Hello again,
This is the second thing I thought quite some time ago and which I wanted to discuss here. :-)
My interrogation is quite simple: what is the purpose of the use of the word “fellowship”?
I am a member of several associations, and in all of them, except FSFE, I am called a “member” of the “association” itself. On the contrary, here in the FSFE, I am called a “fellow”, or perhaps a “member” of the “fellowship” of FSFE, I am not sure. Anyway, this is not natural at all, and I really do not understand why there seems to be a specific program, with a dedicated, separated website for people that want to support the FSFE?
The first time I subscribed, I must tell that when I got redirected to the “fellowship” website, I really wondered if I that was right and if I was not subscribing to something else. Even now, I still do not understand what that “fellowship” is about and how it is different from the association itself, assuming that there is an actual difference. And I also wonder if other people understand: if they do not, then would confuse them as it confuses me.
Any light on that?
hi Tanguy,
* Tanguy Ortolo tanguy+fsfe@ortolo.eu [2012-01-05 09:45:41 +0000]:
My interrogation is quite simple: what is the purpose of the use of the word “fellowship”?
I am a member of several associations, and in all of them, except FSFE, I am called a “member” of the “association” itself. On the contrary, here in the FSFE, I am called a “fellow”, or perhaps a “member” of the “fellowship” of FSFE, I am not sure. Anyway, this is not natural at all, and I really do not understand why there seems to be a specific program, with a dedicated, separated website for people that want to support the FSFE?
That is because legally you are not a member of the association when you are a Fellow of FSFE (see the buttom of https://fsfe.org/about/members.en.html). FSF calls their supporters associated members, but FSFE decided in 2004 to call them Fellows. Actually the name was decided before I joined FSFE, but afaik it was choosen because it sounds cool. A little bit like the Fellowship of the ring :)
The first time I subscribed, I must tell that when I got redirected to the “fellowship” website, I really wondered if I that was right and if I was not subscribing to something else. Even now, I still do not understand what that “fellowship” is about and how it is different from the association itself, assuming that there is an actual difference. And I also wonder if other people understand: if they do not, then would confuse them as it confuses me.
We are improving this at the moment. Currently we move the sites from the current fellowship.fsfe.org to fsfe.org/fellowship/. So we will include it better in the general fsfe.org website, and explain it better. (Now you can reach it under join in the main fsfe.org menu. Not "Fellowship" anymore, which will be confusing for a lot of people.)
Did that answer you question?
Regards, Matthias
Matthias Kirschner, 2012-01-05 11:25+0100:
Did that answer you question?
Yes it does. What I will remember is that our laws suck too much to allow the creation of a true European association, so this has been worked around this way. I do not think the term “fellowship” was the best thing to ease comprehension, but anyway perhaps this should be explained on the corresponding Web page.
* Tanguy Ortolo tanguy+fsfe@ortolo.eu [2012-01-05 10:41:58 +0000]:
I do not think the term “fellowship” was the best thing to ease comprehension, but anyway perhaps this should be explained on the corresponding Web page.
We will do so. When the new version is online, please give us feedback.
Matthias
Tanguy Ortolo tanguy+fsfe@ortolo.eu
Yes it does. What I will remember is that our laws suck too much to allow the creation of a true European association, so this has been worked around this way. [...]
Is that actually true? It thought it was a choice to have fellows instead of members.
Given what it is, I think "fellow" is much better than the misleading "associated members" used elsewhere (who aren't members and it's not an association).
Regards,
* MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [2012-01-05 12:13:47 +0000]:
Tanguy Ortolo tanguy+fsfe@ortolo.eu
Yes it does. What I will remember is that our laws suck too much to allow the creation of a true European association, so this has been worked around this way. [...]
Is that actually true? It thought it was a choice to have fellows instead of members.
There are two topics: - There is no European association. That is bad, because else FSFE would have choosen that one. As this is not possible, we set up a German association. - Fellows not being members. It was a choice when we set up the Fellowship to have Fellows as non-members. Like most of the people doing work for FSFE are non-members. After some time we wanted to give the Fellows more legal power in our constitution, so we introduced the Fellowship seats in the GA, which Fellows can vote. (Of course one of the most powerful ways to influence FSFE is still to just do the work as a volunteer and to contact us on matters, and discuss with us.)
Given what it is, I think "fellow" is much better than the misleading "associated members" used elsewhere (who aren't members and it's not an association).
I agree. That's why we try not talking about members, when it is not members in the actual legal sense. Although there are team members (in the web, translators, legal, etc. teams).
Regards, Matthias
Before I start: http://fsfe.org/source/index.en.xhtml looks broken and the contact page says to mention it here.
Matthias Kirschner mk@fsfe.org
There are two topics:
- There is no European association. That is bad, because else FSFE would have choosen that one. As this is not possible, we set up a German association.
To all intents and purposes, a German association is a European association because it is governed by EU law as well as German law and I think members could join it from anywhere in the EU (maybe even the world).
Even when a European corporate form exists, like SCE, you still have to choose somewhere as its residence.
- Fellows not being members. It was a choice when we set up the Fellowship to have Fellows as non-members. Like most of the people doing work for FSFE are non-members.
I feel that was a poor choice, as you can probably guess. I am a member of most of the things I work for at the moment.
Not trusting future leaders with all aspects of our work is one reason why people choose strong copyleft, GPL rather than BSD, so it seems a bit odd that FSFE (like FSF) basically demands BSD-style surrendering of control over the future uses of one's work.
After some time we wanted to give the Fellows more legal power in our constitution, so we introduced the Fellowship seats in the GA, which Fellows can vote.
That was a good move.
(Of course one of the most powerful ways to influence FSFE is still to just do the work as a volunteer and to contact us on matters, and discuss with us.)
That seems rather opaque and neither democratic nor do-ocratic. As you may remember, I stopped volunteering when that approach did not produce proper consideration of putting any FSFE web pages under a free software licence.
Regards,
Hey
On 5 January 2012 14:36, MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop wrote:
Before I start: http://fsfe.org/source/index.en.xhtml looks broken and the contact page says to mention it here.
Elaborate. Seems fine to me. It is certainly proper XML.
Matthias Kirschner mk@fsfe.org
There are two topics:
- There is no European association. That is bad, because else FSFE would
have choosen that one. As this is not possible, we set up a German association.
To all intents and purposes, a German association is a European association because it is governed by EU law as well as German law and I think members could join it from anywhere in the EU (maybe even the world).
True, but if all Fellows were members, hosting GAs would got out of hand.
- Fellows not being members. It was a choice when we set up the
Fellowship to have Fellows as non-members. Like most of the people doing work for FSFE are non-members.
I feel that was a poor choice, as you can probably guess. I am a member of most of the things I work for at the moment.
It is possible to join FSFE as a member too.
Not trusting future leaders with all aspects of our work is one reason why people choose strong copyleft, GPL rather than BSD, so it seems a bit odd that FSFE (like FSF) basically demands BSD-style surrendering of control over the future uses of one's work.
How, where?
(Of course one of the most powerful ways to influence FSFE is still to just do the work as a volunteer and to contact us on matters, and discuss with us.)
That seems rather opaque and neither democratic nor do-ocratic. As you may remember, I stopped volunteering when that approach did not produce proper consideration of putting any FSFE web pages under a free software licence.
That seems rather honest. It works out to that one way or the other and acknowledging it is good. I agree with the licensing issue though. We are trying to handle it for software first. Take a look at trac. However, I am also of the opinion that our web pages should be CC-BY-SA. The logo should be an exception.
Best,
"Heiki "Repentinus" Ojasild", 2012-01-05 15:48+0100:
It is possible to join FSFE as a member too.
Is it? I thought that was impossible, but if it is, then it is rather well hidden, or at least not really encouraged. Is there a specific reason why people that would like to help FSFE financially should do as as “fellows” rather as regular members as in any regular association?
How is FSFE different from APRIL, which has something like 6.000 members and seems to work rather fine with it? I thought the European status was a barrier, but since it is not, what is it?
However, I am also of the opinion that our web pages should be CC-BY-SA. The logo should be an exception.
Oh, please, not another logo nightmare… This has been a pain with Firefox, and even the Debian logo has freedom issues that are problematic within Debian itself, let us not add another one!
Le jeudi 05 janvier 2012 à 15:13 +0000, Tanguy Ortolo a écrit :
How is FSFE different from APRIL, which has something like 6.000 members and seems to work rather fine with it?
April works typically like a French 1901 association and many other associations. This is not exactly the same kind of association as FSFE (e.V.) also they are legally similar, I would like to point out the cultural difference here. For historical reasons, although FSFE was quite European at the beginning (including France), it has a lot of Germany's cultural aspects in the way the organisation works, that's more like other German associations I am aware of.
Now, I would like to point out that April as a "Conseil d'administration" something that FSFE does not have. And I don't think this is easier to get into April's CA than to become a member of the FSFE. It just works differently.
Now, which is better is another matter, and IMHO all the points you raise are valid and worth discussing.
Hugo Roy, 2012-01-05 16:22+0100:
April works typically like a French 1901 association and many other associations. This is not exactly the same kind of association as FSFE (e.V.) also they are legally similar, I would like to point out the cultural difference here. For historical reasons, although FSFE was quite European at the beginning (including France), it has a lot of Germany's cultural aspects in the way the organisation works, that's more like other German associations I am aware of.
I can understand that, but I really doubt that the German law provides no way to have a viable assotiation with more than a handful of “members”, that term being understood as: people that pay a subscription and are able to vote for decisions or name a board of representatives to take decisions.
Being French myself, of course I mostly know French law associations, but I also subscribed to Debian France, which is an Alsace-Moselle law association. I think this is quite close to the German law, and as far as I know, I am a member of it, although I have never been sollicitated for an assembly yet.
On Thu, 5 Jan 2012 16:30, tanguy+fsfe@ortolo.eu said:
I can understand that, but I really doubt that the German law provides no way to have a viable assotiation with more than a handful of “members”, that term being understood as: people that pay a
Sure there is; there are lots of associations with hundreds of thousands members. It was a deliberate decision of most of the FSFE founders, that the current members shall have a close control over the acceptance of new members. This close control of membership was also one of the reasons why the FSF-France members split themselves of from the FSFE (despite that the seem to keep their membership also restricted to a few people).
Hopefully the FSFE can eventually turn itself into an equal membership association (like most associations are).
Salam-Shalom,
Werner
* Tanguy Ortolo tanguy+fsfe@ortolo.eu [2012-01-05 15:13:14 +0000]:
"Heiki "Repentinus" Ojasild", 2012-01-05 15:48+0100:
It is possible to join FSFE as a member too.
Is it?
Yes, it is. Can you ask for becoming a member of FSFE. The usual procedure is that people who do work for FSFE, and whom the others trust are added as members. The other way is that you can candidate for the Fellowship seat, which makes you a member, too. In February are the next elections, so everybody who is Fellow for more than one year can candidate.
I thought that was impossible, but if it is, then it is rather well hidden, or at least not really encouraged.
Yes, that is right. Because a lot of the day to day work is not done by the members, but it is done by the different working groups. The members work on the strategic long term decisions.
Is there a specific reason why people that would like to help FSFE financially should do as as “fellows” rather as regular members as in any regular association?
The porpose of FSFE's members is not to get financial support. This is done by donors (mainly companies) and the Fellowship donations.
How is FSFE different from APRIL, which has something like 6.000 members and seems to work rather fine with it? I thought the European status was a barrier, but since it is not, what is it?
I don't know APRIL's structures well enough to answer that question.
The structure from FSFE is influenced by FSF's structure before the start in 2001 and than developed from this point.
Regards, Matthias
"Heiki "Repentinus" Ojasild" repentinus@fsfe.org
On 5 January 2012 14:36, MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop wrote:
Before I start: http://fsfe.org/source/index.en.xhtml looks broken and the contact page says to mention it here.
Elaborate. Seems fine to me. It is certainly proper XML.
It isn't xhtml and doesn't include any details of how to download the source code which is what I expected there. http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://fsfe.org/source/index.en.xhtml
To all intents and purposes, a German association is a European association because it is governed by EU law as well as German law and I think members could join it from anywhere in the EU (maybe even the world).
True, but if all Fellows were members, hosting GAs would got out of hand.
I don't see why. There are co-operatives with millions of members that still hold useful general meetings, although I prefer dividing into smaller units before you get to those numbers.
I feel that was a poor choice, as you can probably guess. I am a member of most of the things I work for at the moment.
It is possible to join FSFE as a member too.
How, where? ;-) The "Join" link is for the fellowship.
Not trusting future leaders with all aspects of our work is one reason why people choose strong copyleft, GPL rather than BSD, so it seems a bit odd that FSFE (like FSF) basically demands BSD-style surrendering of control over the future uses of one's work.
How, where?
It's more of a practice than a policy, but try to start with volunteer work under any other terms than the existing, even when the existing terms are not free software, and see how far you don't get. This may have changed in recent years but I'd seen no visible indication of it.
That seems rather opaque and neither democratic nor do-ocratic. As you may remember, I stopped volunteering when that approach did not produce proper consideration of putting any FSFE web pages under a free software licence.
That seems rather honest. It works out to that one way or the other and acknowledging it is good. I agree with the licensing issue though. We are trying to handle it for software first. Take a look at trac.
Thank you for the information. https://trac.fsfe.org shows an invalid certificate - is that expected?
Regards,
* MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [2012-01-05 15:14:17 +0000]:
It's more of a practice than a policy, but try to start with volunteer work under any other terms than the existing, even when the existing terms are not free software, and see how far you don't get. This may have changed in recent years but I'd seen no visible indication of it.
Isn't that true for all organisations? When you want to start working, you first do that with the rules of the group. Than people see you do good work, and than you suggest changing rules to the group.
That's the procedure I experienced in FSFE, as well as in other organisations I took part.
Regards, Matthias
On 05/01/2012 05:27 μμ, Matthias Kirschner wrote:
Isn't that true for all organisations? When you want to start working, you first do that with the rules of the group. Than people see you do good work, and than you suggest changing rules to the group.
People (like Matthias) who write quotes (but also believe the very ideas) like the above are the reason I love Free Software and its communities and fellowships.
You can freely add my statement to this year's campaign "Tell us why you love Free Software!"
:)
That's the procedure I experienced in FSFE, as well as in other organisations I took part.
Regards, Matthias
On 5 January 2012 15:14, MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop wrote:
It isn't xhtml and doesn't include any details of how to download the source code which is what I expected there. http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://fsfe.org/source/index.en.xhtml
It is extended XHTML and your browser is sent the source. Use "Save Page As" or "View Page Source" or the equivalents in your browser to get the real source.
It is possible to join FSFE as a member too.
How, where? ;-) The "Join" link is for the fellowship.
https://fsfe.org/about/legal/constitution.en.html - write an application to Karsten Gerloff in his official capacity as the President of the FSFE. I admit, it is hidden rather well.
Thank you for the information. https://trac.fsfe.org shows an invalid certificate - is that expected?
I am not sure. I might have manually imported the certificate earlier. The cert should be signed by StartCom Ltd, the site should use AES-256 and the cert should expire on 2012-10-14.
Hi,
please let me add a little background to this discussion:
Am Donnerstag, den 05.01.2012, 15:28 +0000 schrieb Heiki "Repentinus" Ojasild:
It is possible to join FSFE as a member too.
How, where? ;-) The "Join" link is for the fellowship.
https://fsfe.org/about/legal/constitution.en.html - write an application to Karsten Gerloff in his official capacity as the President of the FSFE. I admit, it is hidden rather well.
Ever since FSFE exists, we have tried to limit the bureaucratic overhead to what is absolutely necessary.
Basically FSFE is a bunch of people working together for the advantage of Free Software. They come and go as they want, they get more or less involved according to their own wishes, from an hour a month to a full time job, and with commitments ranging from occasional contributions to a discussion to maintaining the complete server infrastructure, meaning to be more or less reachable at any time.
However, there needs to be a legal body representing this bunch of people legally, towards banks, towards the court, and so on. For this, FSFE decided to create a legal association based in Germany. This association is kept as small as necessary to fulfil it's purpose.
The operational decisions in FSFE are not taken in this legal body. They are taken in the working groups, consisting of the people - as the name implies - that do the work.
Of course there are tasks that the legal body has assigned, however these tasks are more of the kind that usually a "board of directors", a "steering committee" or a "supervisory board" would do.
So yes, the procedure of joining the legal body behind FSFE is not published very aggressively, and that's because joining the "real" FSFE (the people doing the work, a by magnitudes bigger group) is much easier *and* much more important.
[Side note: believe me, once you contribute to FSFE over a longer period, you get sucked into a role with more responsibility and decision power faster than you expected. Happened to me as well ;-)]
Thanks, Reinhard
Thanks for your good explanation Reinhard!
* Reinhard Müller reinhard@fsfe.org [2012-01-05 17:09:52 +0100]:
[Side note: believe me, once you contribute to FSFE over a longer period, you get sucked into a role with more responsibility and decision power faster than you expected. Happened to me as well ;-)]
Yeah, that happens very fast. You do work for FSFE, you're not running fast enough, and than you are coordinating a working team, become the financial officer, or even working fulltime for FSFE ;)
Regards, Matthias
Yeah, that happens very fast. You do work for FSFE, you're not running fast enough, and than you are coordinating a working team, become the financial officer, or even working fulltime for FSFE ;)
You do not even need a working team to coordinate. Just get a bunch of friends to do translations with you and you can be pretty sure you can influence them. Just watch out you do not lose them.
Point is, find whatever you like to do and start doing it. Then you won't notice petty issues like decision making. (Especially if your wireless connection is constantly dropping when you are trying to send an e-mail and you do not want to climb a floor higher.)
* Reinhard Müller reinhard@fsfe.org [120105 17:10, mID 1325779792.1880.86.camel@dublin]:
[Side note: believe me, once you contribute to FSFE over a longer period, you get sucked into a role with more responsibility and decision power faster than you expected. Happened to me as well ;-)]
Same here, a few years later though :-)
Martin
"Heiki "Repentinus" Ojasild" repentinus@fsfe.org
On 5 January 2012 15:14, MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop wrote:
It isn't xhtml and doesn't include any details of how to download the source code which is what I expected there. http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://fsfe.org/source/index.en.xhtml
It is extended XHTML and your browser is sent the source. Use "Save Page As" or "View Page Source" or the equivalents in your browser to get the real source.
And how does one compile that mislabelled source code to produce the page? In GPLese, am I asking for the Corresponding Source?
Of course, by this point, I have long forgotten why I wanted the source code and FSFE loses out on some more help until someone else spots whatever bug I spotted before.
[...]
Thank you for the information. https://trac.fsfe.org shows an invalid certificate - is that expected?
I am not sure. I might have manually imported the certificate earlier. The cert should be signed by StartCom Ltd, the site should use AES-256 and the cert should expire on 2012-10-14.
I'm seeing "The certificate is only valid for the following names: fellowship.fsfe.org , fsfe.org , www.fellowship.fsfe.org "
I wonder why.
Confused,
Dear MJ,
On 10 January 2012 21:05, MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop wrote:
And how does one compile that mislabelled source code to produce the page? In GPLese, am I asking for the Corresponding Source?
This https://fsfe.org/README.texi tells you how to build them. The corresponding source is what you have been given. If you cannot build the binaries out of it, even GPL would make it your problem.
Sincerely,
* Heiki "Repentinus" Ojasild repentinus@fsfe.org [120110 22:12, mID CA+KqsuHhzU9wnEB537J-MM4eR7FNKoMv2Fb46DJemMvztq2hKw@mail.gmail.com]:
Dear MJ,
On 10 January 2012 21:05, MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop wrote:
And how does one compile that mislabelled source code to produce the page? In GPLese, am I asking for the Corresponding Source?
This https://fsfe.org/README.texi tells you how to build them. The corresponding source is what you have been given. If you cannot build the binaries out of it, even GPL would make it your problem.
There are no binaries here [1] :-) Also, the webpages are more about content. And yes, you can check out the webpage SVN at any time and build the webpage yourself. Documentation is included AFAIR.
Martin
[1] Except maybe for a few PDFs, but IIRC source is also available for them.
Hi,
* MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [120110 22:05, mID E1Rkism-00073t-BB@petrol.towers.org.uk]:
And how does one compile that mislabelled source code to produce the page? In GPLese, am I asking for the Corresponding Source?
Everything in /source/ is the actual source. The necessary tools are in the webpage SVN. You may want to read [1]
Of course, by this point, I have long forgotten why I wanted the source code and FSFE loses out on some more help until someone else spots whatever bug I spotted before.
If the bug you spotted earlier comes to your mind again, please drop us a line.
Thank you for the information. https://trac.fsfe.org shows an invalid certificate - is that expected?
I am not sure. I might have manually imported the certificate earlier. The cert should be signed by StartCom Ltd, the site should use AES-256 and the cert should expire on 2012-10-14.
I'm seeing "The certificate is only valid for the following names: fellowship.fsfe.org , fsfe.org , www.fellowship.fsfe.org "
Yes, this is true. The problem is that we didn't know we'd have to use the same server for trac and fellowship. Please temporarily allow the certificate. I hope we can fix this.
I wonder why.
See above.
[1] http://fsfe.org/contribute/web/
Thanks, Martin
Am Dienstag, den 10.01.2012, 21:05 +0000 schrieb MJ Ray:
Of course, by this point, I have long forgotten why I wanted the source code and FSFE loses out on some more help until someone else spots whatever bug I spotted before.
If you find a bug on the web pages, you can always send a short note to web (at) fsfeurope.org.
Thanks, Reinhard
Reinhard Müller reinhard@fsfe.org
If you find a bug on the web pages, you can always send a short note to web (at) fsfeurope.org.
Could that be added to URL: http://fsfe.org/contact/contact.en.html please?
Regards,
Am Mittwoch, den 11.01.2012, 14:19 +0000 schrieb mjr@phonecoop.coop:
Could that be added to URL: http://fsfe.org/contact/contact.en.html please?
Yes, this makes a lot of sense. I'll ask our webmasters to add that, or even to add a note to the footer of each page.
Thanks, Reinhard
Am Mittwoch, den 11.01.2012, 15:33 +0100 schrieb Reinhard Müller:
Am Mittwoch, den 11.01.2012, 14:19 +0000 schrieb mjr@phonecoop.coop:
Could that be added to URL: http://fsfe.org/contact/contact.en.html please?
Yes, this makes a lot of sense. I'll ask our webmasters to add that, or even to add a note to the footer of each page.
FWIW, I've just got the feedback that at least some of our webmasters think that it's ok if issues with the web pages are sent to the general contact address given on the URL you've mentioned above.
Anyway, the issue is being considered and discussed by the webmaster team, and they will decide within the team and implement whatever they consider the best solution.
BTW, I think this is an excellent example how FSFE's decision making works: the team responsible for a given field of work decides autonomously for issues within its domain. Within the team decisions are made in a democratic - actually in most cases on a consensus based - manner, input from outside the team is heard and considered.
Thanks, Reinhard
Reinhard Müller reinhard@fsfe.org
BTW, I think this is an excellent example how FSFE's decision making works: the team responsible for a given field of work decides autonomously for issues within its domain. Within the team decisions are made in a democratic - actually in most cases on a consensus based - manner, input from outside the team is heard and considered.
I think it's also an example of three ways that FSFE's decision-making is undemocratic:
1. IIRC the autonomy is only at team level (in debian, for example, the autonomy is also generally present at volunteer and project);
2. the process is structureless/undocumented;
3. the process is opaque, with the outcome usually appearing without closure with the reporter/suggester.
Thanks for the suggestion to just send things to the general contact address. I'm usually reluctant to do that because the general contacts for most websites get confused by technical bug reports. Also, I feel like I should be able to just send in proposed bugfixes, so I try to get the source code, which then led me to find that related bug of xml mislabelled as xhtml that sidetracked me.
Hope that explains,
* MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [120112 16:18, mID E1RlMPi-0007Mv-2G@petrol.towers.org.uk]:
Thanks for the suggestion to just send things to the general contact address. I'm usually reluctant to do that because the general contacts for most websites get confused by technical bug reports.
I think you are right and I also support to have the webmaster's address on all pages.
Also, I feel like I should be able to just send in proposed bugfixes, so I try to get the source code, which then led me to find that related bug of xml mislabelled as xhtml that sidetracked me.
Well, the file extension itself says nothing about the content. Still it is probably true that the FSFE webserver should not serve these files as application/xhtml+xml files, but rather as application/xml or text/xml (I'm Ccing web@ on this again).
Thanks, Martin
Martin Gollowitzer gollo@fsfe.org
- MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [120112 16:18,
Also, I feel like I should be able to just send in proposed bugfixes, so I try to get the source code, which then led me to find that related bug of xml mislabelled as xhtml that sidetracked me.
Well, the file extension itself says nothing about the content. Still it is probably true that the FSFE webserver should not serve these files as application/xhtml+xml files, but rather as application/xml or text/xml (I'm Ccing web@ on this again).
True about the extension, but as you note the Content-Type is also xhtml. Then you get into a related question about whether it's a bug with the website or the browsers if a browser attempts to display that not-quite-xhtml as if it is xhtml.
A link to /contribute/web/ or README.texi alongside the source code link is another way it could be made less confusing. Or there could be some link in the source file that gets hidden when the page is compiled. Lots of possible resolutions. Good luck choosing.
Regards,
Am Donnerstag, den 12.01.2012, 15:18 +0000 schrieb MJ Ray:
I think it's also an example of three ways that FSFE's decision-making is undemocratic:
- IIRC the autonomy is only at team level (in debian, for example,
the autonomy is also generally present at volunteer and project);
The autonomy is at the level of who's affected. Decisions about DFD are generally taken by people involved with DFD. Decisions about FSFE's booth at FOSDEM are taken by the people participating in the booth. The decision whether I want to be at FOSDEM on Saturday, on Sunday, or on both days, is with me alone (well, and with my wife ;-)).
While I strongly believe that this is the most reasonable way to handle it, I don't think the definition of group size is not a matter of democracy but rather of subsidiarity.
- the process is structureless/undocumented;
Even worse: the process is flexible and up to the group to define, as well as all members of the group are fine with it. I know that some Fellowship groups make decisions while they meet over a beer.
BTW, for essential decisions (such that affect the whole core team of FSFE), the process is strictly structured and documented. The documentation is available to every member of the core team.
I've never seen it as a requirement for democracy that the documentation of the decision process is available to people outside the domain of the decision. It is an interesting political question, although I don't think it would change much in the case of FSFE.
- the process is opaque, with the outcome usually appearing without
closure with the reporter/suggester.
I agree that this happens sometime, and that this is bad. If the outcome of a decision is not communicated to the people giving input or requesting the decision, it is certainly not on purpose, and I hope that the word "usually" above is more of a subjective feeling than a fact, since it would mean we're bad at communicating what we do.
Sometimes our decision processes take long, also related to key people in FSFE travelling a lot. Sometimes we simply forget to report back. If in doubt what came out for a specific issue, just ask.
FWIW, I don't think that this is a matter of democracy, it's a matter of communication.
Thanks, Reinhard
Reinhard Müller reinhard@fsfe.org
Am Donnerstag, den 12.01.2012, 15:18 +0000 schrieb MJ Ray:
I think it's also an example of three ways that FSFE's decision-making is undemocratic:
- IIRC the autonomy is only at team level (in debian, for example,
the autonomy is also generally present at volunteer and project);
The autonomy is at the level of who's affected. Decisions about DFD are generally taken by people involved with DFD. Decisions about FSFE's booth at FOSDEM are taken by the people participating in the booth. [...]
I don't think that's quite true. Decisions about one's own work for the team seemed to be usually taken by the team, even when they do not affect anyone else much. While that is often what employers do, it's not always how voluntary groups work.
[...]
While I strongly believe that this is the most reasonable way to handle it, I don't think the definition of group size is not a matter of democracy but rather of subsidiarity.
It may also involve subsidiarity (which is an organizing principle that is basically a sub-matter of democracy), in which case it is also tied up with other things that I hold dear, like autonomy, independence, freedom of association and stuff like that.
- the process is structureless/undocumented;
Even worse: the process is flexible and up to the group to define, as well as all members of the group are fine with it.
Trouble is: that either means redefining the process on each new member, or the new member having to believe whatever they are told by older members about how decisions are taken, which may be codswallop.
I know that some Fellowship groups make decisions while they meet over a beer.
To such groups, I wish a abstemious temperance teetotaller!
[... 3. Decisions never reported ...]
Sometimes our decision processes take long, also related to key people in FSFE travelling a lot. Sometimes we simply forget to report back. If in doubt what came out for a specific issue, just ask.
FWIW, I don't think that this is a matter of democracy, it's a matter of communication.
I think it's both. Communication is necessary for democracy.
Regards,
Am Samstag, den 14.01.2012, 18:56 +0000 schrieb MJ Ray:
Decisions about one's own work for the team seemed to be usually taken by the team, even when they do not affect anyone else much.
I have worked in a number of teams and never experienced this.
It seems to me that you made an experience in a specific case (you proposed a change of license of our web pages) which was turned down, could it be that you're generalizing from this a little too much?
Even worse: the process is flexible and up to the group to define, as well as all members of the group are fine with it.
Sorry I just saw I wrote nonsense: it should of course mean "as *long* as all members of the group are fine with it".
I know that some Fellowship groups make decisions while they meet over a beer.
To such groups, I wish a abstemious temperance teetotaller!
I said over *a* beer ;-)
[... 3. Decisions never reported ...]
FWIW, I don't think that this is a matter of democracy, it's a matter of communication.
I think it's both. Communication is necessary for democracy.
Communication *inside* a democratic organisation is of course necessary for democracy. Certainly we can also improve that, but in this thread we were (or at least I was) talking about communication to the outside.
Thanks, Reinhard
* MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [2012-01-14 18:56:00 +0000]:
The autonomy is at the level of who's affected. Decisions about DFD are generally taken by people involved with DFD. Decisions about FSFE's booth at FOSDEM are taken by the people participating in the booth. [...]
I don't think that's quite true. Decisions about one's own work for the team seemed to be usually taken by the team, even when they do not affect anyone else much. While that is often what employers do, it's not always how voluntary groups work.
Do you have an example for that? Because I did not have the impression.
Thanks, Matthias
On Mon, Jan 16, 2012 at 8:58 AM, Matthias Kirschner mk@fsfe.org wrote:
- MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [2012-01-14 18:56:00 +0000]:
The autonomy is at the level of who's affected. Decisions about DFD are generally taken by people involved with DFD. Decisions about FSFE's booth at FOSDEM are taken by the people participating in the booth.
[...]
I don't think that's quite true. Decisions about one's own work for the team seemed to be usually taken by the team, even when they do not affect anyone else much. While that is often what employers do, it's not always how voluntary groups work.
Do you have an example for that? Because I did not have the impression.
Assumptions about what it is that volunteers are willing can be the death of a volunteer organisation. I observe this in local politics and in global volunteer software projects. Linus had it right when he called it "herding cats". I've spoken with local authority administrators about their assumptions of what I call "minimum terms of participation" which must be met before a volunteer will do anything and the removal of which will cause the volunteers to vanish like the morning mist.
Those who treat volunteers as a resource to be directed will be puzzled repeatedly. Michael Gove in the UK is about to find this out as he lays out grand new plans with extra and onerous responsibilities on school governors who are not regularly punished by government inspectors for doing a good job but not providing enough evidence to prove to the inspectors that they are doing a good job.
I mean that the conclusion of the inspectors will back up the volunteer governors report and claims of the school, showing that the governors did know what they were talking about; but if the governors can't prove that this wasn't a lucky guess, then they get a beating by the inspectors.
Sam
Hi,
I found two mails of you in my spam folder because the header contains 8 bit characters. For ages I check that so to sort out Chinese mail/spam. However, the original poster or someone later encoded the subject this way (showed using C escapes):
Subject: Re: Why \342\200\234fellowship\342\200\235?
Martin's mail encoded it correctly, but your mailer didn't. Let's see whether my Gnus gets it right.
Shalom-Salam,
Werner
Werner Koch wk@gnupg.org
Martin's mail encoded it correctly, but your mailer didn't. Let's see whether my Gnus gets it right.
I'm using Emacs mail-mode (or sendmail-mode I thought). I didn't find this in the emacs debbugs but I'm surprised it's not a known bug. When I'm at that system again, I'll file a bug report.
Thanks,
On Wed, 11 Jan 2012 13:39, wk@gnupg.org said:
Martin's mail encoded it correctly, but your mailer didn't. Let's see whether my Gnus gets it right.
Okay, Gnus fixes the subjkect encoding before sending.
Salam-Shalom,
Werner
* MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [2012-01-05 14:36:57 +0000]:
That seems rather opaque and neither democratic nor do-ocratic. As you may remember, I stopped volunteering when that approach did not produce proper consideration of putting any FSFE web pages under a free software licence.
(It does not make sense to talk about "democratic" when you talk about organisations. It just makes sense for states. For organisations we should talk about participation, transperency, decision making, etc.)
Your input about the license of the FSFE was considered (at least by me). But a lot of people at that time did not agree with it. That can also happen in organisations where all members vote on a proposal.
I still think it was bad that you stopped your involvement, because of this.
Regards, Matthias
Matthias Kirschner mk@fsfe.org
- MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [2012-01-05 14:36:57 +0000]:
That seems rather opaque and neither democratic nor do-ocratic. As you may remember, I stopped volunteering when that approach did not produce proper consideration of putting any FSFE web pages under a free software licence.
(It does not make sense to talk about "democratic" when you talk about organisations. It just makes sense for states. For organisations we should talk about participation, transperency, decision making, etc.)
As one may expect from a supporter of ICA.coop/coop/principles.html and other democracy campaigns, I disagree with that parenthesis completely. People who want us to ask for lesser words instead of democracy are similar to those who want us to ask about lesser aspects like "open source" instead of freedoms, so I am really surprised and disappointed to see it from such a leading light in FSFE.
I feel it is as important that users control our corporations as it is that users control our computers.
Your input about the license of the FSFE was considered (at least by me). But a lot of people at that time did not agree with it. That can also happen in organisations where all members vote on a proposal.
I don't recall that consideration and did not find it in the archives. I suspect it was based on the usual objection, that the freedoms would help those that oppose us, more than they'd help our supporters.
Yes, mistakes can happen in democratic organisations, but then you have both open discussion in a known consideration process and a more informative outcome (even if that information is sometimes difficult to interpret).
I still think it was bad that you stopped your involvement, because of this.
Why? Once I had realised that I am merely a fellow traveller and actively disagree with this aspect of FSFE policy and tactics, I felt it better to transfer my involvement to other free software support organisations that I feel are more likely to succeed in the long term. After all, why would anyone continue to give to an organisation which they feel undermines its own campaigns?
If I'm right, FSFE undermines itself more slowly without my help but there's more chance another free software supporter will succeed and convince it to free its material before it dies. If I'm wrong, the world still had the same number of volunteers supporting free software and we lost mainly a bit of friction along the way.
Regards,
hi MJ Ray,
* MJ Ray mjr@phonecoop.coop [2012-01-10 21:38:26 +0000]:
(It does not make sense to talk about "democratic" when you talk about organisations. It just makes sense for states. For organisations we should talk about participation, transperency, decision making, etc.)
As one may expect from a supporter of ICA.coop/coop/principles.html and other democracy campaigns, I disagree with that parenthesis completely. People who want us to ask for lesser words instead of democracy are similar to those who want us to ask about lesser aspects like "open source" instead of freedoms, so I am really surprised and disappointed to see it from such a leading light in FSFE.
I think there is a misunderstand between the two of us, which results form my different background as a former student of political science.
I feel it is as important that users control our corporations as it is that users control our computers.
I agree with this.
What I meant with my statement is, that the word "democracy" makes no sense for something else than states. (I need to search for an old e-mail where I explained that.)
For organisation we should not waste our time to think about "is it democratic, or not", but talk about participation (who can participate how), decision making (who can influence decisions, how are they made), transparency (how are decisions and structures documented/communicated), ...
Of course I am also fine that everybody chooses the organisation where he wants to get active and work for. With organisations that is much easier than we states :)
Regards, Matthias
Den 16-01-2012 10:12, Matthias Kirschner skrev:
I agree with this.
What I meant with my statement is, that the word "democracy" makes no sense for something else than states. (I need to search for an old e-mail where I explained that.)
For organisation we should not waste our time to think about "is it democratic, or not", but talk about participation (who can participate how), decision making (who can influence decisions, how are they made), transparency (how are decisions and structures documented/communicated), ...
There is one good reason for not running a political organization or NGO as an association with free membership, and that's the risk of "coups".
Suppose an association is really successful and attract a lot of donations. Come next general assembly, some group who is hostile to the association's goals, organize a lot of people to join just in time to be able to vote at the next general assembly.
In the case of the FSFE, that could be some Microsoft astroturfing group (like an SCO ...) or it could be an "open source" group who wants to sincerely warn governments against switching to free software if the commercial alternatives are technically superior (we have previously discussed a Norwegian "free software" group with that attitude).
Whenever you have an NGO with a clear political message and strong influence, there's that risk of "co-optation by coup". This risk can be averted by not running it formally as an association with free membership. If this is why the FSFE is structured as it is, that may be a good thing.
What's important is that the *community* is democratic, i.e. collaborative and with an open spirit.
Carsten Agger agger@modspil.dk [...]
There is one good reason for not running a political organization or NGO as an association with free membership, and that's the risk of "coups".
Suppose an association is really successful and attract a lot of donations. Come next general assembly, some group who is hostile to the association's goals, organize a lot of people to join just in time to be able to vote at the next general assembly.
That's why not-for-profit groups should not hold more assets than necessary, why a group may need some entry qualification and why there should be regulators who can enforce the stated goals, but it is not a reason against open and voluntary membership and democratic member control.
In fact, I suggest that the risk of coups is greater in undemocratic organisations because the attacker would only need to persuade a few core group postholders in private and don't need to convince a majority of a large audience of supporters pretty much in public.
The organisations that I have seen fall to such coups have gone because there was no regulator who would intervene, the board had been persuaded first and then they persuaded the wider membership. I don't remember any coups led by a membership against a board's wishes, so as long as only a minority of the board is elected each assembly, there's time to defeat a coup one way or another.
[...]
What's important is that the *community* is democratic, i.e. collaborative and with an open spirit.
Amen! And to reply to the earlier post: as I understand it, democratic does apply to organisations. It just means the people (Greek demos) run it (kratein). Usually these days, we understand it as being the whole audience, but it may be debatable who that is for orgs.
Regards,