I'm not sure this is actually a change, but I think that many would
> consider this a change, so perhaps it should be made explicit:
> 
> There is one Gentoo.  The Council heads it up.  There is one Gentoo
> Foundation.  The trustees head it up.  Full stop.
> 
> All other positions of leadership/etc exist to facilitate day to day
> work.  All are subordinate to one of these two bodies.  The council may
> be voting enact or revoke policy on behalf of any project/etc, and may
> make administrative decisions regarding project leads/etc.

I very strongly disagree with this view. I do want an elected body that
can have influence in the distribution, but I don't agree with this view
that there's the council, the developers and everything else "doesn't
matter" - doesn't matter if it's expressed in other words, more subtly
or diplomatically.
I'll try to write my ideas on this subject in another reply to this
thread, but for now I'll just say that we should try to find a balance
between individual projects and their elected leads and the council.
Furthermore, we have some special projects like Developer Relations and
Infrastructure that need particular care as their "subordinate role" is
either not so clear or not so desirable.
To address specifically your point about conflict of interest, that is
something that we should never waive casually. There is no rule that the
DevRel lead cannot be a council member - in case you've missed it, our
new DevRel lead is a council member. But we have a policy on how to deal
with developers and the eagerness on the idea to throw it away and just
let the council (the single body council?) do what it wants, is very
disturbing to me.


- -- 
Regards,

Jorge Vicetto (jmbsvicetto) - jmbsvicetto at gentoo dot org
Gentoo- forums / Userrel / Devrel / KDE / Elections
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Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Richard Freeman]

Note - references below to specific teams like Devrel are purely for 
illustrative purposes.  I don't intend to suggest that the council 
actually needs to step in right now to fix anything in any of these teams.

On 04/21/2010 08:27 PM, Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto wrote:
> On 18-04-2010 11:58, Richard Freeman wrote:
>> All other positions of leadership/etc exist to facilitate day to
>> day work.  All are subordinate to one of these two bodies.  The
>> council may be voting enact or revoke policy on behalf of any
>> project/etc, and may make administrative decisions regarding
>> project leads/etc.
> I'll try to write my ideas on this subject in another reply to this
> thread, but for now I'll just say that we should try to find a
> balance between individual projects and their elected leads and the
> council. Furthermore, we have some special projects like Developer
> Relations and Infrastructure that need particular care as their
> "subordinate role" is either not so clear or not so desirable.

Here is my concern.  I didn't vote for the lead of any of Gentoo's
projects.  At best I might get a chance to vote for one or two.
However, I do vote for the council.  So, the council represents the
developers of Gentoo as a whole.  If a project team wants to do
something that the council considers detrimental to the distro as a
whole (though perhaps it is optimal from the POV of the single team),
then they should have the right to step in and make amends.

The council and trustees are the most democratic bodies in Gentoo, and
it is fitting that they ultimately wield the most power.

> To address specifically your point about conflict of interest, that
> is something that we should never waive casually.

Agreed, that is why the council shouldn't just step in and deal with an
issue unless it is a serious one.  Who gets to decide if an issue is
serious enough?  Well, that would be the council, since they're the most
trusted body in the organization.

> But we have a policy on how to deal with developers and the eagerness
> on the idea to throw it away and just let the council (the single
> body council?) do what it wants, is very disturbing to me.

Who voted to create this policy?  Who gets to change it?  If I want to 
change devrel policy, how would I do that?  Suppose 85% of the Gentoo 
devs want to change it?  Right now they'd need to somehow convince a 
majority of the members of Devrel to change the policy, or elect a lead 
that would.  If the members of devrel are mostly from the 15% who 
disagree with the change then that might not happen.  If devrel just 
boots the council on some pretense, should the council not be allowed to 
hear their own appear since it is a conflict of interest?  My point is 
basically that closed groups like devrel should always be subordinate to 
an elected body - either the trustees or the council.

If you look at any other serious organization the purpose of committees 
and bureaucracy is to serve the organization, and the organization is 
represented overall by the board of directors, who are elected by the 
members/shareholders/etc.  This system works well - ultimately the 
members have absolute authority in elections, but the directors oversee 
things from time to time, and the committees and bureaucracy deal with 
the day-to-day.

For example, the KDE team shouldn't be running every decision past the 
council.  They probably should try to communicate to the community what 
they're up to, and they're one of the teams I'd actually consider among 
the better in this regard.  If the council sees a big problem then they 
should be able to step in if necessary, but they should of course use 
discretion before doing so.

That's really all I'm saying.  The council should not wield its power 
with a heavy hand, but it should not be prevented from intervening on 
behalf of the community when necessary.  To be honest, the complaint 
around here (perhaps warranted, perhaps not) seems to be more that the 
council doesn't do enough - I'm not sure that any council in memory 
would be eager to micromanage every project team.  However, this is why 
devs should consider maturity when electing the council.

The council doesn't do what it wants - it does what the developers as a 
whole want.  By all means throw in a recall provision in the GLEP if you 
want, but if the dispute is between the council (elected by all) and 
some project lead (maybe elected by a few devs they work closely with), 
I'd say the council will have the best overall perspective.

Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto]

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On 22-04-2010 01:23, Richard Freeman wrote:
> Note - references below to specific teams like Devrel are purely for
> illustrative purposes.  I don't intend to suggest that the council
> actually needs to step in right now to fix anything in any of these teams.
> 
> On 04/21/2010 08:27 PM, Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto wrote:
>> On 18-04-2010 11:58, Richard Freeman wrote:
>>> All other positions of leadership/etc exist to facilitate day to
>>> day work.  All are subordinate to one of these two bodies.  The
>>> council may be voting enact or revoke policy on behalf of any
>>> project/etc, and may make administrative decisions regarding
>>> project leads/etc.
>> I'll try to write my ideas on this subject in another reply to this
>> thread, but for now I'll just say that we should try to find a
>> balance between individual projects and their elected leads and the
>> council. Furthermore, we have some special projects like Developer
>> Relations and Infrastructure that need particular care as their
>> "subordinate role" is either not so clear or not so desirable.
> 
> Here is my concern.  I didn't vote for the lead of any of Gentoo's
> projects.  At best I might get a chance to vote for one or two.
> However, I do vote for the council.  So, the council represents the
> developers of Gentoo as a whole.  If a project team wants to do
> something that the council considers detrimental to the distro as a
> whole (though perhaps it is optimal from the POV of the single team),
> then they should have the right to step in and make amends.

My concern here is the idea that the council should be able to "disband"
a project or turn it around 180 degrees. If we open the door to this,
then we'll be throwing away the principles that any developer can create
a project, that a team acts as its members choose to and that in the end
some choices fall to those who do the work.
I don't disagree with the council being able to influence or to
cooperate with a particular project, but I don't like the idea of it
having "nukes". Also, you'rd arguing that if a developer can't have
influence on a team, they could try to go around it straight into the
council. The vast majority of Gentoo projects are open to membership and
that should be the preferred way to have influence on them - by sharing
the load and working with the other members. Besides, if the council
were to "disband" a team or try to force a policy on it, how do you
think that would work if there were no team members left and no one
stepped up?
If and when a project or an individual developer exhibits a behaviour or
takes action that compromises Gentoo or detriments its image, we should
have tools to address that. We already have some tools though.
Individual developers, depending on their actions, may be subject to
DevRel action or have their access suspended by the infra team. If the
issue has a legal base, the Foundation Trustees can be called to
intervene. Finally, in extreme cases, the council can also have a word
regarding individual developers and or projects.

> The council and trustees are the most democratic bodies in Gentoo, and
> it is fitting that they ultimately wield the most power.

Gentoo isn't exactly a "democracy" and therefore such comparisons
usually are not adequate for us.

>> But we have a policy on how to deal with developers and the eagerness
>> on the idea to throw it away and just let the council (the single
>> body council?) do what it wants, is very disturbing to me.
> 
> Who voted to create this policy?  Who gets to change it?  If I want to
> change devrel policy, how would I do that?  Suppose 85% of the Gentoo
> devs want to change it?  Right now they'd need to somehow convince a
> majority of the members of Devrel to change the policy, or elect a lead
> that would.  If the members of devrel are mostly from the 15% who
> disagree with the change then that might not happen.  If devrel just
> boots the council on some pretense, should the council not be allowed to
> hear their own appear since it is a conflict of interest?  My point is
> basically that closed groups like devrel should always be subordinate to
> an elected body - either the trustees or the council.
> 
> If you look at any other serious organization the purpose of committees
> and bureaucracy is to serve the organization, and the organization is
> represented overall by the board of directors, who are elected by the
> members/shareholders/etc.  This system works well - ultimately the
> members have absolute authority in elections, but the directors oversee
> things from time to time, and the committees and bureaucracy deal with
> the day-to-day.

Gentoo (the distribution) is not a Corporation, so that comparison isn't
adequate as well.

Like it or not, a body like Developer Relations isn't democratic by
nature. I don't think it ever had open membership as one of the concerns
is that its members have some particular traits. Thus, as far as I know,
all current and former members were always invited in.
But Developer Relations isn't a "Boy's Club" or the only "not so open"
group in Gentoo. There's also User Relations. The infrastructure team,
for its own responsibility and abilities, as far as I know, has always
invited members in and doesn't have open membership. To a certain extent
the QA team has worked that way too and I'm sure most of us would like
QA members to exhibit certain qualities. Then there's PR.
So, as I said, some teams have particularities that need to be taken
into account. Also, some policies like Developer Relations are never
good candidates for a referendum. To have an effective and adequate
policy, you want people to work on it with cool blood, to leverage some
experience on it and not to be concerned with the document's
"popularity". If DevRel were ever to try to introduce arbitrary measures
in the policy contrary to Gentoo's interest and or of questionable
nature, the Council should obviously have a say. I would say Trustees
could also be called into action, but I don't see a direct way for them
to intervene as long as the change impact only the people working on
Gentoo and or the way they work on Gentoo and not the distribution in
itself, but nothing prevents the Council asking for their help if they
see it fit.

> For example, the KDE team shouldn't be running every decision past the
> council.  They probably should try to communicate to the community what
> they're up to, and they're one of the teams I'd actually consider among
> the better in this regard.  If the council sees a big problem then they
> should be able to step in if necessary, but they should of course use
> discretion before doing so.

A former council did have some influence, not directly in the KDE
project, but by having DevRel evaluate and act on one of its members -
at the time the Lead. That action did had a profound impact in the
project - it almost killed it and it took a long time for KDE to get
back in shape. For this discussion the relevant part is that the action
was done by DevRel, it was about an individual member behaviour and even
though it followed procedure it still raised much concern about the
council influence - so one can only imagine what would have been the
reactions if council were able to take action directly. Furthermore,
such influence in the end lead to most of the existing active members
leaving the project and if there had been no new blood coming in, we
might had been left without KDE on Gentoo. So a direct intervention by
the Council on a project may have dire consequences.
To be clear, I do want the Council to have influence over Gentoo, but I
don't like the idea of "carte blanche" and therefore am concerned about
the degree and method by which the council should "leverage" its influence.

> That's really all I'm saying.  The council should not wield its power
> with a heavy hand, but it should not be prevented from intervening on
> behalf of the community when necessary.  To be honest, the complaint
> around here (perhaps warranted, perhaps not) seems to be more that the
> council doesn't do enough - I'm not sure that any council in memory
> would be eager to micromanage every project team.  However, this is why
> devs should consider maturity when electing the council.
> 
> The council doesn't do what it wants - it does what the developers as a
> whole want.  By all means throw in a recall provision in the GLEP if you
> want, but if the dispute is between the council (elected by all) and
> some project lead (maybe elected by a few devs they work closely with),
> I'd say the council will have the best overall perspective.
> 
> Rich
> 

- -- 
Regards,

Jorge Vicetto (jmbsvicetto) - jmbsvicetto at gentoo dot org
Gentoo- forums / Userrel / Devrel / KDE / Elections
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Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Richard Freeman]

On 04/22/2010 07:41 AM, Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto wrote:
> My concern here is the idea that the council should be able to "disband"
> a project or turn it around 180 degrees. If we open the door to this,
> then we'll be throwing away the principles that any developer can create
> a project, that a team acts as its members choose to and that in the end
> some choices fall to those who do the work.

Not at all - developers could still do all of this, as long as they 
don't do anything so drastically bad for the distro that the council 
would need to step in.

The council should of course use discretion in its actions, and it 
should always just talk to somebody before they go booting people/etc.

> Besides, if the council
> were to "disband" a team or try to force a policy on it, how do you
> think that would work if there were no team members left and no one
> stepped up?

Again, a good reason for the council to use discretion.  However, in 
some cases it would be better to not have a team at all than to have a 
team acting contrary to the overall distro's interests.

> Finally, in extreme cases, the council can also have a word
> regarding individual developers and or projects.

How?  This is exactly what I'm proposing - that in extreme cases the 
council can intervene directly as needed.  If the council can't do this, 
then how can they "have a word" unless you literally mean nothing more 
than words.

> Gentoo isn't exactly a "democracy" and therefore such comparisons
> usually are not adequate for us.

Perhaps not purely so, it is a bit more of a meritocracy, but it is 
essentially democratic.  I don't see why democracy is a bad thing, as 
long as it doesn't involve those who don't do anything wielding power 
over those who do.  Having at least a little control over the membership 
roles should mitigate this.

> Gentoo (the distribution) is not a Corporation, so that comparison isn't
> adequate as well.

What is a corporation?  It is essentially a body of people aligned to a 
common purpose.  The same governance models apply to everything from 
businesses to clubs to professional organizations to churches to 
parliaments.  Perhaps all these organizations have figured out that this 
model works fairly well - or at least better than the alternatives. 
Honestly, I don't really see what cohesive alternative you're offering 
other than a loose confederation with oversight by closed bodies.

> But Developer Relations isn't a "Boy's Club" or the only "not so open"
> group in Gentoo. There's also User Relations. The infrastructure team,
> for its own responsibility and abilities, as far as I know, has always
> invited members in and doesn't have open membership. To a certain extent
> the QA team has worked that way too and I'm sure most of us would like
> QA members to exhibit certain qualities. Then there's PR.

I don't think that any of these organizations are doing a bad job.  I'm 
not sure they should be open to anybody who wants to sign up.  However, 
there should always be oversight.  That is really all I'm proposing. 
Having council oversight actually frees up these organzations to not 
feel as beholden to admit devs at large, since the council can hold them 
accountable.

In the end there will always be oversight - right now it isn't written 
down, but in the end SOMEBODY or some group is in charge.  I guess it 
effectively is whoever has root on the servers, or perhaps the trustees 
since they can determine who can use the name Gentoo.  All I'm saying is 
that we should realize that governance is necessary and set up the best 
form of governance we can have.

> A former council did have some influence, not directly in the KDE
> project, but by having DevRel evaluate and act on one of its members -
> at the time the Lead. That action did had a profound impact in the
> project - it almost killed it and it took a long time for KDE to get
> back in shape.

And in the end, was Gentoo as a whole better off or worse off? 
Sometimes you need to take a step back to take a step forward.  I have 
no idea what the specifics of this situation were, so I can't comment on 
whether I agree or disagree with what the council did.  However, if a 
key contributor to Gentoo is doing more harm than good by driving others 
away, then it might be better for them to not be around.

Donnie gave a good talk to this effect:
http://www.mefeedia.com/watch/21519531

> To be clear, I do want the Council to have influence over Gentoo, but I
> don't like the idea of "carte blanche" and therefore am concerned about
> the degree and method by which the council should "leverage" its influence.

Well, are there any alternatives short of the Council being able to do 
nothing but ask people nicely to not destroy the distro?  I'm fine with 
checks and balances, but in the end somebody needs to have the final 
say, and I'd rather see that be a body elected by all - either the 
trustees or the council.

Maybe there are some ways to address the concern of a runaway council.

Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

On 22-04-2010 21:55, Richard Freeman wrote:
> On 04/22/2010 07:41 AM, Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto wrote:
>> My concern here is the idea that the council should be able to "disband"
>> a project or turn it around 180 degrees. If we open the door to this,
>> then we'll be throwing away the principles that any developer can create
>> a project, that a team acts as its members choose to and that in the end
>> some choices fall to those who do the work.
> 
> Not at all - developers could still do all of this, as long as they
> don't do anything so drastically bad for the distro that the council
> would need to step in.
> 
> The council should of course use discretion in its actions, and it
> should always just talk to somebody before they go booting people/etc.
> 
>> Besides, if the council
>> were to "disband" a team or try to force a policy on it, how do you
>> think that would work if there were no team members left and no one
>> stepped up?
> 
> Again, a good reason for the council to use discretion.  However, in
> some cases it would be better to not have a team at all than to have a
> team acting contrary to the overall distro's interests.
> 
>> Finally, in extreme cases, the council can also have a word
>> regarding individual developers and or projects.
> 
> How?  This is exactly what I'm proposing - that in extreme cases the
> council can intervene directly as needed.  If the council can't do this,
> then how can they "have a word" unless you literally mean nothing more
> than words.

I read your proposal as giving unlimited powers to the council without
some form of check and balances. I gather from your last reply that you
want to ensure they have enough leeway to be able to act, but that they
should only do it in extreme cases. It seems there's room to try to find
a balance.

>> Gentoo isn't exactly a "democracy" and therefore such comparisons
>> usually are not adequate for us.
> 
> Perhaps not purely so, it is a bit more of a meritocracy, but it is
> essentially democratic.  I don't see why democracy is a bad thing, as
> long as it doesn't involve those who don't do anything wielding power
> over those who do.  Having at least a little control over the membership
> roles should mitigate this.

I don't think democracy is bad, I just wanted to highlight that not
everything in Gentoo is subject to democratic rules.

>> Gentoo (the distribution) is not a Corporation, so that comparison isn't
>> adequate as well.
> 
> What is a corporation?  It is essentially a body of people aligned to a
> common purpose.  The same governance models apply to everything from
> businesses to clubs to professional organizations to churches to
> parliaments.  Perhaps all these organizations have figured out that this
> model works fairly well - or at least better than the alternatives.
> Honestly, I don't really see what cohesive alternative you're offering
> other than a loose confederation with oversight by closed bodies.

You have a point as I haven't submitted any alternative yet. I do want
to submit a proposal but I'm still thinking about it and evaluating old
thoughts about Gentoo's meta-structure.

>> But Developer Relations isn't a "Boy's Club" or the only "not so open"
>> group in Gentoo. There's also User Relations. The infrastructure team,
>> for its own responsibility and abilities, as far as I know, has always
>> invited members in and doesn't have open membership. To a certain extent
>> the QA team has worked that way too and I'm sure most of us would like
>> QA members to exhibit certain qualities. Then there's PR.
> 
> I don't think that any of these organizations are doing a bad job.  I'm
> not sure they should be open to anybody who wants to sign up.  However,
> there should always be oversight.  That is really all I'm proposing.
> Having council oversight actually frees up these organzations to not
> feel as beholden to admit devs at large, since the council can hold them
> accountable.
> 
> In the end there will always be oversight - right now it isn't written
> down, but in the end SOMEBODY or some group is in charge.  I guess it
> effectively is whoever has root on the servers, or perhaps the trustees
> since they can determine who can use the name Gentoo.  All I'm saying is
> that we should realize that governance is necessary and set up the best
> form of governance we can have.

I agree fully with you about oversight. I don't think any project on
Gentoo can and should be able to run without oversight. My question is
about what type of oversight and what tools it should have at its disposal.

>> A former council did have some influence, not directly in the KDE
>> project, but by having DevRel evaluate and act on one of its members -
>> at the time the Lead. That action did had a profound impact in the
>> project - it almost killed it and it took a long time for KDE to get
>> back in shape.
> 
> And in the end, was Gentoo as a whole better off or worse off? Sometimes
> you need to take a step back to take a step forward.  I have no idea
> what the specifics of this situation were, so I can't comment on whether
> I agree or disagree with what the council did.  However, if a key
> contributor to Gentoo is doing more harm than good by driving others
> away, then it might be better for them to not be around.

I purposely avoided making a judgement about that decision. All I wanted
to do is to pick in an example from a team you mentioned to highlight
the consequences the type of council decisions we're talking about may have.

> Donnie gave a good talk to this effect:
> http://www.mefeedia.com/watch/21519531

I know his talk and some older talks about the same issue. The type of
behaviour at stake is something that in the short term falls under
either Developer Relations or User Relations. A discussion about what to
do in the long term was started by previous Councils, but a conclusion
wasn't reached.

>> To be clear, I do want the Council to have influence over Gentoo, but I
>> don't like the idea of "carte blanche" and therefore am concerned about
>> the degree and method by which the council should "leverage" its
>> influence.
> 
> Well, are there any alternatives short of the Council being able to do
> nothing but ask people nicely to not destroy the distro?  I'm fine with
> checks and balances, but in the end somebody needs to have the final
> say, and I'd rather see that be a body elected by all - either the
> trustees or the council.

I don't have any alternatives yet, but that's what I'd like to find.

> Maybe there are some ways to address the concern of a runaway council.

Yes, that may be part of the solution.

> Rich
> 

- -- 
Regards,

Jorge Vicetto (jmbsvicetto) - jmbsvicetto at gentoo dot org
Gentoo- forums / Userrel / Devrel / KDE / Elections
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Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Roy Bamford]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1801 bytes --]

On 2010.04.22 12:41, Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto wrote:
> On 22-04-2010 01:23, Richard Freeman wrote:
[snip]
> >
> > If you look at any other serious organization the purpose of
> committees
> > and bureaucracy is to serve the organization, and the organization
> is
> > represented overall by the board of directors, who are elected by
> the
> > members/shareholders/etc.  This system works well - ultimately the
> > members have absolute authority in elections, but the directors
> oversee
> > things from time to time, and the committees and bureaucracy deal
> with
> > the day-to-day.
> 
> Gentoo (the distribution) is not a Corporation, so that comparison
> isn't
> adequate as well.
> 
>
[snip]
> > Rich
> >
> 
> --
> Regards,
> 
> Jorge Vicetto (jmbsvicetto) - jmbsvicetto at gentoo dot org
> Gentoo- forums / Userrel / Devrel / KDE / Elections
> 

Team,

Gentoo the (distro) has no legal standing at all - thats wrapped up in 
the Foundation. Hence the two headed structure we have today.
That means that Gentoo (the distro) cannot bring a legal action, nor 
can it be the target of one. (There is no legal entity)

We are very close to a standard corporate structure. I suspect if 
there was ever any external (legal) pressure on Gentoo the distro, we 
would adopt a standard corporate structure, with the trustees 
(directors) looking after the business issues and the council looking 
after technical issues as a committee of the Gentoo Foundation Inc.

I won't speculate on the detail of any such change as what we have 
works for us at the moment. The missing strand is someone with a 
position in both groups, serving as a technical director.

-- 
Regards,

Roy Bamford
(Neddyseagoon) a member of
gentoo-ops
forum-mods
trustees


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Re: [gentoo-project] [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Richard Freeman]

On 04/22/2010 11:27 PM, Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto wrote:
>
> I read your proposal as giving unlimited powers to the council without
> some form of check and balances. I gather from your last reply that you
> want to ensure they have enough leeway to be able to act, but that they
> should only do it in extreme cases. It seems there's room to try to find
> a balance.

I think we're on the same page here.

> You have a point as I haven't submitted any alternative yet. I do want
> to submit a proposal but I'm still thinking about it and evaluating old
> thoughts about Gentoo's meta-structure.

Looking forward to it.  Perhaps you'll find such a balance.

I also agree with Roy's assessment that if push came to shove things may 
have to change, although honestly the status quo works well enough that 
I'm not sure I'd drive that change unless necessary.  I think that was 
what Roy was trying to suggest as well.

Rich

[gentoo-project] Re: [GLEP 39 overhaul] Do we want to make changes to the role of the council?

[Denis Dupeyron]

Summary for this topic. Here's the list of voting propositions that we
should discuss during the next meeting.

 - The council only reacts to requests from developers. The council
does not have other powers than making decisions which affects
multiple projects (i.e. GLEPs and EAPIs, anything else?) and being the
final court of appeal for disciplinary decisions.

 - The council only reacts to requests from developers and has direct
control over projects (feel free to suggest better language here),
including but not limited to creating, killing, merging splitting
projects, changing their leads, etc...

 - The council should be proactive in setting a direction and act
accordingly. The council does not however have direct control over
projects. (does this make any sense?)

 - The council should be proactive in setting a direction and act
accordingly, and has direct control over projects (feel free to
suggest better language here), including but not limited to creating,
killing, merging splitting projects, revoking their leads, etc...

 - Same as above but the trustees can revoke the council when they see
fit, especially when their actions are considered dangerous to the
foundation.

Denis.