Fedora Project and Fedora Board

Fri May 13 18:33:47 UTC 2011

It's that time again where we elect leadership on the community side of the Fedora Project. Like every time in recent history I have been getting nagged to run. I have said no in the past for several reasons, these reasons no longer apply.

One thing I refuse to do is "self-nominate" for any election. If you think I am good enough for the job put your money where your mouth is and nominate me, Dave Riches has decided to do just that. One of my requirements to accepting the nomination is that at least 10 people have to pledge all their Fedora Board votes exclusively to me, this means you don't give "range votes" to anyone else. You also put your name on the wiki page endorsing me, post about it on your blog, your facebook, the footers in your emails. If you think I can help make Fedora better, then it is going to be a team effort. My team, the community.

People ask why would I do this? what are my goals? Why when I am so unpopular with so many? Hopefully the nomination page questions will help answer these.

    * Goal statement: Work with the current FPL and the others on the Fedora Board to make sure we continue to respect the Four Foundations. To make sure that the community knows they are being heard via active two way communication. To read/hear what the community is saying and nodding your head is not enough. If the board is doing something, talking about something I want the community to know and I will want feedback from the community. The community elected Board members are your appointed voices and need to be accountable to you. Fedora is built on what I call "The Community Concept" in the recent past it seems that this concept has been failing, lets get it back on the right track.

      An issue that the Board and Fedora are facing now and in the near future is the CWG, how to enforce the CoC and how to deal with enforcement. Long term is the relationship with the GNOME Project. As downstream many feel we should have a say in what GNOME does, As upstream, hey it's the GNOME project and shouldn't they be able to do as they see fit? One thing that we the Fedora Project has to remember is that Red Hat has a huge investment in both projects, how does that impact what we do in the future? I think Red Hat needs to be respected, they do a lot for us. Should we or can we move away from GNOME as the main desktop in Fedora if that is the consensus of the community? How would our actions in that case impact them with out our foundation of First? GNOME has to deal with many external pressures and do their best to fit their market. I am not sure at this time how I feel about it as there are so many questions to think about, if elected I expect you to tell me how you feel about them and essentially how you want me to vote on these topics and any others that come up. I want to be your voice, anyone that knows me well knows I can play "devil's advocate" sticking up for something even if I personally disagree with it.

    * Past work summary: In the past 8 years I have been involved in many parts of the Fedora Project and the Fedora Community. The one most know is being one of the founders of the Fedora Unity Project, this project has given to the community things like FedoraSolved.org, Re-Spins of Fedora releases, the first LiveCDs. As part of Fedora Unity I was named as a Fedora Award winner in 2007. In the past have been involved in the Fedora Documentation Project including sitting on it's Steering Committee, The Fedora Ambassadors including sitting on FAMSCo, early on I was involved in Fedora Marketing and Websites. I started the Fedora Amateur Radio SIG packaging Ham apps for Fedora. I am actively involved in the "IRC Support SIG" trying to improve the user experience and change how we have done things wrong in the past and in some cases still are. I also have two projects on Fedora Hosted that we are currently working on, Reflector and Multiboot Media Creator.

    * Future plans: This is the hardest question for me to answer, it forces me to look at things that I may have done wrong... I have been and will continue to work on my communication skills so I don't piss people off every time I open my mouth or fire up my keyboard. Long term I would like to be the first true community FPL. I know they say it's a full time job and the FPL is a Red Hat employee. I have no desire to be a Red Hat employee at this time, to be paid to do something that I am passionate about.

    * Anything else you want to add: I will not self-nominate, if the community shows they want me then I am in. Some suggest that I am unpopular, If I have more than 10 people publicly endorsing me I am clearly not unpopular with everyone. Why am I unpopular with some? I speak the truth as I see it, some disagree with me, some think I am too brutal... some can't handle the truth. I have been known to say the right things the wrong way, I'm human. The Fedora Board is not about popularity, it's about making Fedora better, stronger, the best community in the sea of many distros. We do not have to be "First" in the market, Fedora's First is about innovation. That innovation like it or not is what brought most of us to Fedora and now we complain about new things in each release... We have to work together, splintering Fedora as a distro does us no good as a community.

So lets go ahead and run it up the flag pole and see who has the intestinal fortitude to salute.

-- Bob

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|       Robert 'Bob' Jensen        ||       Fedora Unity Founder       |
|       bob at fedoraunity.org        ||      http://fedoraunity.org/     |
|                   http://bjensen.fedorapeople.org/                   |
|                http://blogs.fedoraunity.org/bobjensen                |
|                   http://www.facebook.com/rpjensen                   |
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