Draft Workstation WG Governance Charter

[Josh Boyer]

On Tue, Nov 5, 2013 at 9:51 AM, Miloslav Trmač <mitr at volny.cz> wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 4, 2013 at 6:57 PM, Owen Taylor <otaylor at redhat.com> wrote:
>> On Wed, 2013-10-30 at 15:22 -0400, Josh Boyer wrote:
>>> On Wed, Oct 30, 2013 at 3:16 PM, Ray Strode <halfline at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> > Hi,
>>> >
>>> > On Wed, Oct 30, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Josh Boyer <jwboyer at fedoraproject.org> wrote:
>>> >> The other positions will be filled by general election
>>> >> every two years. As a special exception, four seats will be filled in
>>> >> one year, with those positions chosen at random (unless some number of
>>> >> members decide to step down). Voting will follow the standard Fedora
>>> >> election process and be open to all contributors in the CLA+1 group.
>>> >>
>>> >> In the event that a current member relinquishes their seat, that seat
>>> >> will be filled by the first runner up in the previous election.  If
>>> >> that person is not able or willing to fill the seat, it will go to
>>> >> each successive runner up until the seat is filled.
>>> >
>>> > I think, I personally, would rather see the previous working group
>>> > decide new members of the working group.  They're the ones doing the
>>> > work, so they should get the most say in the direction the work goes.
>>> > (the whole "fedora is a meritocracy not a democracy" thing).
>>> >
>>> > Put another way: I don't think someone who works on desktop related
>>> > software should have much say in who gets to be put in the cloud
>>> > working group, or vice-versa.
>>> >
>>> > Let the people already doing the work decide the continuing direction
>>> > of the work.
>>> > If things really get off course, fesco can intervene, but I don't
>>> > think that will happen.
>>>
>>> Fair.  To be honest, the more I think about it the more I dislike the
>>> idea of doing full blown elections.  They seem overkill and cumbersome
>>> when it comes to coordinating, etc.
>>
>> I strongly support this view - the end result of having too many
>> elections is that only a tiny fraction of people have the attention to
>> understand what is going on and vote.
>
> Repeating myself from the server list:
>
> I don't think long serving terms, and especially indefinite serving
> terms, are healthy: there should be an easy way for the community to
> self-correct without requiring extraordinary effort like finding a
> thick-skinned "opposition leader" to set up a recall election or the
> like.

Isn't that something that's addressed by FESCo oversight here?

> AFAICT unlike (Czech and US at least) national governments, the Fedora
> elections have always had very low overhead and basically no campaign
> / pre-election posturing seasons disruptive to the project; there
> hasn't been much election-related burden to speak of.

It's not necessarily about burden, though I think there is some burden
here.  It's mostly about the voting body either having no idea who to
pick because they aren't participating in this area, or being entirely
indifferent and not voting for the same reasons.  Coordinating a full
election for the WG seems overkill.

>> It also seems problematical to
>> have a elected working group that falls under the supervision of FESCO
>> which is also elected. What if FESCO and the group disagree?
> This can just as well happen with a non-elected group.

Yes.  I don't think the WG can change this itself anyway.  The WGs are
under the supervision (used very loosely here) of FESCo.

josh