<div dir="ltr">Yes Patrick-<div><br></div><div>My reasoning for reaching out to yourself and Larry on this point is obvious-- who can we trust ? </div><div><br></div><div>In my recent conversations with the White House and Congressional members there is a bit of confusion as to best practices with regard to repositories as well as concern regarding service company availability. I guess these are good problems to have as it shows forward movement. </div><div><br></div><div>I have noticed that when new champions come along there is a tendency for group think to the extent the new found excitement might wish to replace the old guard pioneers. I persist we must keep our vetted core team in the driver's seat as we can not afford to be derailed here. </div><div><br></div><div>Best and thanks-</div><div><br></div><div>BT </div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Feb 23, 2016 at 12:55 PM, Patrick Masson <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:masson@opensource.org" target="_blank">masson@opensource.org</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><u></u>
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I agree, care should be taken to ensure the autonomy, direction, ethos of the original developers/organizers is maintained. <br>
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My suggestion would not be to relegate the project to some group, but rather find a place for--as we're quiting Simon Phipps--"a safe environment for the project to exist" or what he calls an "asset lock." <<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybAiTpqanDY" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybAiTpqanDY</a>>. I would offer that all of the operational and governance David rightly advocates for can be managed within the right foundation.<br>
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As we ll know, there is a lot of work in developing both the code and community. Again, the right foundation can reduce the overhead of starting up and maintaining the project: key phrase, "right foundation" that does not threaten the project just as David fears/describes.<br>
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My fear is that S.F. City generates an RFP that includes a requirement that the final result be distributed with an open source license. Then all the development goes off behind the closed doors of the winning contractor where only a final product is pushed over the wall. This is both a governance and operational/development catastrophe. I'd also be worried that that contractor retains the copyright (or even the city) versus a foundation where authority/governance is representative rather than appointed or sponsored (pay to play).<br>
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All that said, David is spot on to raise these concerns as a foundation can very much take over, or put such a burden on the project that it constrains it.<br>
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And again, quoting Simon from the above OSCON keynote, "If you're going to start a new activity, I beg you to join an existing organization if you possibly can--an existing proven organization." That video also has some other good advise that might be worth considering as your project moves forward.<br>
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Patrick<br>
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On Tue, 2016-02-23 at 13:29 -0700, David RR Webber (XML) wrote:
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My experience with all this is not at all positive I'm afraid.
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Whomever you assign it to then thinks they "own it" - and start down a slippery path to the dark side of control mania.
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Alternatively - all the original players leave there - and then the new folks ignore it - loose the domains - passwords et al.
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My preference is for the Github / Sourceforge model - where there is a team of technical folks managing the source base - and have a vested interest in that. Plus - you have people assigned tasks - and are submitting updates - and all changes are tracked.<br>
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If you want to have some way for organizations - such as States or Cities to be stewards - and request features - fund updates - then that is cool - building an engaged user commuity.
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<b>A great model for that is what LibreOffice is doing and see this posting from there:</b>
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<b><a href="http://webmink.com/2016/02/19/joining-the-document-foundation-board" target="_blank">http://webmink.com/2016/02/19/joining-the-document-foundation-board</a>/</b><br>
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Please don't call it a Foundation though - as Simon Phipps notes!!!<br>
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David
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