EMEA Membership Questione (was: Einladung / Invitation)

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Dienstag, den 06.05.2008, 22:56 +0200 schrieb Gerold Kassube:
>  Hi all together for the second,
>  
>  because I forgot and some are asking for; there is only a german bank
>  account possible (if we have elected a new Treasurer) and the
>  membership fee is EUR 128,-/year for Full membership. This amount can
>  be payed at Linuxtag in person (because of high transfer costs from
>  foreign countrys) ... 
AFAIR the Fedora EMEA NPO was founded to make it easier for us TO RAISE
money for Fedora and not TO SPEND it. Or did I get something
completely wrong here?

IMHO 128 € is way to much especially for those of us who are not from
the wealthy countries of Europe. I think once again the European
Ambassadors/Founding members of EMEA did not take the situation of all
ambassadors into account. Remember, the letters "ME" in EMEA mean
"Middle East" and "A" is for Africa. Has anybody really thought about
the people there?

Could someone also please point out what the difference between the
different membership grades is (full membership, family membership and
so on)? According to the declaration of accession to Fedora EMEA the
cost-reduced membership requires "a confirmation accepted in the Federal
Republic of Germany." What does that mean?

Next question: What do I get for my membership? If I read Jörg Simons
mail of March 24th 2008 correctly, members are getting a "one-off and
exclusive" welcome present, whatever this means. Must be a hell of a
present though... ;)

Also EMEA members are allowed to vote what to do the raised money. Of
course
understand this but I'm afraid we are going to divide the ambassadors
program into first and second class ambassadors: Those who (can afford
to) pay and therefore have more rights and those who don't.

Sorry, but this scares me off
Christoph

EMEA Membership Questione

[Sandro "red" Mathys]

Thank you Christoph, I already thought I'm the only guy who's thinking
something's going terribly wrong there.

+1 on everything, especially the €128.

Even though I can afford that money quite easily, I really have no idea
how that helps me to save money for travels to events a.s.o.

I thought private persons are welcome as basic members at a small fee
(10-20€...maybe less, if I'm thinking about certain countries) and it's
the companys that have to pay more for the member- oder even sponsorship.

By the way, I've been to Cameroun (West Africa) lately and you can't
imagine what it'd mean there to spend €128. A beer (0.6l) costs about
€0.6 and most people can't even afford to drink a single beer every day
(soft drinks are not way cheaper). Can you imagine what it'd meant to
spend €128 for them? And yes, they might be future ambassadors. I've
visited some computer schools there and they're doing a good job.
They're using Windows and not Linux yet, but maybe that's going to
change some day - as soon as it's no longer accepted that they're using
illegal licenses for example.

Well, my $.02

-- red


Christoph Wickert wrote:
>  Am Dienstag, den 06.05.2008, 22:56 +0200 schrieb Gerold Kassube:
> > Hi all together for the second,
> >
> > because I forgot and some are asking for; there is only a german bank
> > account possible (if we have elected a new Treasurer) and the
> > membership fee is EUR 128,-/year for Full membership. This amount can
> > be payed at Linuxtag in person (because of high transfer costs from
> > foreign countrys) ...
>  
>  AFAIR the Fedora EMEA NPO was founded to make it easier for us TO RAISE
>  money for Fedora and not TO SPEND it. Or did I get something
>  completely wrong here?
>  
>  IMHO 128 € is way to much especially for those of us who are not from
>  the wealthy countries of Europe. I think once again the European
>  Ambassadors/Founding members of EMEA did not take the situation of all
>  ambassadors into account. Remember, the letters "ME" in EMEA mean
>  "Middle East" and "A" is for Africa. Has anybody really thought
> about
>  the people there?
>  
>  Could someone also please point out what the difference between the
>  different membership grades is (full membership, family membership and
>  so on)? According to the declaration of accession to Fedora EMEA the
>  cost-reduced membership requires "a confirmation accepted in the Federal
>  Republic of Germany." What does that mean?
>  
>  Next question: What do I get for my membership? If I read Jörg Simons
>  mail of March 24th 2008 correctly, members are getting a "one-off and
>  exclusive" welcome present, whatever this means. Must be a hell of a
>  present though... ;)
>  
>  Also EMEA members are allowed to vote what to do the raised money. Of
>  course
>  understand this but I'm afraid we are going to divide the ambassadors
>  program into first and second class ambassadors: Those who (can afford
>  to) pay and therefore have more rights and those who don't.
>  
>  Sorry, but this scares me off
>  Christoph
>  
>  
>  --
>  Fedora-ambassadors-list mailing list
>  Fedora-ambassadors-list(a)redhat.com
>  https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-ambassadors-list

EMEA Membership Questione

[Gerold]

Just ONE small(er) answer because I'm on work and have not the time to
respond detailled ...

IT IS NOT MANDATORY TO BE MEMEBER OF FEDORA EMEA e.V. AND IT IS NOT PART
OF THE AMBASSADORS PROJECT!

If you want to discuss, we can do it here BUT the NPO once again is not
MANDATORY ...


The NPO starts out of the Ambassador Project and at the moment MOST
members are also Fedora Ambassador but YOU DON'T NEED TO JOIN!

More detailled (I hope) later

Regards

Gerold



>  Thank you Christoph, I already thought I'm the only guy who's
> thinking
>  something's going terribly wrong there.
>
>  +1 on everything, especially the €128.
>
>  Even though I can afford that money quite easily, I really have no idea
>  how that helps me to save money for travels to events a.s.o.
>
>  I thought private persons are welcome as basic members at a small fee
>  (10-20€...maybe less, if I'm thinking about certain countries) and it's
>  the companys that have to pay more for the member- oder even sponsorship.
>
>  By the way, I've been to Cameroun (West Africa) lately and you can't
>  imagine what it'd mean there to spend €128. A beer (0.6l) costs about
>  €0.6 and most people can't even afford to drink a single beer every day
>  (soft drinks are not way cheaper). Can you imagine what it'd meant to
>  spend €128 for them? And yes, they might be future ambassadors. I've
>  visited some computer schools there and they're doing a good job.
>  They're using Windows and not Linux yet, but maybe that's going to
>  change some day - as soon as it's no longer accepted that they're using
>  illegal licenses for example.
>
>  Well, my $.02
>
>  -- red
>
>
>  Christoph Wickert wrote:
> > Am Dienstag, den 06.05.2008, 22:56 +0200 schrieb Gerold Kassube:
> >> Hi all together for the second,
> >>
> >> because I forgot and some are asking for; there is only a german bank
> >> account possible (if we have elected a new Treasurer) and the
> >> membership fee is EUR 128,-/year for Full membership. This amount can
> >> be payed at Linuxtag in person (because of high transfer costs from
> >> foreign countrys) ...
> >
> > AFAIR the Fedora EMEA NPO was founded to make it easier for us TO RAISE
> > money for Fedora and not TO SPEND it. Or did I get something
> > completely wrong here?
> >
> > IMHO 128 € is way to much especially for those of us who are not from
> > the wealthy countries of Europe. I think once again the European
> > Ambassadors/Founding members of EMEA did not take the situation of all
> > ambassadors into account. Remember, the letters "ME" in EMEA mean
> > "Middle East" and "A" is for Africa. Has anybody really thought
> about
> > the people there?
> >
> > Could someone also please point out what the difference between the
> > different membership grades is (full membership, family membership and
> > so on)? According to the declaration of accession to Fedora EMEA the
> > cost-reduced membership requires "a confirmation accepted in the Federal
> > Republic of Germany." What does that mean?
> >
> > Next question: What do I get for my membership? If I read Jörg Simons
> > mail of March 24th 2008 correctly, members are getting a "one-off and
> > exclusive" welcome present, whatever this means. Must be a hell of a
> > present though... ;)
> >
> > Also EMEA members are allowed to vote what to do the raised money. Of
> > course
> > understand this but I'm afraid we are going to divide the ambassadors
> > program into first and second class ambassadors: Those who (can afford
> > to) pay and therefore have more rights and those who don't.
> >
> > Sorry, but this scares me off
> > Christoph
> >
> >
> > --
> > Fedora-ambassadors-list mailing list
> > Fedora-ambassadors-list(a)redhat.com
> > https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-ambassadors-list
>
>  --
>  Fedora-ambassadors-list mailing list
>  Fedora-ambassadors-list(a)redhat.com
>  https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-ambassadors-list
>

EMEA Membership Questione

[Jeroen van Meeuwen]

Christoph Wickert wrote:
>  Am Dienstag, den 06.05.2008, 22:56 +0200 schrieb Gerold Kassube:
>    
> > Hi all together for the second,
> >
> > because I forgot and some are asking for; there is only a german bank
> > account possible (if we have elected a new Treasurer) and the
> > membership fee is EUR 128,-/year for Full membership. This amount can
> > be payed at Linuxtag in person (because of high transfer costs from
> > foreign countrys) ...
> >     
>
>  AFAIR the Fedora EMEA NPO was founded to make it easier for us TO RAISE
>  money for Fedora and not TO SPEND it. Or did I get something
>  completely wrong here?
>     
Regardless of the height of the membership fee, Fedora EMEA will enable 
us, Fedora Ambassadors, to RAISE money easier, as well as SPEND it 
easier. That money however does not necessarily need to come from your 
pocket, and if it does, it doesn't necessarily mean it needs to be a 
membership fee.

>  IMHO 128 € is way to much especially for those of us who are
> not from
>  the wealthy countries of Europe. I think once again the European
>  Ambassadors/Founding members of EMEA did not take the situation of all
>  ambassadors into account. Remember, the letters "ME" in EMEA mean
>  "Middle East" and "A" is for Africa. Has anybody really thought
> about
>  the people there?
>
>  Could someone also please point out what the difference between the
>  different membership grades is (full membership, family membership and
>  so on)? According to the declaration of accession to Fedora EMEA the
>  cost-reduced membership requires "a confirmation accepted in the Federal
>  Republic of Germany." What does that mean?
>
>  Next question: What do I get for my membership? If I read Jörg Simons
>  mail of March 24th 2008 correctly, members are getting a "one-off and
>  exclusive" welcome present, whatever this means. Must be a hell of a
>  present though... ;)
>
>  Also EMEA members are allowed to vote what to do the raised money. Of
>  course
>  understand this but I'm afraid we are going to divide the ambassadors
>  program into first and second class ambassadors: Those who (can afford
>  to) pay and therefore have more rights and those who don't.
>
>  Sorry, but this scares me off
>     
I do understand there are those of us that will want to become a member, 
but can't bring up this kind of money; I'm very sorry for that and I'll 
make sure this issue is raised as soon as we get the chance to 
reconsider the membership fee. I would like to see more feedback on what 
it is you think is an appropriate membership fee.

Here's a couple of my own personal thoughts on the topic - so take this 
with a grain of salt, as it does not reflect Fedora EMEA's official 
policy, or anything other then what I think;

Fedora EMEA is founded to provide Ambassadors with a means (non-profit 
organization) to a goal. This includes all Ambassadors, and not just 
Ambassadors that are willing to, or able to, become a member of the NPO. 
Being able to take donations is one of those means, being able to sell 
(and buy!) stuff is another, not to mention the investments (booths, 
hotels) now often done by Fedora community members themselves, to a goal 
that remains similar if not entirely equal between _all_ Ambassadors, 
and as such is the single most important item to take into consideration 
each time we consider changing anything within the organization itself, 
or do anything on the outside. This doesn't say anything about the 
membership fee, yet, I know.

One does not necessarily need to be a member of the NPO in order to 
claim resources, gain resources or participate in any discussion - In 
fact I think it is key in the success of Fedora EMEA that this is in no 
way a requirement, ever. When it comes down to voting on anything 
however, one is required to be a member -which is a legal requirement in 
any country we could have founded the NPO, not our own policy. Votes 
could include electing Board members, changing statutes and membership 
fee - all directly related to the operation of the NPO within itself - 
and possibly matters that need to be voted upon from a legal stance.

Now if I needed to remind a large subset of Fedora Ambassadors as voting 
members of the NPO that they need to take into consideration the greater 
good for _all_ Ambassadors - not to mention all of Fedora Project - and 
vote accordingly, I'm not as sure about the end-result as I would with 
kindly reminding any number of voting members that specifically choose 
to join us because just that (the greater good for all Ambassadors, 
Fedora Project) is what they're after -specifically-, and they want to 
take into account EMEA only stands for a subset of the community members 
dearest to us. I'd like to think that in such cases, we won't even vote 
on any such thing, rather then vote to let FAmSCo decide and accept 
their verdict. It's our responsibility to make that work for all of us, 
and not against any of us. In fact, let me put it like this: The one 
thing Fedora EMEA will need to remember, is that there is no Fedora 
EMEA. We're a means to a goal, your goal, our goal. Nothing more, 
nothing less.

Another key in success of Fedora EMEA is that we should not, ever, 
become the sole NPO that takes money in form of donations or revenue and 
spend it without regard to any given party that actually enabled 
anything generating revenue from. Whenever I need to clarify that I like 
taking "selling Unity Re-Spins" as an example as I'm heavily involved 
with those as well. I'd like to think that should Fedora EMEA start 
selling Unity Re-Spins, the revenue (minus production/shipping costs) is 
not entirely EMEA's to spend. I know they (including me) spend money as 
well, and lacking an organization like ours, the money comes from out of 
their(our) own pockets -and they(we) can't take donations in any form. 
I'd like to think that, should Fedora EMEA start selling Unity Re-Spins, 
revenue that belongs to them ends up in their spending budget regardless 
of the factual owner of the bank account the money lives on.

One other thing is, what happens with money that we take from donations, 
that actually belongs to the Fedora Project rather then just 
Ambassadors? I'm thinking it shouldn't be Ambassadors solely benefiting 
from any revenue gained -including revenue coming from membership fees. 
I'm not sure where we're going with this though, yet. Not that I lack 
vision on the topic; I think we may need to raise the topic with FAmSCo 
as it is -ohw, how politically correct- not entirely up to us to decide. 
Again, key to success is to prevent us (Fedora EMEA) from moving inside 
our own little niche without regard to us (Fedora Project in general and 
Fedora Ambassadors in particular).

That being said I hope Ambassadors understand we are not (at all) aiming 
to become the largest subset of members within the Fedora Ambassadors 
FAS group -or any other FAS group for that matter. I hope people in 
general and Ambassadors in particular understand it is not like a small 
group of people deciding what the NPO should or should not do. I hope we 
all understand it is not only Ambassadors we need to take into account 
but other parties as well. And, that if (read: when) we do need to take 
all Ambassadors into account, or we, as Ambassadors, need to take into 
account other parties, the question/problem/issue at hand then is more 
appropriately being addressed by a group works globally, for us all, and 
is elected by us and from amongst ourselves, without requirements to any 
paid-for-membership; FAmSCo.

Thank you,

Yours sincerely,

Jeroen van Meeuwen
-kanarip

EMEA Membership Questione

[Max Spevack]

The benefit of having an actual legal entity -- in this case it is 
called "Fedora EMEA" -- is to make it easier for events related to 
Fedora to happen in Europe.

Think about it this way:

The same way that FAMSCo helps to organize (and fund) everything that is 
happening in Fedora Ambassadors all over the world, the Fedora EMEA 
group can help to organize (and fund) events that are happening in 
Fedora.

My ultimate goal, in the work that I do with FAMSCo and also in the work 
that I will be doing in Europe, is this:

***
Give the budget that Red Hat sets aside for Fedora directly to the hands 
of our community leaders, and allow them to make the most of it.
***

The reason why the Fedora EMEA "non-profit organization" is important is 
because it is a "legal entity" that makes it possible for Red Hat to 
transfer a large chunk of budget (say, several thousand dollars) 
directly to that organization, and know that the money is being 
accounted for properly, and being spent on promoting Fedora and 
community.

I don't want people to get caught up in this whole idea of "membership". 
The goal should not be to raise money from our own Ambassadors, who are 
already giving us so much.  The goal of Fedora EMEA non-profit is to be 
able to take money from Red Hat in an easier way, and also to be able to 
take sponsorship money from any other group or company that might want 
to give it to *Fedora*, but that cannot give it to *Red Hat*.

The Fedora community in EMEA -- ambassadors, developers, translators, 
Red Hat employees, Fedora users -- is my main focus, starting next week.

The Fedora EMEA non-profit is simply a *tool that we can use* to help 
ourselves be better organized.

I know that many people will be at LinuxTag in Berlin in a few weeks. 
I would like to use some of the time that we have when we are all 
together in a room to talk more about this.

Please, if you have any more questions, let me know and let's talk about 
it.

--Max

EMEA Membership Questione

[Christoph Wickert]

Thanks everybody for his replies, a special thanks to Jeroen for his
elaborate answer and his thoughts.

Am Donnerstag, den 08.05.2008, 10:34 +0200 schrieb Gerold:
>  Just ONE small(er) answer because I'm on work and have not the
> time to
>  respond detailled ...
>  
>  IT IS NOT MANDATORY TO BE MEMEBER OF FEDORA EMEA e.V. AND IT IS NOT PART
>  OF THE AMBASSADORS PROJECT!
>  
>  If you want to discuss, we can do it here BUT the NPO once again is not
>  MANDATORY ...
>  
>  
>  The NPO starts out of the Ambassador Project and at the moment MOST
>  members are also Fedora Ambassador but YOU DON'T NEED TO JOIN! 
Gerold, I still see this different and Max's and Jerome's replies seem
to support my point of view: As Max wrote RH wants/needs the NPO because
they need a legal entity they can hand money over [1]. So the money
given by RH is raised money of the EMEA e.v. And as Jeroen wrote only
members of the NPO are allowed to vote EMEA issues [2]. So in the end
the possibility to participate and to make decisions is becoming smaller
for non-NPO-members than it is now for the ambassadors.

>  More detailled (I hope) later
>  
>  Regards
>  
>  Gerold 
Regards,
Christoph

[1] Quoting May from his reply: "The reason why the Fedora EMEA
"non-profit organization" is important is because it is a "legal
entity"
that makes it possible for Red Hat to transfer a large chunk of budget
(say, several thousand dollars) directly to that organization, and know
that the money is being accounted for properly, and being spent on
promoting Fedora and community."

[2] Quoting from Jeroen's reply: "When it comes down to voting on
anything however, one is required to be a member -which is a legal
requirement in any country we could have founded the NPO, not our own
policy."

EMEA Membership Questione

[Robert M. Albrecht]

Hi,

Sandro "red" Mathys schrieb:
>  Thank you Christoph, I already thought I'm the only guy who's
> thinking
>  something's going terribly wrong there.
>
>  +1 on everything, especially the €128.
>
>  Even though I can afford that money quite easily, I really have no idea
>  how that helps me to save money for travels to events a.s.o.
>  
The membership fee is astronomicaly high, thats correct. For many people or 
countrys is out of the question. And I think it`s the highest membership 
fee I ever saw.

The interessting question is, what happens with this money ?

If it`s well spend, it`s ok from my side. If it`s not well spend, it`s 
better to donate that money to the Free Software Foundation, as they are 
doing far more important job than promoting a single distribution. Or if 
you want it more direct, you could also donate the money to KDE for example.

Donating the money to FSF or one of the projects would benefit the whole 
free software world.

After all, Fedora is still some kind of outsourcing-project to reduce the 
cost of development for RHEL. Fedora would not survive without Redhat, 
unlike Debian or Gentoo.

cu romal

EMEA Membership Questione

[Jeroen van Meeuwen]

Robert M. Albrecht wrote:
>  Hi,
>  
>  Sandro "red" Mathys schrieb:
>   > Thank you Christoph, I already thought I'm the only guy who's thinking
>   > something's going terribly wrong there.
>   >
>   > +1 on everything, especially the €128.
>   >
>   > Even though I can afford that money quite easily, I really have no idea
>   > how that helps me to save money for travels to events a.s.o.
>   >
>  
>  The membership fee is astronomicaly high, thats correct. For many people 
>  or countrys is out of the question. And I think it`s the highest 
>  membership fee I ever saw.
>  
>  The interessting question is, what happens with this money ?
>   
The most interesting question is, what do you think is an appropriate
membership fee? Without that kind of feedback, I can only guess. Talk to me.

I can't believe we're having this "discussion", while all I hear is
"the
membership fee is too high". Maybe it is, maybe it's not.

I know there's reasons for the membership fee to be 128 EURO/year. Other 
people agreed with the proposal back in the day when we founded this 
NPO. We've had new members join since, and obviously they agree with the 
membership fee. They think it's important the NPO is doing the right 
thing for everyone out there more so then they think it's important for 
the NPO to do what they personally think is right.

Are you just bluntly disagreeing or is this based on every possible
argument you could think of? Do you know what it means to have a low fee 
so that everyone can afford to join, although it isn't necessary, nor 
required, because decisions made by the NPO and it's members is already 
supposed to, if not required to, follow upstream, which is you, your 
peers, or anyone else that does or does not join?

How does one, given a low membership fee so that everyone can join, 
arraign a General Membership Meeting requiring a two-third majority of 
all votes cast (not just all attendees)? The consequences of lowering 
the membership fee are rather obvious, as too many members against low 
fees will not be able to gather on such General Members Meeting, thereby 
practically eliminating it's mandate.

What if the membership fee is lowered to anything anyone can afford, and 
it's members, whom have the ultimate power, start disagreeing with the 
Fedora Project Board, or even FAmSCo? Do you think that's beneficial to 
anyone? Don't you think it is really, really important to prevent that 
from ever happening? Could not be one way to prevent that from ever 
happening, be, to say:

"We are an NPO that does RAISE and SPEND money about which we decide not
on our own, but follow our upstream, our peers as well as report back to
them, because that's where every single contributor, our target, can
vote, discuss, elect and be elected, and in order to do so, before you
become a member of this NPO, you should realize that you are becoming a
puppet of the community".

Not the Fedora EMEA NPO, nor it's board, nor it's members, are pulling
any strings. Don't forget that. You are. As it should be.

Now what about that membership fee? Talk to me.

I understand you are becoming a member, for which I'm very grateful. 
Note that this mail is not as much a reply to yours, as well as a reply 
to everyone expressing similar concerns.

We'll talk some more at LinuxTag, in real life, and when we do, I'm sure 
you'll appreciate the dedication the people involved have with regards 
to this NPO, their passion and vision, whether a member of the NPO or 
not. I'm excited!

Kind regards,

Jeroen van Meeuwen
-kanarip

EMEA Membership Questione

[Max Spevack]

On Sat, 10 May 2008, Robert M. Albrecht wrote:

>  Fedora would not survive without Redhat, unlike Debian or Gentoo.
There was a time when this statement was true.  But I don't think it is 
true today.  Even if all Red Hat support for Fedora disappeared tomorrow 
(which it won't, but we're playing pretend), I believe that the 
infrastructure of participation that we have built up over the past few 
years ensures that Fedora, as an independent, fully-functional operating 
system, would continue to exist and thrive.

I'll quote myself from an interview I did with LWN last year, after the 
release of Fedora 7:

"Red Hat will continue to be Fedora's biggest sponsor, providing 
development resources, infrastructure money, bandwidth, 
community-budget, FUDCons, legal support, etc.

However, I believe that it is ultimately the job of the Fedora Project 
Leader, whoever that person is, to say "what do I have to do to ensure 
that the Fedora Project can grow and thrive, *EVEN IF* all Red Hat 
support were to one day disappear"?

It's a hypothetical question. But the answer is real. And the answer is 
the critical path of Fedora in a 2-3 year horizon."

http://lwn.net/Articles/237700/

--Max

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Hi all,

first of all I'd like to say thanks to Gerold who called me up early
yesterday morning to dispel my concerns. We talked for more than a hour,
in the end Gerold was late for work but he still did not manage to ally
my doubts. 

Whenever we did not agree it came out to 
      * "This is a theoretical case and will never happen" 
      * "Nonsense" ("Quatsch mit Soße" for the German readers) or 
      * "Bullshit"
On the other hand I wasn't able to expose my problems to Gerold, so I'm
going to outline my concerns once more, maybe somebody else will be able
to meet them.

Am Samstag, den 10.05.2008, 13:19 +0200 schrieb Jeroen van Meeuwen: 
>  Robert M. Albrecht wrote:
>  > Hi,
>  > 
>  > Sandro "red" Mathys schrieb:
>  >  > Thank you Christoph, I already thought I'm the only guy who's
> thinking
>  >  > something's going terribly wrong there.
>  >  >
>  >  > +1 on everything, especially the EUR 128.
>  >  >
>  >  > Even though I can afford that money quite easily, I really have no idea
>  >  > how that helps me to save money for travels to events a.s.o.
>  >  >
>  > 
>  > The membership fee is astronomicaly high, thats correct. For many people 
>  > or countrys is out of the question. And I think it`s the highest 
>  > membership fee I ever saw.
>  > 
>  > The interessting question is, what happens with this money ?
>  > 
>  
>  The most interesting question is, what do you think is an appropriate
>  membership fee? Without that kind of feedback, I can only guess. Talk to me. 
I'm also member of another FOSS support NPO (a German "e. V." just like
Fedora EMEA) and we only have a symbolic fee of 1 EUR a month there. So
far we haven't had any problems with that (except for we don't have much
money, but we hardly have any expenses ether). 

>  I can't believe we're having this "discussion",
> while all I hear is "the
>  membership fee is too high". Maybe it is, maybe it's not.
>  
>  I know there's reasons for the membership fee to be 128 EURO/year.  
According to Gerold there were two reasons for the 128 EUR:
a) "we are binary people" and 128 EUR equals 2*2*2*2*2*2*2.
b) "we are having the same fee in my local LUG, too"
Honestly I don't think that any of these sounds convincing. Maybe there
are better reasons, but this is what Gerold told me on the phone. 

>  Other 
>  people agreed with the proposal back in the day when we founded this 
>  NPO. We've had new members join since, and obviously they agree with the 
>  membership fee.  
How many members from Africa or the middle east have joined and how many
European members does the EMEA have in comparison?

>  They think it's important the NPO is doing the right 
>  thing for everyone out there more so then they think it's important for 
>  the NPO to do what they personally think is right.
>  
>  Are you just bluntly disagreeing or is this based on every possible
>  argument you could think of? Do you know what it means to have a low fee 
>  so that everyone can afford to join, although it isn't necessary, nor 
>  required, because decisions made by the NPO and it's members is already 
>  supposed to, if not required to, follow upstream, which is you, your 
>  peers, or anyone else that does or does not join? 
Is the EMEA e. V. really bound to our decisions? I doubt that very much.
And what if ambassadors and EMEA disagree on a particular issue? Gerold
argued, that this won't happen because the main goal of the EMEA e. V.
is the same as the ambassador's: To promote and support Fedora. But even
if we have the same goal there might be different opinions on how to
achieve this goal, so I think sooner or later there might be conflicts.

Imagine this: 5 ambassadors want Fedora to be on Foo-Expo. On the other
hand 5 ambassadors who are also Fedora EMEA members disagree and think
it is better to visit an event called Bar-Con. When it comes down to
voting guess who will get financial support for their event...

>  How does one, given a low membership fee so that everyone can join, 
>  arraign a General Membership Meeting requiring a two-third majority of 
>  all votes cast (not just all attendees)? The consequences of lowering 
>  the membership fee are rather obvious, as too many members against low 
>  fees will not be able to gather on such General Members Meeting, thereby 
>  practically eliminating it's mandate. 
I agree this might become a problem, but I think the bigger problem will
be: The EMEA covers three continents, so the distance and the resulting
costs are a much bigger hurdle for the attendees. Of course we could
solve this problem by raising the member fee even more. Why not make it
let's say a 1000 Euros, because people who can spend a thousand Euros
for the NPO can also afford the travel costs the the members meeting. ;(

I think right now we are morally eliminating the mandate by making the
EMEA an exclusive group of wealthy people. As Gerold said the cost
reduced membership is available only for pupils, students and other
people "who do not work full time". This means that the ambassadors from
Middle East and Africa will have to pay the full membership fee too.
This should be reconsidered, because one cannot compare rich countries
in Europe with countries in the Middle East or Africa. 

>  What if the membership fee is lowered to anything anyone can afford,
> and 
>  it's members, whom have the ultimate power, start disagreeing with the 
>  Fedora Project Board, or even FAmSCo? Do you think that's beneficial to 
>  anyone?  
No, but I think 
      * agreement or disagreement is not a question of money or the
        number of members but a question of opinion. 
      * making participation depend on money isn't beneficial ether.

>  Don't you think it is really, really important to prevent that 
>  from ever happening? Could not be one way to prevent that from ever 
>  happening, be, to say:
>  
>  "We are an NPO that does RAISE and SPEND money about which we decide not
>  on our own, but follow our upstream, our peers as well as report back to
>  them, because that's where every single contributor, our target, can
>  vote, discuss, elect and be elected, and in order to do so, before you
>  become a member of this NPO, you should realize that you are becoming a
>  puppet of the community". 
In your last mail you wrote that for legal requirements only members are
allowed to vote, but now you say you don't decide on your own. I think
only one of these two statements can be right.

>  Not the Fedora EMEA NPO, nor it's board, nor it's members,
> are pulling
>  any strings. Don't forget that. You are. As it should be.
>  
>  Now what about that membership fee? Talk to me. 
I have no idea, we can only gather suggestions and decide on them later.
If it needs to be binary for me 2*2*2*2*2=32 EUR would be fine.

>  I understand you are becoming a member, for which I'm very
> grateful. 
>  Note that this mail is not as much a reply to yours, as well as a reply 
>  to everyone expressing similar concerns. 
I'm not sure if I will become a member of the NPO. I'd love to but for
now I can ultimately say: I'm not going to spend 128 EUR a year for the
EMEA. Why not? 
     1. I'm already spending a lot of time on Fedora: I'm maintaining
        nearly 50 packages, I'm doing artwork, going to Linux events and
        so on. 
     2. It's not that I cannot afford another 128 €, but for me FOSS is
        not about money in first place but about community and working
        together. 
     3. I am already spending a lot of money for charitable purposes. 
     4. If I'm going to spend another 128 EUR on charity there are lots
        of organizations who in my eyes need the money more urgent than
        Fedora.

>  We'll talk some more at LinuxTag, in real life, and when we do,
> I'm sure 
>  you'll appreciate the dedication the people involved have with regards 
>  to this NPO, their passion and vision, whether a member of the NPO or 
>  not. I'm excited! 
Me too. Looking forward to see all of you in Berlin.

Christoph

>  Kind regards,
>  
>  Jeroen van Meeuwen
>  -kanarip

EMEA Membership Questions

[Max Spevack]

On Sat, 10 May 2008, Christoph Wickert wrote:

>      4. If I'm going to spend another 128 EUR on charity there are
> lots
>         of organizations who in my eyes need the money more urgent than
>         Fedora. 
I speak only for myself, here, but from my perspective the primary 
benefit of the .e.V. non-profit is that *companies* or *organizations* 
that want to contribute directly to Fedora, and who want to avoid the 
hassle of trying to give money to *Red Hat*, which is complicated when 
it is not for a specific product.

*Our* community contributes its time, its energy, and its skills. 
Organizing events, maintaining packages, writing documentation, testing, 
etc.  Those contributions are far more valuable than cash.

But there are a lot of organizations or individuals that love Fedora, 
and that derive massive value from Fedora, who would be happy to make a 
cash donation if there existed a mechanism for them to do so, and that 
is the void that Fedora EMEA e.V. fills.

As far as the MEA part of EMEA -- I fully expect and plan to build 
community not just in Europe, but also in the Middle East and Africa, as 
interesting opportunities present themselves.

--Max

EMEA Membership Questions

[Gerold]

*aaaaarhh*


Am Samstag, den 10.05.2008, 22:32 +0200 schrieb Christoph Wickert:
>  Hi all,
>  
>  first of all I'd like to say thanks to Gerold who called me up early
>  yesterday morning to dispel my concerns. We talked for more than a hour,
>  in the end Gerold was late for work but he still did not manage to ally
>  my doubts. 
>  > I know there's reasons for the membership fee to be 128 EURO/year. 
>  
>  According to Gerold there were two reasons for the 128 EUR:
>  a) "we are binary people" and 128 EUR equals 2*2*2*2*2*2*2.
>  b) "we are having the same fee in my local LUG, too"
>  Honestly I don't think that any of these sounds convincing. Maybe there
>  are better reasons, but this is what Gerold told me on the phone.  
^^
THIS were my answers why the numbers are 1 2 8 and not 123 or 241 or 85
or something similar ...
AND definitly NOT the reasons why the Foundation members voted for EUR
128 per year!

I also explained that I like the idea to propose a "binary membership
fee"
- because we are a computer driven NPO
- 128 is a multiple of 2
and also once again: The members of Fedora EMEA who attend the
foundation meeting elected 10 vs. 0 FOR that fee!

Gerold

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Samstag, den 10.05.2008, 17:22 -0400 schrieb Max Spevack:
>  On Sat, 10 May 2008, Christoph Wickert wrote:
>  
>  >     4. If I'm going to spend another 128 EUR on charity there are lots
>  >        of organizations who in my eyes need the money more urgent than
>  >        Fedora.
>  
>  I speak only for myself, here, but from my perspective the primary 
>  benefit of the .e.V. non-profit is that *companies* or *organizations* 
>  that want to contribute directly to Fedora, and who want to avoid the 
>  hassle of trying to give money to *Red Hat*, which is complicated when 
>  it is not for a specific product.
>   
+1

>  *Our* community contributes its time, its energy, and its skills. 
>  Organizing events, maintaining packages, writing documentation, testing, 
>  etc.  Those contributions are far more valuable than cash.
>   
+100

Christoph

EMEA Membership Questions

[Gerold]

>  > Other 
>  > people agreed with the proposal back in the day when we founded this 
>  > NPO. We've had new members join since, and obviously they agree with the 
>  > membership fee.  
^^
OMG ...
One day Christoph, we meet again (let`s say in two weeks) ...
and then we discuss all your issues and your concerns in a long night
and then you DON`T change my words in my mouth and DON`T interpret
issues you don't know about or ask somebody before ...

THIS ISSUE was not discussed in our call but I tell you why we haven`t
new members "hired" right now.

1.) Fedora EMEA has founded and gave the "paperwork" to the registration
court WHO register the NPO ..
2.) BEFORE THAT LEGAL ISSUE isn't done, you can`t have other members
than the foundation members
3.) IN THE SAME TIME, we gave our statutes to the financial department
to get the status as a "tax reducable association"

Issue 2 was confirmed at 2008-04-22
Issue 3 was confirmed YESTERDAY

And as you pointed clearly out, that you won't become member of that
NPO, because of the membership fee; I also told you that this is no
problem at all!

BUT I have FOUR other people who will sign her membership at LINUXTAG
2008 in Berlin, and believe me I don't put the gun on her chest and told
"membership or die" ...

4.) We did not start yet to have advertise Fedora EMEA e.V. because of
2.) and 3.)

Gerold

EMEA Membership Questions

[Max Spevack]

On Sat, 10 May 2008, Gerold Kassube wrote:

>  One day Christoph, we meet again (let`s say in two weeks) ... and
> then 
>  we discuss all your issues and your concerns in a long night and then 
>  you DON`T change my words in my mouth and DON`T interpret issues you 
>  don't know about or ask somebody before ... 
Let's all just calm down, and everyone should make their lists of 
questions, and we will sit together in a room at LinuxTag and explain 
everything face to face.

:)

--Max

EMEA Membership Questions

[Gerold]

>  Imagine this: 5 ambassadors want Fedora to be on Foo-Expo. On the
>  other
>  hand 5 ambassadors who are also Fedora EMEA members disagree and think
>  it is better to visit an event called Bar-Con. When it comes down to
>  voting guess who will get financial support for their event... 
^^
AGAIN and AGAIN and AGAIN

YOU are creating hypothetic and illusional scenes.

As more than once tryed to explain:
If anybody comes and askes for support from "Fedora EMEA e.V." we will
do all human possible to make it happen,
- with personal support
- with material
- and with money IF THE ASSOCIATION HAVE IN SPARE and the board is able
to help.

And also again ONLY for you: If we have (RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) money,
we have it from the MEMBERS of Fedora EMEA e-V- - Members who are
willing to help the Ambassadors which you mentioned in your f*****
examble above AND NO OTHER MONEY. 

And now tell me where is your SUPPORT for these five Ambassadors who're
not member of Fedora EMEA e.V.!


Gerold

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Samstag, den 10.05.2008, 23:29 +0200 schrieb Gerold Kassube:
>  *aaaaarhh*
>  
>  
>  Am Samstag, den 10.05.2008, 22:32 +0200 schrieb Christoph Wickert:
>  > Hi all,
>  > 
>  > first of all I'd like to say thanks to Gerold who called me up early
>  > yesterday morning to dispel my concerns. We talked for more than a hour,
>  > in the end Gerold was late for work but he still did not manage to ally
>  > my doubts. 
>  > > I know there's reasons for the membership fee to be 128 EURO/year. 
>  > 
>  > According to Gerold there were two reasons for the 128 EUR:
>  > a) "we are binary people" and 128 EUR equals 2*2*2*2*2*2*2.
>  > b) "we are having the same fee in my local LUG, too"
>  > Honestly I don't think that any of these sounds convincing. Maybe there
>  > are better reasons, but this is what Gerold told me on the phone. 
>  ^^
>  THIS were my answers why the numbers are 1 2 8 and not 123 or 241 or 85
>  or something similar ...
>  AND definitly NOT the reasons why the Foundation members voted for EUR
>  128 per year! 
Sorry if I took you to literally. Also as I already told you in private
I do not criticize you or your work. Please don't be offended just
because you are the chair of EMEA. Thanks

Maybe someone else of the people who voted for 128 EUR could explain it
to me then? I'm not talking about 128 or 129 Euros now but the general
height of the fee.

There are several people on this list who say the fee is very high so I
don't understand why this hasn't been considered by the founding members
before.

Christoph

EMEA Membership Questions

[Gerold]

Because you want to read it black on white ...

>  Is the EMEA e. V. really bound to our decisions? I doubt that very
> much.
>  And what if ambassadors and EMEA disagree on a particular issue? Gertold
>  argued, that this won't happen because the main goal of the EMEA e. V.
>  is the same as the ambassador's: To promote and support Fedora. But even
>  if we have the same goal there might be different opinions on how to
>  achieve this goal, so I think sooner or later there might be conflicts. 
^^
AS explained:
Fedora EMEA e.V. is bound on the statutes they have! We are founded out
from the Ambassadors project, MOST (not ALL) are Ambassadors, correct!
"Fedora EMEA e.V." is by law bounded on the decissons and elections they
did in member meetings BY the MEMBERS on things which BELONGS to the
association nothing more, nothing else. Any comments?

And so again you don`t trust the foundation members as written below:
- with their personal behavior,
- their (partial) signed cla (at the Fedora Project)

and you also miscredit here in public with your written words on the
Ambassadors Mailing List

Fabian Affolter, Swiss, Ambassador AND FAmSCo VICE CHAIR
Francesco Crippa, Italian, Ambassador
Chitlesh Goorah, Mauritian, Ambassador
Stefan Hartsuiker, Netherlands
Gerold Kassube, Germany, Ambassador
Jens Kuehnel, Germany
Jeroen van Meeuwen, Netherlands, Ambassador
Robert Scheck, Germany, Ambassador
Jörg Simon, Germany, Ambassador also
Francesco Ugolini, Italian, Ambassador AND FAmSCo CHAIR

which are the foundation members of Fedora EMEA e.V.

Thanks for your great statements

Gerold

EMEA Membership Questions

[Sebastian Vahl]

Am So 11.Mai 2008 schrieb Gerold Kassube:

>  Fabian Affolter, Swiss, Ambassador AND FAmSCo VICE CHAIR
>  Francesco Crippa, Italian, Ambassador
>  Chitlesh Goorah, Mauritian, Ambassador
>  Stefan Hartsuiker, Netherlands
>  Gerold Kassube, Germany, Ambassador
>  Jens Kuehnel, Germany
>  Jeroen van Meeuwen, Netherlands, Ambassador
>  Robert Scheck, Germany, Ambassador
>  Jörg Simon, Germany, Ambassador also
>  Francesco Ugolini, Italian, Ambassador AND FAmSCo CHAIR
>
>  which are the foundation members of Fedora EMEA e.V. 
Please take this just as a question: So far this discussion was between 
europeans (plus Max). The founders of EMEA are all europeans (and Chitlesh 
who is AFAIK still living in Europe). 
So the height of the fee might be decided based on european living standards? 
Please correct me If my conclusion was wrong. But to hear the opinion of some 
people who are not living in (western) europe might clear up some things.

Sebastian

EMEA Membership Questione

[Robert M. Albrecht]

Hi,

> > The membership fee is astronomicaly high, thats correct. For
> many
> > people or countrys is out of the question. And I think it`s the
> > highest membership fee I ever saw.
>  The interessting question is, what happens with this money ?
>  The most interesting question is, what do you think is an appropriate
>  membership fee? 
  Nope. My question points into the future. If the money is will spend,
  the fee is ok. If the money is not well spend, it`s crap. Every for
  himself has to judge this after one or two years.

  For KDE Cebit Booth or Chaos Communication Congress in Berlin we don`t
  go in a hotel, we rent a flat for a week (400 Euros per week for all 10
  people). Moving more people to a booth than are needed to equip the
  booth may be great fun, but it`s not well spend.

>  Are you just bluntly disagreeing or is this based on every possible
>  argument you could think of? 
I`m not disagreeing at all, I just raised a question and did not answer it.

>  How does one, given a low membership fee so that everyone can join,
>  arraign a General Membership Meeting requiring a two-third majority of
>  all votes cast (not just all attendees)? 
  In Chaos Computer Club we have a statement, that membership meetings can
  take place via telecommunication. That`s perfectly legal. Moving people
  physically is not a legal requirement.

  cu romal

EMEA Membership Questione

[Jeroen van Meeuwen]

Robert M. Albrecht wrote:
>  Hi,
>  
>   >> The membership fee is astronomicaly high, thats correct. For many
>   >> people or countrys is out of the question. And I think it`s the
>   >> highest membership fee I ever saw.
>   > The interessting question is, what happens with this money ?
>   > The most interesting question is, what do you think is an appropriate
>   > membership fee?
>  
>   Nope. My question points into the future. If the money is will spend,
>   the fee is ok. If the money is not well spend, it`s crap. Every for
>   himself has to judge this after one or two years.
>  
>   For KDE Cebit Booth or Chaos Communication Congress in Berlin we don`t
>   go in a hotel, we rent a flat for a week (400 Euros per week for all 10
>   people). Moving more people to a booth than are needed to equip the
>   booth may be great fun, but it`s not well spend.
>  
>   > Are you just bluntly disagreeing or is this based on every possible
>   > argument you could think of?
>  
>  I`m not disagreeing at all, I just raised a question and did not answer it.
>   
What will happen with the money is exactly what has always happened with 
the money. There's just more, it's being spend more efficiently, and 
it's being spend by the actual party that initially commits itself to 
coughing up money, rather then having to await reimbursements or money 
transfers.

You are questioning the spending of (say..) ~0.1% percentage of a budget 
here -the part which comes from membership fees. You are doing so based 
on comparison to other parties that may or may not have 1 large 
corporate sponsor, that was already taking care of some of the spendings 
before the party spending the money ever turned into an NPO, and had 
enabled themselves to take donations by becoming an NPO, or parties that 
are specifically intended to attract members.

Then, you're saying you are not OK with a membership fee if the revenue 
from those fees isn't being spent in a way you think is appropriate, 
while what you should be worrying about is; previously I requested money 
or swag or CD/DVDs from Red Hat, is that going to change?

>   > How does one, given a low membership fee so that everyone can
> join,
>   > arraign a General Membership Meeting requiring a two-third majority of
>   > all votes cast (not just all attendees)?
>  
>   In Chaos Computer Club we have a statement, that membership meetings can
>   take place via telecommunication. That`s perfectly legal. Moving people
>   physically is not a legal requirement.
>   
However CCC does need to have membership meetings in person for changing 
anything related to the organization itself, like Statutes, Board, and 
with meetings over telco one cannot easily use representatives 
authorized to submit your vote for you -because you might not be able to 
attend yourself.

Kind regards,

Jeroen van Meeuwen
-kanarip

EMEA Membership Questions

[Jeroen van Meeuwen]

Sebastian Vahl wrote:
>  Please take this just as a question: So far this discussion was
> between 
>  europeans (plus Max). The founders of EMEA are all europeans (and Chitlesh 
>  who is AFAIK still living in Europe). 
>  So the height of the fee might be decided based on european living standards?  
We did not look at what a person would be able to spend, at all. It has
never been about the number of members, or getting everyone to join us. 
Your involvement already serves us plenty. And besides, as we could not, 
and did not want to, request or require people to join, the membership 
fee is a donation - not a purchase of the right to chime in, because you 
have that already.

The first proposition for a member fee was 10,24 EURO/month. Everyone
agreed. I suggested it would be simpler to take 128 EURO/year, and
everyone agreed. Vote passed.

Imagine the membership fee would be 10 EURO/year. To transfer that
money, you would have to pay at least that same amount of money. That, I
think, does not give anyone the impression the money is getting where
it's supposed to get. Bad idea.

Kind regards,

Jeroen van Meeuwen
-kanarip

EMEA Membership Questions

[Paul W. Frields]

On Sun, 2008-05-11 at 13:53 +0200, Jeroen van Meeuwen wrote:
>  Sebastian Vahl wrote:
>  > Please take this just as a question: So far this discussion was between 
>  > europeans (plus Max). The founders of EMEA are all europeans (and Chitlesh 
>  > who is AFAIK still living in Europe). 
>  > So the height of the fee might be decided based on european living standards? 
>  
>  We did not look at what a person would be able to spend, at all. It has
>  never been about the number of members, or getting everyone to join us. 
>  Your involvement already serves us plenty. And besides, as we could not, 
>  and did not want to, request or require people to join, the membership 
>  fee is a donation - not a purchase of the right to chime in, because you 
>  have that already.
>  
>  The first proposition for a member fee was 10,24 EURO/month. Everyone
>  agreed. I suggested it would be simpler to take 128 EURO/year, and
>  everyone agreed. Vote passed.
>  
>  Imagine the membership fee would be 10 EURO/year. To transfer that
>  money, you would have to pay at least that same amount of money. That, I
>  think, does not give anyone the impression the money is getting where
>  it's supposed to get. Bad idea. 
Here's how I see the issues thus far:

* Fedora EMEA e.V. was set up to allow a group of people to sell schwag,
collect charitable donations, and so forth, in support of Fedora Project
activities in EMEA.

* Membership in Fedora EMEA is not and should not be required for
anyone, including Ambassadors, to get support from Fedora EMEA.  And all
the statements I've seen from Fedora EMEA support that.

* Fedora EMEA operates under the Fedora name by permission of the Fedora
Project and Red Hat, Inc., who own the FEDORA trademarks.

* Financial accountability is required by the trademark license grant,
and although the exact details of financial reporting have yet to be
worked out, this will happen by the direction of the Fedora Project
Board.

* There are more questions still hanging, and the meeting around
LinuxTag is where they should be asked and answered.  The Fedora EMEA
group is an exciting development which is still new, and there's no need
for people to get discouraged by things like membership fees, in light
of the above points.

I'm looking forward to meeting with the Fedora EMEA folks in Berlin in a
couple weeks when we can resolve a lot of the remaining questions and
ensure that all the constituents and their needs are well represented.
Thanks to everyone for your help in doing that in a positive,
constructive way!

-- 
Paul W. Frields                                http://paul.frields.org/
  gpg fingerprint: 3DA6 A0AC 6D58 FEC4 0233  5906 ACDB C937 BD11 3717
  http://redhat.com/   -  -  -  -   http://pfrields.fedorapeople.org/
  irc.freenode.net: stickster @ #fedora-docs, #fedora-devel, #fredlug

EMEA Membership Questions

[Joerg Simon]

Am Samstag, 10. Mai 2008 22:32:52 schrieb Christoph Wickert:
>  We talked for more than a hour,
>  in the end Gerold was late for work but he still did not manage to ally
>  my doubts.
>  On the other hand I wasn't able to expose my problems to Gerold, so I'm
>  going to outline my concerns once more, maybe somebody else will be able
>  to meet them.
>  I'm not sure if I will become a member of the NPO. I'd love to but for
>  now I can ultimately say: I'm not going to spend 128 EUR a year for the
>  EMEA. Why not?
>       1. I'm already spending a lot of time on Fedora: I'm maintaining
>          nearly 50 packages, I'm doing artwork, going to Linux events and
>          so on.
>       2. It's not that I cannot afford another 128 €, but for me FOSS is
>          not about money in first place but about community and working
>          together 
Working together in a Community, that is absolut the point! 
A Ambassador who is not present make no harm to the Project and is no 
Problem - Members in the NPO can slow us down - even can make us 
inoperative - if they not contribute regularly.
We need hard working Members and not people who participate only to be in the 
NPO, get Travel Costs and Hotel Rooms payed. The fee is a clear statement to 
work in the NPO to serve the Fedoraproject. And there can not be a conflict 
because FESCO, FAMSCO ... - are the rulers, the NPO serve the Fedoraproject 
for their needs - and must Report it quarterly.
It is really easy to abuse the work of much active people, without 
constructive suggestion for a solution. 
We live meritocracy, be sure if there are People who do valuable contributions 
and can not pay the fee we will find a Solution, maybe Sponsors for them. If 
you ever had really worked with the Community of Ambassadors you would know 
that!

Happy Whitsun
-- 
Jörg Simon
jsimon(a)fedoraproject.org
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/JoergSimon
Key Fingerprint:
3691 0989 2DCA 58A2 8D1F 2CAC C823 558E 5B5B 5688

EMEA Membership Questione

[Francesco Ugolini]

2008/5/8 Sandro red Mathys <red(a)fedoraproject.org&gt;:
>  Thank you Christoph, I already thought I'm the only guy who's
> thinking
>   something's going terribly wrong there.
>
>   +1 on everything, especially the €128.
>
>   Even though I can afford that money quite easily, I really have no idea
>   how that helps me to save money for travels to events a.s.o.
>
>   I thought private persons are welcome as basic members at a small fee
>   (10-20€...maybe less, if I'm thinking about certain countries) and it's
>   the companys that have to pay more for the member- oder even sponsorship.
>
>   By the way, I've been to Cameroun (West Africa) lately and you can't
>   imagine what it'd mean there to spend €128. A beer (0.6l) costs about
>   €0.6 and most people can't even afford to drink a single beer every day
>   (soft drinks are not way cheaper). Can you imagine what it'd meant to
>   spend €128 for them? And yes, they might be future ambassadors. I've
>   visited some computer schools there and they're doing a good job.
>   They're using Windows and not Linux yet, but maybe that's going to
>   change some day - as soon as it's no longer accepted that they're using
>   illegal licenses for example.
>
>   Well, my $.02
>
>   -- red
>
>
>   Christoph Wickert wrote:
>   > Am Dienstag, den 06.05.2008, 22:56 +0200 schrieb Gerold Kassube:
>   >> Hi all together for the second,
>   >>
>   >> because I forgot and some are asking for; there is only a german bank
>   >> account possible (if we have elected a new Treasurer) and the
>   >> membership fee is EUR 128,-/year for Full membership. This amount can
>   >> be payed at Linuxtag in person (because of high transfer costs from
>   >> foreign countrys) ...
>   >
>   > AFAIR the Fedora EMEA NPO was founded to make it easier for us TO RAISE
>   > money for Fedora and not TO SPEND it. Or did I get something
>   > completely wrong here?
>   >
>   > IMHO 128 € is way to much especially for those of us who are not from
>   > the wealthy countries of Europe. I think once again the European
>   > Ambassadors/Founding members of EMEA did not take the situation of all
>   > ambassadors into account. Remember, the letters "ME" in EMEA mean
>   > "Middle East" and "A" is for Africa. Has anybody really thought
> about
>   > the people there?
>   >
>   > Could someone also please point out what the difference between the
>   > different membership grades is (full membership, family membership and
>   > so on)? According to the declaration of accession to Fedora EMEA the
>   > cost-reduced membership requires "a confirmation accepted in the Federal
>   > Republic of Germany." What does that mean?
>   >
>   > Next question: What do I get for my membership? If I read Jörg Simons
>   > mail of March 24th 2008 correctly, members are getting a "one-off and
>   > exclusive" welcome present, whatever this means. Must be a hell of a
>   > present though... ;)
>   >
>   > Also EMEA members are allowed to vote what to do the raised money. Of
>   > course
>   > understand this but I'm afraid we are going to divide the ambassadors
>   > program into first and second class ambassadors: Those who (can afford
>   > to) pay and therefore have more rights and those who don't.
>   >
>   > Sorry, but this scares me off
>   > Christoph 

Hi,

Fedora EMEA is a resources bridge and a tool that allow people around
EMEA to work together without any limitation. I think to understand
the reason of this fee we have to go right back, starting with the
first FAD: there we understood that we need a unified EMEA
infrastructure that could provide reasonable tools to spread the
fedora voice, it couldn't be possible to work and to join
big/medium/small events without a local management that could provide
fastly monetary and physically resources without waiting the long and
impossible times that we had before.

Fedora EMEA is a no-profit organization, it doesn't produce real
profits, it could live with the founds that came from sponsors (there
aren't a lot of those ones) and members.

Tell me if 10€ could be a reasonable fee: the maximum money we could
rise with 100 members would be 1000: i can assure this money couldn't
cover the expense of a medium event with 3 ambassadors (with  the
connected costs), 100 CDs and a bunch of tshirts.

Fedora EMEA membership is not a requrement to ask for resources and
help, Fedora EMEA want to be a hand for fedora contrbutors and its
membership is another way to contribute to help EMEA people spread
fedora.

I think many people understand this and, personally, i could see it at
FOSDEM and probably you will see it in the next LinuxTAG. If you want
to contribute to this Organization you could do this, if you won't,
don't worry, nothing will happen. As Gerold says Fedora EMEA is not
part of ambassador project: if you will need resources you could ask,
without any problems, one of the aim of fedora EMEA is this.

I haven't the link but i encourage everyone to read the "Fedora EMEA
statute", you will find all the reason behind Fedora EMEA and a reason
for such fee.

Regards

Francesco Ugolini

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Hi Jörg,

thanks a lot for your statement.

Am Montag, den 12.05.2008, 19:36 +0200 schrieb JoergSimon: 
>  
>  Working together in a Community, that is absolut the point!  
Yes, but for me "community" and "working together" mean not to
exclude
people in advance.

>  A Ambassador who is not present make no harm to the Project and is no
>
>  Problem - Members in the NPO can slow us down - even can make us 
>  inoperative - if they not contribute regularly.
>  We need hard working Members and not people who participate only to be in the 
>  NPO, get Travel Costs and Hotel Rooms payed. The fee is a clear statement to 
>  work in the NPO to serve the Fedoraproject.  
I agree the fee is a statement, but do you think that on the other hand
not being able to pay the fee also is one? People who are not willing or
able to pay the membership may still valuable and hard working
contributors.

>  And there can not be a conflict 
>  because FESCO, FAMSCO ... - are the rulers, the NPO serve the Fedoraproject 
>  for their needs - and must Report it quarterly. 
Sorry for asking again, but my question still isn't answered: Is Fedora
EMEA really bound to FESCO or FAMSCO from a judical point of view? Can
someone please show me the corresponding words in the EMEA statutes?
TIA.

>  It is really easy to abuse the work of much active people, without 
>  constructive suggestion for a solution.  
Sorry if I did not point out my suggestion more clearly: Lower the
member fee to enable more people to participate. Especially because the
NPO is called EMEA but lacks ME and A at the moment.

>  We live meritocracy, be sure if there are People who do valuable
> contributions 
>  and can not pay the fee we will find a Solution, maybe Sponsors for them.  
It's a fact that we already have this situation. Think of Kushal for
example: No doubt that he is a valuable contributor and if I did not
offer him a free place to sleep he would not have been able to come to
Berlin at all. Two days ago he told me that he wont be able to come
anyway because he did not find a sponsor.

>  If 
>  you ever had really worked with the Community of Ambassadors you would know 
>  that! 
You just said that I never really worked with the Ambassadors Community.
Thanks a lot! Maybe I'm not the loudest person who always shouts out "Me
first", but I'm doing a lot of work for the project that you won't see
on this mailing list.

Please tell me, did you know what I just wrote about Kushal? If the
answer is "yes", then your "we will find a solution" is wrong. And if
the answer is "no", you are not in the position to tell me that I don't
know what's happening in the Ambassador's community.

>  
>  Happy Whitsun 
Best Regards,
Christoph

EMEA Membership Questione

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Sonntag, den 11.05.2008, 13:19 +0200 schrieb Jeroen van Meeuwen:

>  [...] 
>  
>  You are questioning the spending of (say..) ~0.1% percentage of a budget 
>  here -the part which comes from membership fees. 
If the membership fee is only ~0.1% of the NPOs budget we could easily
halve it. -0.05% budget compared to -50% fee for potential members,
think about it.

Thanks,
Christoph

EMEA Membership Questions

[Gerold]

Hi Christop and all other,

hopefully we don't bother you with that never ending discussion but it
seems that there is a really, really big misunderstanding between some
single persons and the Fedora EMEA e.V. which must be discussed here in
public

> > And there can not be a conflict
> > because FESCO, FAMSCO ... - are the rulers, the NPO serve the
> > Fedoraproject
> > for their needs - and must Report it quarterly.
>
>  Sorry for asking again, but my question still isn't answered: Is Fedora
>  EMEA really bound to FESCO or FAMSCO from a judical point of view? Can
>  someone please show me the corresponding words in the EMEA statutes?
>  TIA. 
^^
ONCE again!
Fedora EMEA e.V. is NOT PART of the Ambassador project and because of
that, FEDORA EMEA isn't bound to any decissions from FAmSCo or any other
SCo of Fedora or on behalb of Red Hat ...
and ALSO ONCE AGAIN: it is _not_ a mandatory membership for!

Fedora EMEA e.V. is bounded on the votes the member make depending on the
Fedora EMEA e.V. targets and audiences.

Nobody needs to sign a membership with us, but we're really happy if YOU
could do so.

> > We live meritocracy, be sure if there are People who do valuable
> > contributions
> > and can not pay the fee we will find a Solution, maybe Sponsors for
> > them.
>
>  It's a fact that we already have this situation. Think of Kushal for
>  example: No doubt that he is a valuable contributor and if I did not
>  offer him a free place to sleep he would not have been able to come to
>  Berlin at all. Two days ago he told me that he wont be able to come
>  anyway because he did not find a sponsor. 
^^
A sponsor for what Christoph?
AS "responsible" for Linuxtag organisation I promise you, that every
Ambassador who is willing to attend Linuxtag will have EXACT the same
amount reserved for LinuxTag. And I decided to propose the accomodation
and asked Max for it, to put these costs into the budget at least to be
fair to everyone!
Maybe you should pay his flight ticket from India to Europe with EUR 1000 :-)
Let's show another way to be fair to everyone: RED HAT should pay every
participant the EUR 1000 for travel plus Hotel (now we take a cheaper one
with let's say EUR 50/day) so we have with 24 attendees right now a
calculation of

24 x EUR 1000 Travel (because we're all valuable contributors)
24 x 5 nights x 50 Euro
-----------------------
TOTAL == EUR 30.000,-

So going ahead and take the 10 EUR from membership you are willing to
spend for Fedora EMEA e.V. we have 10 members (atm) x 10 Euro/year == 100
Euro
Now please have a look again, how big is the sponsorship Fedora EMEA can
do ...


It is really important that we discuss things on the round table maybe
also in native language German ...

Just my (last) 5 Cents

Gerold

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Donnerstag, den 15.05.2008, 16:20 +0200 schrieb Gerold:
>  Hi Christop and all other,
>  
>  hopefully we don't bother you with that never ending discussion but it
>  seems that there is a really, really big misunderstanding between some
>  single persons and the Fedora EMEA e.V. which must be discussed here in
>  public 
Some days ago it was you who wanted to discuss all this in private,
remember? ;)

Maybe it actually IS a misunderstanding, but I'm not the only one who
has concerns regarding the high membership fee. Others on the
list agreed and I know there are others who also agree but don't want
to say this on the list because they are afraid to get flamed by you
like I was last week.

>  >> And there can not be a conflict
>  >> because FESCO, FAMSCO ... - are the rulers, the NPO serve the
>  >> Fedoraproject
>  >> for their needs - and must Report it quarterly.
>  >
>  > Sorry for asking again, but my question still isn't answered: Is Fedora
>  > EMEA really bound to FESCO or FAMSCO from a judical point of view? Can
>  > someone please show me the corresponding words in the EMEA statutes?
>  > TIA.
>  ^^
>  ONCE again!
>  Fedora EMEA e.V. is NOT PART of the Ambassador project and because of
>  that, FEDORA EMEA isn't bound to any decissions from FAmSCo or any other
>  SCo of Fedora or on behalb of Red Hat ... 
This means the answer to my question is a simple "no". Why did it take
so long to get this clear?

So my original question is legitimate: What happens if EMEA e. V.
disagrees with FAmSCo or FeSCo? Indeed, it's a hypothetical question.
I'm not saying that it necessarily will happen, but in a big community
of people it is very likely to happen sooner or later and we need to be
prepared for the worst case.

>  and ALSO ONCE AGAIN: it is _not_ a mandatory membership for! 
It's not mandatory for being an ambassador, but it is mandatory if you
want to vote on EMEA issues. The budget RH spends for all (!)
ambassadors is one of these issues where only (!) members can make
decisions. So the ambassadors who are also (paying) members of the EMEA
have more powers than the rest of the ambassadors.

I repeat: I don not say that the EMEA e. V. is evil and will abuse it's
power, but there may emerge conflicts, because the resources (especially
money) are limited.

>  Fedora EMEA e.V. is bounded on the votes the member make depending on
> the
>  Fedora EMEA e.V. targets and audiences.
>  
>  Nobody needs to sign a membership with us, but we're really happy if YOU
>  could do so. 
I'm sorry, I cannot sign THIS membership and I think I have already
explained why.

>  >> We live meritocracy, be sure if there are People who do
> valuable
>  >> contributions
>  >> and can not pay the fee we will find a Solution, maybe Sponsors for
>  >> them.
>  >
>  > It's a fact that we already have this situation. Think of Kushal for
>  > example: No doubt that he is a valuable contributor and if I did not
>  > offer him a free place to sleep he would not have been able to come to
>  > Berlin at all. Two days ago he told me that he wont be able to come
>  > anyway because he did not find a sponsor.
>  ^^
>  A sponsor for what Christoph? 
Ask Kushal please, I can only tell you what he wrote me. His exact words
were: "Sorry but can not make it this time. Couldn't arrange any
sponsor."

>  AS "responsible" for Linuxtag organisation I promise you,
> that every
>  Ambassador who is willing to attend Linuxtag will have EXACT the same
>  amount reserved for LinuxTag. And I decided to propose the accomodation
>  and asked Max for it, to put these costs into the budget at least to be
>  fair to everyone! 
I never challenged that you are trying your best to make it possible for
everyone to join.

>  Maybe you should pay his flight ticket from India to Europe with EUR
> 1000 :-) 
I cannot laugh about this kind of humor, because you are making jokes on
people (both me and Kushal) because of their financial situation. This
also is why I did not respond to your last mails.

>  Let's show another way to be fair to everyone: RED HAT should pay
> every
>  participant the EUR 1000 for travel plus Hotel (now we take a cheaper one
>  with let's say EUR 50/day) so we have with 24 attendees right now a
>  calculation of
>  
>  24 x EUR 1000 Travel (because we're all valuable contributors)
>  24 x 5 nights x 50 Euro
>  -----------------------
>  TOTAL == EUR 30.000,- 
Please don't exaggerate: Most of the attendees are from Europe and don't
have travel costs of 1000 EUR. And most of the people who are from
Europe can afford to pay the travel themselves, for example I always
paid my costs myself.

I also wanted to cut down the costs by not staying in the hotel all the
time. And guess who criticized me for that... ;)

>  So going ahead and take the 10 EUR from membership you are willing
> to
>  spend for Fedora EMEA e.V. we have 10 members (atm) x 10 Euro/year == 100
>  Euro 
Excuse me: When/Where did I say that I was willing to spend only
10EUR/Year? It was Francesco who wrote that, please don't blame me for
something I never said.

>  Now please have a look again, how big is the sponsorship Fedora EMEA
> can
>  do ... 
You forgot to mention that the EMEA also gets money from sponsors and
not only from it's members. You also forgot to mention how small the
member fee is compared to the budget. EMEA was founded to raise money
from commercial sponsors in first place, not from ambassadors.

>  It is really important that we discuss things on the round table
> maybe
>  also in native language German ...
>  
>  Just my (last) 5 Cents
>  
>  Gerold 
I'm looking forward to discuss this on LT too.

Christoph

EMEA Membership Questions

[Joerg Simon]

Hi Christoph,

You do not need answer this. I think most people are sick of our ping pong 
game :P

Am Donnerstag, 15. Mai 2008 15:08:03 schrieb Christoph Wickert:
>  I agree the fee is a statement, but do you think that on the other
> hand
>  not being able to pay the fee also is one? People who are not willing or
>  able to pay the membership may still valuable and hard working
>  contributors. 
You read my comment about help/sponsoring this people? 

>  Sorry for asking again, but my question still isn't answered: Is
> Fedora
>  EMEA really bound to FESCO or FAMSCO from a judical point of view? Can
>  someone please show me the corresponding words in the EMEA statutes?
>  TIA. 
The Fedora Board has given Fedora EMEA e.V. the right to use the 
Brand "Fedora" (Name, Artwork, Logo ...) and requested quarterly Report to 
have the overview that we act in there terms. If we will not do our Job, they 
can take us this right - without this Fedora EMEA e.V. is nothing. 

>  It's a fact that we already have this situation. Think of Kushal
> for
>  example: No doubt that he is a valuable contributor and if I did not
>  offer him a free place to sleep he would not have been able to come to
>  Berlin at all. Two days ago he told me that he wont be able to come
>  anyway because he did not find a sponsor. 
I think is good to have Friends from all over the world in Berlin. Last Year 
we had Kushal in Berlin and i am sure it is not the last time we had fun 
together. I am also sure most of us in Germany would take the chance to get a 
sponsored flight to india or US to speak about our work in europe. This Year 
Contributors like Yakoov from US will join us - next year another one - for 
me this is a good choice.

>  Please tell me, did you know what I just wrote about Kushal?  
Yes! And be sure many more about him - i can call him a good fellow!

>  If the 
>  answer is "yes", then your "we will find a solution" is wrong. 
To sponsor flights for Speakers in the end is a decission who is taken by 
FedoraCommunity Leader EMEA MaxSpevack. How we handle the Member Fee not.
Only a Example - solution for membership could also be, that the NPO Members 
decide to create a Activity-CreditSystem - less MemberFee for doing something 
like talks, events ... 

>  And if 
>  the answer is "no", you are not in the position to tell me that 
The answer is yes - so i am now?

>  I don't 
>  know what's happening in the Ambassador's community. 
like your kind question in 
http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-ambassadors-list/2007-December/msg0...
You must like our Events a lot! 

>  You just said that I never really worked with the Ambassadors
> Community.
>  Thanks a lot! Maybe I'm not the loudest person who always shouts out "Me
>  first", but I'm doing a lot of work for the project that you won't see
>  on this mailing list. 
Sorry to say, you never showed an interest in the preparation for the NPO in 
Front of Fosdem or other events, or interest to work in a team with the 
majority of European Ambassadors.

I believe you, when you say - you do a lot for the Fedora Project as a 
Maintainer or so ...!
To work as a Ambassador is to communicate and encourage. Tue Gutes und rede 
darueber ;-)  Back to work now!

Gruss Joerg


-- 
Jörg Simon
jsimon(a)fedoraproject.org
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/JoergSimon
Key Fingerprint:
3691 0989 2DCA 58A2 8D1F 2CAC C823 558E 5B5B 5688

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Donnerstag, den 15.05.2008, 23:15 +0200 schrieb JoergSimon:
>  Hi Christoph,
>  
>  You do not need answer this. I think most people are sick of our ping pong 
>  game :P 
I'd be happy if it were ping pong, because I hardly get a reply to
simple yes/no questions. :(

>  Am Donnerstag, 15. Mai 2008 15:08:03 schrieb Christoph Wickert:
>  > I agree the fee is a statement, but do you think that on the other hand
>  > not being able to pay the fee also is one? People who are not willing or
>  > able to pay the membership may still valuable and hard working
>  > contributors.
>  
>  You read my comment about help/sponsoring this people?  
Of course I did, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to ask you
something about this comment, wouldn't I?

>  
>  > Sorry for asking again, but my question still isn't answered: Is Fedora
>  > EMEA really bound to FESCO or FAMSCO from a judical point of view? Can
>  > someone please show me the corresponding words in the EMEA statutes?
>  > TIA.
>  
>  The Fedora Board has given Fedora EMEA e.V. the right to use the 
>  Brand "Fedora" (Name, Artwork, Logo ...) and requested quarterly Report to 
>  have the overview that we act in there terms. If we will not do our Job, they 
>  can take us this right - without this Fedora EMEA e.V. is nothing.  
But this doesn't mean that EMEA e.V. and Fedora (RH, FeSCo, FAmSCo or
whoever) will always agree. And I does not say anything on what to do
when they disagree.

Threatening people is not a solution and will not encourage them to
anything, especially if it is an empty thread. Do you really think RH
would leave the NPO and look for other people to found a new one? This
would be the 'last exit', but we need to find ways to avoid this a few
steps earlier - and this is exactly what I'm talking about.

>  > It's a fact that we already have this situation. Think of Kushal for
>  > example: No doubt that he is a valuable contributor and if I did not
>  > offer him a free place to sleep he would not have been able to come to
>  > Berlin at all. Two days ago he told me that he wont be able to come
>  > anyway because he did not find a sponsor.
>  
>  I think is good to have Friends from all over the world in Berlin. Last Year 
>  we had Kushal in Berlin and i am sure it is not the last time we had fun 
>  together. I am also sure most of us in Germany would take the chance to get a 
>  sponsored flight to india or US to speak about our work in europe. This Year 
>  Contributors like Yakoov from US will join us - next year another one - for 
>  me this is a good choice.
>  
>  > Please tell me, did you know what I just wrote about Kushal? 
>  
>  Yes! And be sure many more about him - i can call him a good fellow!
>  
>  > If the 
>  > answer is "yes", then your "we will find a solution" is wrong. 
>  
>  To sponsor flights for Speakers in the end is a decission who is taken by 
>  FedoraCommunity Leader EMEA MaxSpevack. How we handle the Member Fee not.
>  Only a Example - solution for membership could also be, that the NPO Members 
>  decide to create a Activity-CreditSystem - less MemberFee for doing something 
>  like talks, events ...  
Thanks, this is the first constructive statement regarding the member
fee I heard in this discussion and I think we should follow our idea.
>  
>  > And if 
>  > the answer is "no", you are not in the position to tell me that
>  
>  The answer is yes - so i am now? 
Yes you are, but then I wonder how you can write "we will find a
solution" when you know that we already failed in case of "a good
fellow" of yours.

>  
>  > I don't 
>  > know what's happening in the Ambassador's community.
>  
>  like your kind question in 
>  http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-ambassadors-list/2007-December/msg0...
>  You must like our Events a lot!  
There was simple reason for that: Although EMEA was the primary topic of
FAD at Rheinfelden I could not find the meeting minutes with a search
for "EMEA" or "Rheinfelden". It was my mistake, I did not look close
enough and I publicly excused for this like half an hour later.
Nevertheless I still think the meeting minutes belong into the wiki but
not into a PDF inside a tarball at fedorapeople.org.

>  
>  > You just said that I never really worked with the Ambassadors Community.
>  > Thanks a lot! Maybe I'm not the loudest person who always shouts out "Me
>  > first", but I'm doing a lot of work for the project that you won't see
>  > on this mailing list.
>  
>  Sorry to say, you never showed an interest in the preparation for the NPO in 
>  Front of Fosdem or other events, or interest to work in a team with the 
>  majority of European Ambassadors. 
Now you blame me for not showing interest in the NPO, but in the
previous paragraph you blamed me for asking for information about the
NPO. Huh? So if I'm not interested, why would I ask for information?

Again you confuse "interest" with "financial possibilities". I would
have loved to attend FAD at Rheinfelden, but when I do I need to be sure
it's worth the time and the costs for me. So I wrote a long mail to the
ambassador who organized the FAD and asked if he could give me more
detailed information, so I could prepare better for the meeting. I also
offered more help, but never got a reply, so I did not go to
Rheinfelden.

>  
>  I believe you, when you say - you do a lot for the Fedora Project as a 
>  Maintainer or so ...! 
You are right: I have to admit I did not work WITH the other
ambassadors a lot, but that doesn't mean I didn't work FOR them. In
2007, my fist year as an ambassador I did:
      * Linuxtag 2007 of course
      * I-Party (annual install party here at Münster)
      * 2 full days on "linux.forum/nrw".
      * One radio interview on Fedora
      * One meeting with a couple of journalists whom I showed "sugar"
Correct my if I'm wrong but I think all of these events are ambassadors
action.

>  To work as a Ambassador is to communicate and encourage. Tue Gutes und rede 
>  darueber ;-)  Back to work now! 
I'm not good in fishing for compliments and I don't need to write I did
this or that just to win recognition.

The saying "Do something good and talk about it" also means that
something needs to be done before you can talk. Unfortunately I'm under
the impression that some people are proceeding the other way round, so I
try to talk as little as possible. I hope you won't reproach me with
that.

>  
>  Gruss Joerg
>   
Regards,
Christoph

EMEA Membership Questions

[Max Spevack]

On Thu, 15 May 2008, Christoph Wickert wrote:

>  So my original question is legitimate: What happens if EMEA e. V. 
>  disagrees with FAmSCo or FeSCo? Indeed, it's a hypothetical question. 
>  I'm not saying that it necessarily will happen, but in a big community 
>  of people it is very likely to happen sooner or later and we need to 
>  be prepared for the worst case. 
I speak only for myself:

Fedora EMEA e.V. can do whatever it wants.  It is a *coincidence* that 
many of Fedora EMEA e.V.'s members are also Fedora contributors, 
volunteers, developers, and ambassadors.

Fedora EMEA e.V. is granted the right to use the "Fedora" name by the 
Fedora Board, and that right is granted as long as the Fedora Board 
believes that the work Fedora EMEA e.V. is doing supports the larger 
work that the Fedora Project is doing.

One of the most useful properties of Fedora EMEA e.V. is that it will 
allow the Fedora and Community budget that Red Hat allocates for EMEA 
(not just Europe, but for all of EMEA) to be more easily managed and 
spent.

Right now, paying for an event like LinuxTag is a difficult task, that 
has taken up a lot of my time and energy behind the scenes.  The actual 
organizational work has been done by the LinuxTag organizational team, 
but in the end it is my responsibility to make sure the bills get paid. 
Having a legal entity (Fedora EMEA e.V.) in the future will make this 
easier.

Again, I urge everyone to think of Fedora EMEA e.V. as a useful tool and 
legal entity that can *support* the Fedora Project, and *not* as a 
replacement for anything that the Fedora Ambassadors group is doing.

==========

On the subject of LinuxTag directly, I will say this:

We are spending close to $20k USD on LinuxTag this year, which is more 
than double what we spent on the event last year.

There will be over 20 Fedora Ambasadors from all over Europe at the 
event, which makes it the largest non-FUDCon event that we have ever 
had, anywhere in the world.  It is also a 4 day event in a large, 
expensive city.  The *vast majority* of the costs of LinuxTag go to 
helping to make sure that all the Fedora Ambassadors and contributors 
who attend the event do not have to suffer financial hardship in order 
to do so.  Those Ambassadors are already giving 4 days of their time, 
and almost all of them are going into their own pockets for travel costs 
and for Fedora polo shirts.  The Fedora Project is helping to make sure 
that the hotel bills are paid.

But our money is not infinite, and while it pains me to not be able to 
fully fund everyone's trip to LinuxTag, at some point we had to draw the 
line.  There is only *one person* coming to LinuxTag from outside of 
Europe, and that is Paul Frields.

The Fedora Project spends the *vast majority* of its funds directly on 
community members, helping to fund travel, lodging, etc.  This will 
continue to be the case, but our money is not unlimited.  :)

Significant community investment is being made this year in Europe, 
India, South America, and Asia.  These are areas that have, in the past, 
only received small amounts of funding.  All Fedora contributors in 
those parts of the world will have opportunities to organize, attend, 
and participate in events this year that never existed before.

=======

I hope this email serves to give everyone some of my own views into the 
Fedora EMEA e.V. and also into how worldwide budget decisions are 
weighed and managed.

I am happy to talk in depth about any more of this, either on the list, 
or in person at LinuxTag.

--Max

EMEA Membership Questions

[Max Spevack]

On Thu, 15 May 2008, JoergSimon wrote:

>  I think is good to have Friends from all over the world in Berlin. 
>  Last Year we had Kushal in Berlin and i am sure it is not the last 
>  time we had fun together. I am also sure most of us in Germany would 
>  take the chance to get a sponsored flight to india or US to speak 
>  about our work in europe. This Year Contributors like Yakoov from US 
>  will join us - next year another one - for me this is a good choice. 
Just to clarify:

Yaakov will be in Europe *anyway* during the months of May, June, and 
July.  So having him at LinuxTag is a very small additional cost to our 
budget.

I try to spread our sponsorship money around to a variety of people, and 
not simply sponsor the same people over and over again.

In North America, there are a number of people who have received 
sponsorship to attend FUDCons in the past who will not receive 
sponsorship for FUDCon Boston.  Does this mean that they are not 
valuable members of our community?  Of course not -- they are very 
valuable.  But there are other valuable members of our community who 
have never been to an event like FUDCon, and we want them to be able to 
attend also.

--Max

EMEA Membership Questions

[Francesco Ugolini]

2008/5/10 Christoph Wickert <christoph.wickert(a)googlemail.com&gt;:

>  Sorry if I took you to literally. Also as I already told you in
> private
>  I do not criticize you or your work. Please don't be offended just
>  because you are the chair of EMEA. Thanks
>
>  Maybe someone else of the people who voted for 128 EUR could explain it
>  to me then? I'm not talking about 128 or 129 Euros now but the general
>  height of the fee. 
All the founders vote for this fee, and they all together decided that
it would the best solution, considering the number in a year ( 10.5 €
circa per month and less than 4 cent per day), so i know we are living
with an economy near the stagnation, but i don't understand why this
fee could create such criticism. Yes, i agree if you tell me that
those are money, and it's a week or two of work in a PA office, but i
think if you consider that amount in a larger view it's not so much.

>  There are several people on this list who say the fee is very high so I
>  don't understand why this hasn't been considered by the founding members
>  before. 
Maybe because they weren't in Bruxelles?

> I agree the fee is a statement, but do you think that on the other
> hand
> not being able to pay the fee also is one? People who are not willing or
> able to pay the membership may still valuable and hard working
> contributors. 
There are several categories that have cost reduction to allow people
who can't afford such cost (i think one of this people with a certain
income not to pay or pay a low fee, but see the "fee document" to be
sure).

> Sorry if I did not point out my suggestion more clearly: Lower the
> member fee to enable more people to participate. Especially because the
> NPO is called EMEA but lacks ME and A at the moment. 
A is not missing. In Africa there are some ambassadors who expressed
in the past their agreement for such initiative, not to have a card
with Fedora EMEA writte on it, but to be able to easily ask for
resources and be part of a easy network that could linke them. In the
last LinuxTag a Monzambique ambassador attended the event and seemes
interested in this idea.

For ME there is some work in progress, but if you consider we had just
an event in Dubay (http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraEvents/GITEX).

I think if we ask ambassadors and contributors they aren't in search
of membership, but in search of help. Fedora EMEA is something that
was created after two year of contribution, that underlines the
importance to have a center in the EMEA where we can refer to improve
our work.

> It's a fact that we already have this situation. Think of Kushal
> for
> example: No doubt that he is a valuable contributor and if I did not
> offer him a free place to sleep he would not have been able to come to
> Berlin at all. Two days ago he told me that he wont be able to come
> anyway because he did not find a sponsor. 
I agree with Joerg and Max posts: they express what i think too.

Let me add a tought:

There is a lot of work in front of us, we have to focus our time and
passion (that you and everyone here has) in a costructive way. While
we are discussiong about this issue, we are losing a possible Fedora
user and/or contributors, and we are moving away the community.

Please, just give the time to Fedora EMEA to spring its wings and
demostrate its capacities, then you'll have all the time to criticize
its positions, but, now, let Gerold and the EMEA board to build Fedora
EMEA: they were voted by people with a publig vote (see the M-L
announce and the self-nomination wiki) and now they have the right and
the duty to work!

Regards

Francesco Ugolini

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Hi Francesco,

thanks for your reply and for defining your position. I cannot agree to
everything (especially to your mathematics ;)), so please let me give
you a few answers:

Am Freitag, den 16.05.2008, 15:03 +0200 schrieb Francesco Ugolini: 
>  2008/5/10 Christoph Wickert
> <christoph.wickert(a)googlemail.com&gt;:
>  
>  > Sorry if I took you to literally. Also as I already told you in private
>  > I do not criticize you or your work. Please don't be offended just
>  > because you are the chair of EMEA. Thanks
>  >
>  > Maybe someone else of the people who voted for 128 EUR could explain it
>  > to me then? I'm not talking about 128 or 129 Euros now but the general
>  > height of the fee.
>  
>  All the founders vote for this fee, and they all together decided that
>  it would the best solution, considering the number in a year ( 10.5 €
>  circa per month and less than 4 cent per day), 
??? 10,50 Euros a month divided by 30 days is 35 Cent per day. (This
makes me wonder if I'm the only one who is reading your mail.)

>   so i know we are living
>  with an economy near the stagnation, but i don't understand why this
>  fee could create such criticism. Yes, i agree if you tell me that
>  those are money, and it's a week or two of work in a PA office, but i
>  think if you consider that amount in a larger view it's not so much. 
It's not much for you and me or might not be much for most Europeans,
but for people in Africa it's two months working full time (see below).
When you say "it's a week of work" then I doubt you understood the
problem. 
>  
>  >
>  > There are several people on this list who say the fee is very high so I
>  > don't understand why this hasn't been considered by the founding members
>  > before.
>  
>  Maybe because they weren't in Bruxelles? 
Point taken. But I think it is wrong to imply indifference to all people
who did not make it Bruxelles.

>  
>  >I agree the fee is a statement, but do you think that on the other hand
>  >not being able to pay the fee also is one? People who are not willing or
>  >able to pay the membership may still valuable and hard working
>  >contributors.
>  
>  There are several categories that have cost reduction to allow people
>  who can't afford such cost (i think one of this people with a certain
>  income not to pay or pay a low fee, but see the "fee document" to be
>  sure). 
I'd love to but I have no idea what document your are talking about. I
did a full text search on all my fedora mail but I can't find it, did
search the Wiki and did not find it ether. Could you please show me this
document?

In January we had the "EMEA: Preliminary Statutes" thread and there
only a maximum was defined. The fad_2007_emea_ship_en presentation at
http://chitlesh.fedorapeople.org/FAD/ mentions two fellowship/membership
levels: 25 and 50 Euros. So I hope you can understand why I was shocked
when I first heard of 128 EUR last week.

According to Gerold the cost reduced membership is only available to
pupils, students or to people who do not work full time. I already wrote
this im my second mail in this thread and nobody has corrected me/Gerold
since then, so I have to assume this is correct.

The Problem with this fee is that it does not take the ambassador's
income or their countries purchasing power parity (PPP) into account. 

GDP - per capita (PPP): [1]
Germany: 34,400
France: $33,800
Italy: $31,000
Netherlands: $38,600
Switzerland: $39,800

and in contrast:
Armenia: $5,700
Jordan: $4,700
Mauritius $11,900
Mozambique: $900
Nigeria: $2,200

We have Ambassadors from all these countries and all these people will
have to pay the same amount of money. Do you really think you will be
able to attract members from Africa or the Middle East this way?

>  
>  >Sorry if I did not point out my suggestion more clearly: Lower the
>  >member fee to enable more people to participate. Especially because the
>  >NPO is called EMEA but lacks ME and A at the moment.
>  
>  A is not missing. In Africa there are some ambassadors who expressed
>  in the past their agreement for such initiative, not to have a card
>  with Fedora EMEA writte on it, but to be able to easily ask for
>  resources and be part of a easy network that could linke them. In the
>  last LinuxTag a Monzambique ambassador attended the event and seemes
>  interested in this idea. 
Africa or Middle East are missing as long as the EMEA e.V. has no paying
member from there that is allowed to vote on all e.V. issues. Simple as
that.

>  
>  For ME there is some work in progress, but if you consider we had just
>  an event in Dubay (http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FedoraEvents/GITEX).
>  
>  I think if we ask ambassadors and contributors they aren't in search
>  of membership, but in search of help. Fedora EMEA is something that
>  was created after two year of contribution, that underlines the
>  importance to have a center in the EMEA where we can refer to improve
>  our work. 
I can only speak for myself, but I'm also in search of participation.
And participation unfortunately is limited to membership. As Jeroen
pointed out this is not our policy but a legal need that you cannot
change. All you can change is the height of the fee.
>  
>  >It's a fact that we already have this situation. Think of Kushal for
>  >example: No doubt that he is a valuable contributor and if I did not
>  >offer him a free place to sleep he would not have been able to come to
>  >Berlin at all. Two days ago he told me that he wont be able to come
>  >anyway because he did not find a sponsor.
>  
>  I agree with Joerg and Max posts: they express what i think too.
>  
>  Let me add a tought:
>  
>  There is a lot of work in front of us, we have to focus our time and
>  passion (that you and everyone here has) in a costructive way. While
>  we are discussiong about this issue, we are losing a possible Fedora
>  user and/or contributors, and we are moving away the community. 
Do you really think we are loosing people because we TALK? Fedora is
lucky to have a large and vital community and it is completely normal
for people to have different opinions. Talking about this is not a
uncomfortable liability or a waste of time but a fundamental need.

If you say we are moving away from the community I have to reply that
IMO we are moving away by making the Fedora NPO an exclusive club of
Europeans or people who can afford it otherwise.

>  
>  Please, just give the time to Fedora EMEA to spring its wings and
>  demostrate its capacities, then you'll have all the time to criticize
>  its positions,  
Sorry to interrupt you here: I'm not criticizing the EMEA's positions
but a single point in it's design. 

>  but, now, let Gerold and the EMEA board to build Fedora
>  EMEA: they were voted by people with a publig vote (see the M-L
>  announce and the self-nomination wiki) and now they have the right and
>  the duty to work! 
Of course they have, please understand I don't challenge this at all.

Kind Regards,
Christoph

[1] Numbers are taken from the World Fact Book.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/

EMEA Membership Questions

[Francesco Ugolini]

2008/5/17 Christoph Wickert <christoph.wickert(a)googlemail.com&gt;:
>  Hi Francesco,
>
>  thanks for your reply and for defining your position. I cannot agree to
>  everything (especially to your mathematics ;)), so please let me give
>  you a few answers:
>
>  Am Freitag, den 16.05.2008, 15:03 +0200 schrieb Francesco Ugolini:
> > 2008/5/10 Christoph Wickert <christoph.wickert(a)googlemail.com&gt;:
> >
> > > Sorry if I took you to literally. Also as I already told you in private
> > > I do not criticize you or your work. Please don't be offended just
> > > because you are the chair of EMEA. Thanks
> > >
> > > Maybe someone else of the people who voted for 128 EUR could explain it
> > > to me then? I'm not talking about 128 or 129 Euros now but the general
> > > height of the fee.
> >
> > All the founders vote for this fee, and they all together decided that
> > it would the best solution, considering the number in a year ( 10.5 €
> > circa per month and less than 4 cent per day),
>
>  ??? 10,50 Euros a month divided by 30 days is 35 Cent per day. (This
>  makes me wonder if I'm the only one who is reading your mail.) 
Just a mistake made with calculator (I've read the decimal like the
cent and I've approximated this one, sorry). The substance doesn't
change.

It doesn't matter if nobody took care of my mail, I prefer to see 10
people working for fedora than 20 ones reading my mail :)


>  I'd love to but I have no idea what document your are talking
> about. I
>  did a full text search on all my fedora mail but I can't find it, did
>  search the Wiki and did not find it ether. Could you please show me this
>  document?
>
>  In January we had the "EMEA: Preliminary Statutes" thread and there
>  only a maximum was defined. The fad_2007_emea_ship_en presentation at
>  http://chitlesh.fedorapeople.org/FAD/ mentions two fellowship/membership
>  levels: 25 and 50 Euros. So I hope you can understand why I was shocked
>  when I first heard of 128 EUR last week.
>
>  According to Gerold the cost reduced membership is only available to
>  pupils, students or to people who do not work full time. I already wrote
>  this im my second mail in this thread and nobody has corrected me/Gerold
>  since then, so I have to assume this is correct.
>
>  The Problem with this fee is that it does not take the ambassador's
>  income or their countries purchasing power parity (PPP) into account.
>
>  GDP - per capita (PPP): [1]
>  Germany: 34,400
>  France: $33,800
>  Italy: $31,000
>  Netherlands: $38,600
>  Switzerland: $39,800
>
>  and in contrast:
>  Armenia: $5,700
>  Jordan: $4,700
>  Mauritius $11,900
>  Mozambique: $900
>  Nigeria: $2,200
>
>  We have Ambassadors from all these countries and all these people will
>  have to pay the same amount of money. Do you really think you will be
>  able to attract members from Africa or the Middle East this way?
>  
For this question, it would be a pleasure to know the African and
Middle East ambassadors opinion.

Fedora NPO is the only way to get resources for EMEA without being
dependent from others. I think if we want enough money to produce
cd/dvd, to sponsor events, to get help and to coordinate everything we
have to set up a responsible fee. Everyone in EMEA could benefit from
this decision, especially ME and Africa, i don't see how Fedora NPO
membership could affect your ambassadors status.

>  Do you really think we are loosing people because we TALK? Fedora is
>  lucky to have a large and vital community and it is completely normal
>  for people to have different opinions. Talking about this is not a
>  uncomfortable liability or a waste of time but a fundamental need.
>
>  If you say we are moving away from the community I have to reply that
>  IMO we are moving away by making the Fedora NPO an exclusive club of
>  Europeans or people who can afford it otherwise.
>  
But, once again, Fedora NPO is a resources' bridge, Ambassadors
project is a different thing: Ambassadors could ask Fedora NPO for
resources and help: they still remain Ambassadors, without any
difference at all.

I, you, Gerold,  ME and A members etc. are both Ambassadors, and we
will be so without any difference. I don't understand why join a NPO
could change our status, when we would able to get stuffs and help
from it :)

Personally I think your opinions are important and those ones
underline that you are following with attention this important step in
the evolution of Fedora. I don't want to cut the discussion, I'm just
asking to wait and see what the Board will do, because I'm sure they
are working hard and they have the same goal of any other person here.

Long life to Ambassadors!

Francesco Ugolini

EMEA Membership Questions

[Christoph Wickert]

Am Samstag, den 17.05.2008, 16:48 +0200 schrieb Francesco Ugolini:
>  2008/5/17 Christoph Wickert
> <christoph.wickert(a)googlemail.com&gt;:
>  
>  Just a mistake made with calculator (I've read the decimal like the
>  cent and I've approximated this one, sorry). The substance doesn't
>  change. 
IMO it makes a big difference. If it were only 4 Cent a day we surly
would not discuss this here.

Anyway, can you show me the "fees" document you were talking about? I'd
like to read it in preparation of the FAD.
>   
[snipped]
>   
> I don't want to cut the discussion, I'm just
> asking to wait and see what the Board will do, because I'm sure they
> are working hard and they have the same goal of any other person here.

Once again: It's not about what the board will do but about the design.
I'm convinced that everybody will do his best, nevertheless this is an
issue that needs further discussion on the FAD.

C U there,
Christoph

EMEA Membership Questions

[Max Spevack]

On Sat, 17 May 2008, Christoph Wickert wrote:

>  We have Ambassadors from all these countries and all these people
> will 
>  have to pay the same amount of money. Do you really think you will be 
>  able to attract members from Africa or the Middle East this way? 
I know that I keep chiming in on the side of this thread, but once again 
I must say that from my perspective as a Red Hat employee whose 
full-time job is to build community throughout EMEA, I am not at all 
interested in collecting any sorts of fees from people who are members 
of the Fedora community.

When the idea of a Fedora EMEA e.V. was first proposed to me, the reason 
that I supported the idea was because it would be useful to have a legal 
entity, not Red Hat, that was organized and working to promote the 
mission of Fedora throughout EMEA.  I think it is also an interesting 
experiment in community empowerment, and a good next step for the larger 
Fedora Project to try.

Fedora EMEA e.V., if you ask *my opinion*, should be trying to raise 
money from third parties, and not from the current Fedora community.  A 
peson does not need to be a "member" of Fedora EMEA e.V. to be a member 
of the Fedora community in Europe, Africa, Middle East, or anywhere.

Again, I speak only for myself, and from the viewpoint of someone who is 
tasked with thinking about the overall health of the Fedora community in 
EMEA, and in also making sure that the financial situation of Fedora 
EMEA e.V., whatever that situation might be, is handled transparently 
for the community, the Fedora Board, and Red Hat to all make the most of 
it.

--Max

EMEA Membership Questions

[Andreas Rau]

Collecting money from third parties is the primary reason in my point of
view... getting money from the community is not the target of this
operation! 

So there is nothing to fear - there is no need to be a member.. this is
mainly a way to get sponsors

Kind regards,
Andi Rau

Am Montag, den 19.05.2008, 09:31 +0200 schrieb Max Spevack:
>  On Sat, 17 May 2008, Christoph Wickert wrote:
>  
>  > We have Ambassadors from all these countries and all these people will 
>  > have to pay the same amount of money. Do you really think you will be 
>  > able to attract members from Africa or the Middle East this way?
>  
>  I know that I keep chiming in on the side of this thread, but once again 
>  I must say that from my perspective as a Red Hat employee whose 
>  full-time job is to build community throughout EMEA, I am not at all 
>  interested in collecting any sorts of fees from people who are members 
>  of the Fedora community.
>  
>  When the idea of a Fedora EMEA e.V. was first proposed to me, the reason 
>  that I supported the idea was because it would be useful to have a legal 
>  entity, not Red Hat, that was organized and working to promote the 
>  mission of Fedora throughout EMEA.  I think it is also an interesting 
>  experiment in community empowerment, and a good next step for the larger 
>  Fedora Project to try.
>  
>  Fedora EMEA e.V., if you ask *my opinion*, should be trying to raise 
>  money from third parties, and not from the current Fedora community.  A 
>  peson does not need to be a "member" of Fedora EMEA e.V. to be a member 
>  of the Fedora community in Europe, Africa, Middle East, or anywhere.
>  
>  Again, I speak only for myself, and from the viewpoint of someone who is 
>  tasked with thinking about the overall health of the Fedora community in 
>  EMEA, and in also making sure that the financial situation of Fedora 
>  EMEA e.V., whatever that situation might be, is handled transparently 
>  for the community, the Fedora Board, and Red Hat to all make the most of 
>  it.
>  
>  --Max
>  
>  --
>  Fedora-ambassadors-list mailing list
>  Fedora-ambassadors-list(a)redhat.com
>  https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-ambassadors-list