Minutes for Meeting of October 4

Next Meeting

  • October 18, 2011

Attending

  • Bastien Nocera
  • Brian Cameron
  • Emmanuele Bassi
  • Karen Sandler
  • Rosanna Yuen
  • Shaun McCance

  • Stormy Peters
  • Ryan Lortie
  • Germán Poo-Caamaño

Regrets

Missing

Board Meeting Agenda

  • Events
    • GUADEC 2012
      • Organizers proposed July 26-30. Our response?
      • Concerned about August travel. Quick search doesn't seem to be an issue.
      • Core days: 27 28 29
      • Warmup/after-hours: 26, 30
      • "Stay after and hack": 31, 1
      • AB meeting should not be scheduled back to back with the board meeting.
      • Board meeting: 26
      • ACTION: Brian - To communicate with the GUADEC team about the Board's dates recommendations.

    • GUADEC 2010 (The Hague) budget.
      • Made $60,000 profit.
      • Should we highlight in the minutes or some other forum how much profit we made and/or the details of this final transaction?
        • Mention the profit in the minutes.
        • Blog post linking to the minutes.
          • corporate sponsors really came through - were really good that year
          • both national government and the Hague put in money
          • Dave Neary introduced developer training sessions
    • Desktop Summit
      • What to do with the survey results?
      • Stormy asked for a breakdown of the data, received a full data dump of the results in csv format. Asked for database format.
      • Some data mining required.
      • ACTION: Shaun - To help out extracting the GNOME respondents of the Desktop Summit survey.

  • Andreas Nilsson recommended the board open a flattr account and add it to gnome.org frontpage.
    • +1 from Stormy, Brian, Emmanuele, Ryan, Germán
    • Advantages of flattr?
    • Seems to be the most used solution for micro-payments in the GNOME community.
    • Experimental usage for a month.
    • Should be made clear that flattr is not to be confused with FoG and PayPal donations.

    • flattr needs to be checked for compatibility with non-profits.
    • ACTION: Karen - Will check flattr Terms of Service for compatibility with the Foundation.

  • A11y Contracting work
    • +1 from Brian, Emmanuele, Shaun.
    • Ryan okay with the idea of sponsoring engineering work related to a11y but not necessarily commenting on this proposal.
    • Stormy abstains: not enough context.
    • Is this different now that most of them are working for Igalia? i.e. should we open it up wider?
    • a11y is a real issue that needs work
    • Have they gotten input from other GNOME teams on the issues?
    • We have a history of working well with them.
    • All people involved are employed by the same company.
    • Plans include setting up a review board with different companies involved.
    • Who would get the money?
    • A11Y team members are the ones identifying the issues and offering to work on them.
    • Transparency is important to avoid wrong impressions.
    • We need an open bidding process to ensure fairness.
    • Ask to have an updated proposal with concrete targets, discussed with the toolkit team (Matthias Clasen, Benjamin Otte).
    • The proposal needs success metrics, and transparency/accountability.
    • ACTION: Ryan - To communicate with the a11y team the decisions of the board on their contract work proposal.

    • ACTION: Ryan - Will send a draft of the a11y contract email to board-list.

    • Need a complete proposal for a FoG campaign.
  • Annual Report.
    • Daniel Galleguillos has an interest in working on the Annual Report.
    • Needs somebody to manage him.
    • ACTION: Germán - To respond to Daniel about the Annual Report.

    • Emily (emilyyrose) asked on marketing-list for tasks and who to contact to help out.
    • Maybe move the report from annual to every other year.
    • Or a one-off bump to 2012.
    • Drains: mostly coordination, and design work.
    • Improving the process to release it on time.
    • Quarterly reports are also being released.
    • ACTION: Shaun - To contact the previous editors of the Annual Report to gather a better picture of how to move forward.

  • A lot of spam to the board list is coming from fundraising@gnome.org, can we fix this?

  • Vincent Untz requested to be reimbursed €76.20 for GNOME 3.0 PromoDVD shipments.
    • No vote should be needed, perhaps just an action for Rosanna.
    • ACTION: Rosanna - Will cover costs for Vincent's GNOME 3.0 PromoDVD shipments.

  • Should we join the OSI? We received an invitation from Simon Phipps.
    • Could be an issue with some companies and members of AB.
    • Topic to bring up with the advisory board members.
  • Advisory Board meeting
    • Timezones are a factor for some of the attendees.
    • Agenda should be circulated well in advance.
    • Possible topics
      • GNOME OS
      • Clarity Act
      • Friends of GNOME
      • GNOME 3.2 Promotion

Completed Actions

  • Brian - Will respond to Alejandro Piñeiro on the A11Y performance project.
  • Brian - To send an email to the foundation-list to get the discussion of the Annual Report going.

Status of action items

  • Bastien - To contact the BBC to discuss about possible collaboration in working directly with GNOME.
  • Bastien - Reach out to the GNOME Advisory Board via email to see if they can help out with providing contacts at Yahoo.
  • Brian - Develop trademark usage forms for common use cases. James Vasile from legal is working with Brian on this.
  • Brian - Check records of organizations with existing contracts to use the GNOME trademark. Taken over from Vincent Untz. Look at the archives in 2005 and try to determine which companies can use the GNOME trademark. Know what kind of contracts we had with them. Taken over from Jorge.
  • Brian - Will touch base with the GIMP organizers to find out their plans for the GIMP money.
  • Brian - To coordinate a fund raising meeting with the GStreamer, a11y, GIMP, and Banshee teams. Will draft an agenda.
  • Brian - Follow up with getting Alan Day and Sumana Harihareswara to sign the Copyright Assessment from SFLC.
  • Brian - Will ask Rosanna for more details regarding GSoC payments.
  • Emmanuele - Will send an email to board-list to start the discussion on PGO policy and editorial control.
  • Emmanuele - Will talk to Alberto Ruiz about the board's position on PGO policy changes.
  • Germán - Will talk to membership committee to see if we can do something to help remind people to renew memberships to avoid people losing the ability to vote.
  • Germán - Will continue the discussion with Frederic about the Gitorious instance on gnome.org
  • Germán and Ryan - Will relay the board's recommendations to the membership committee about renewal and expiration of membership.
  • Karen - Will take over discussions to take over ownership of some GNOME related domains.
  • Karen - Will follow up with CiviCRM contract.
    • After some tracking down of the status of the communications, cedwards sent email to get discussions with Claudian moving again.
  • Karen - Will follow up with LojaGeek.

  • Karen - Will follow up with the lawyers to discuss what would be involved to provide liability protection like what the Conservancy provides and to see if they have any perspective about whether the GNOME Foundation should allow GNOME projects to join Conservancy.
  • Karen - To look into Google Checkout as an annual payment option for FoG.
  • Karen - Will work with Gil Forcada from guifi.net and gnome-marketing to define the best way for organizations like guifi.net to participate in the GNOME community. Not many replies from the community. Diego Urrelo will draft something more concrete for gnome-marketing to determine the best name and process for managing this. There was a discussion on the mailing list and a few good ideas, Diego will wrap them up and send them again for further comments. Will follow-up with Board to read the Advisory Board fees for small businesses proposal, ask for feedback and set a date to vote by.
  • Karen - To finish the Privacy Policy, get review from James Vasile, etc.
  • Karen - Will follow up with John and get more information about GNU Mobile.
  • Karen - Will contact the bank again to discuss the fraudulent cheques.
  • Karen - Will contact guadec-list to find out the information we need to do the announcements for GUADEC 2012.
  • Karen - Will lead a discussion about what to do about the next FoG campaign.
  • Karen - Will send an email to adboard to schedule the next meeting.
  • Rosanna - Automate the process of entering PayPal information into GnuCash.

  • Rosanna - Will apply for the GNOME credit card.
  • Ryan - To look into running a survey for foundation members about the Desktop Summit.
  • Ryan - Will contact Canonical for a quote for the release notes.
  • Ryan - Will send an email to the adboard list with an update and to solicit help.
  • Ryan - Will propose a draft of the email on board-list
  • Shaun - Will lead the GNOME Foundation IRC meetings.
  • Shaun - To contact Dave Neary and Ekaterina Gerasimova to get a list of attendees to get feedback for the summit.
  • Stormy - Take care of GnuCash automation. Taken over from Paul & Behdad.

  • Stormy - to ask LWN if they can automate it with gnome.org addresses
  • All board members - To review and comment Brian's April 14th proposal regarding better organizing earmarked fundraising.
  • All board members - Review the unpublished minutes.

New Action Items

  • Brian - To communicate with the GUADEC team about the Board's dates recommendations.
  • Germán - To inform the local GUADEC 2010 organization the decision to make final payment to cover remaining costs.
  • Germán - To respond to Daniel about the Annual Report.
  • Karen - Will check flattr Terms of Service for compatibility with the Foundation.
  • Karen - To contact the sysadmin for options on reducing the spam on fundraising@gnome.org

  • Ryan - To communicate with the a11y team the decisions of the board on their contract work proposal.
  • Ryan - Will send a draft of the a11y contract email to board-list.
  • Rosanna - Will cover costs for Vincent's GNOME 3.0 PromoDVD shipments.
  • Shaun - To help out extracting the GNOME respondents of the Desktop Summit survey.
  • Shaun - To contact the previous editors of the Annual Report to gather a better picture of how to move forward.

Discussed on the mailing list

  • GNOME 3.2 Announcement!
  • Google let the board know that they have $10k earmarked specifically for Gnome hackathons in their 2011 budget.
  • Events
    • Stormy received the survey results from the Desktop Summit.
    • Planning with the GUADEC 2012 Committee.
    • Planning with the organizers of the "Accessibility of the libre! workstation" event.
    • Germán provided the board with the final budget from GUADEC in The Hague.
    • The travel committee received 4 additional travel requests for the Monteal Summit for a total cost of $2,189.95.
      • Approved: +1 from Brian, Ryan, Emmanuele, Bastien, Stormy.
      • Tiffany Antopolski
      • José Aliste
      • Michael Hill
      • Andreas Nilsson
  • The a11y team provided more detailed information about the contract work they are planning.
    • +1 from Brian, Emmanuele.
    • 3 Parts
      • Part 1. A full performance analysis identifying the impact of enabling accessibility support should be conducted.
      • Part 2. A detailed, prioritized list of the specific sources/causes of the performance degradation problems should be provided.
      • Part 3. A performance regression test solution for technologies with identified bottlenecks should be developed.
    • Parts 1+2: $15,000
    • Part 3: $10,000
  • Finance
    • FreeWear provided details on the GNOME merchandise sold in September.

      • 2 items with 6 euros to The GNOME Foundation.
      • 26.40 euros so far in 2011.
    • Vincent Untz requested to be reimbursed €76.20 for GNOME 3.0 PromoDVD shipments.
  • Miscellaneous
    • Simon Phipps invited GNOME to join the OSI.
    • Ryan suggested a contest for "best new GNOME app". Maybe $2000 to winner, and $1000 to each of 3 runner-ups? He thinks it would be nice to keep it pretty much wide open within a few simple guidelines (working well with the shell, etc).
    • Andreas Nilsson recommended the board open a flattr account and add it to gnome.org frontpage.
      • +1 from Stormy, Brian, Emmanuele.
    • Emily provided the board with the final Q2 Report to review before publishing.
    • Discussion about developing closer contact with Adobe.

FoundationBoard/Minutes/20111004 (last edited 2011-10-18 13:57:26 by EmmanueleBassi)