[Elections] Election Team Kickoff

[Daniel Vainsencher]

I agree that the current organization is ill advised. I agree the Debian 
constitution is a good one, but I don't think its values are generally 
accepted by the Squeak community. So I think importing it wholesale will 
  not work.

A constitution is good, elections are good, and a minimum requirement 
for making either legitimate (and even for the task we were "assigned" 
to - choosing candidates for coordinators) is a voting mechanism. I 
think Condorcet as implemented by Debian is a good mechanism, and as a 
"who gets to vote" we can use the web of trust provided by SqP.

I propose that getting this voting mechanism implemented be the first 
goal of this forum.

What do you guys think?

If we agree on this, I volunteer to guide (give initial specs and 
feedback) whoever is willing to implement it.

Unless someone objects to the above, I propose that this be the first 
thing this team does. Does someone here want to do the development? if 
not, I propose we go back to the list and ask for volunteers.

Daniel

Lex Spoon wrote:
> As I posted earlier [1], I don't consider the current "organization" to
> be legitimate at all.  People who have watched this situation over the
> years might notice that the "guides" were supposed to be temporary, and
> that the "castaways" were supposed to be temporary...  but nowadays, the
> "coordinators" now seem to consider themselves enshrined by default?
> 
> I warned the castaways that this would happen, that they themselves
> would come to think of themselves as leaders given a continuing power
> vacuum.  Despite declarations that they do not actually consider
> themselves self-styled leaders, etc., [2], things are the same 10 months
> later.  The castaways web site still lists the original "all your base
> belong to us" email as their mission statement.
> 
> I would suggest the Debian Constitution [3] as a great starting point
> for the Squeak community.  It has worked well for them, and they have a
> similar organization to the Squeak group.  Here's an article I wrote
> earlier on the idea, back when I was burning 5-10 hours per week to help
> with Squeak organization issues (time, I fear, I no longer can
> contribute):
> 
> 	http://people.squeakfoundation.org/article/45.html
> 
> The first change to think about is to elect leaders every year or maybe
> two, without term limits (open source volunteering is inherently limited
> anyway!).  I also like the idea we've explored of having a release
> manager, and would further suggest that the release manager gets
> elected, too.  Elections provide accountability.
> 
> Overall, the current setup is illegitimate and is ill-advised anyway,
> despite the quality of the individuals involved.  For a healthy community,
> there's no better time than the present to improve our organization.
> 
> 
> -Lex
> 
> [1]
> http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2005-February/088316.html
> 
> [2]
> http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2005-February/088335.html
> 
> [3]
> http://www.debian.org/devel/constitution
> _______________________________________________
> Elections mailing list
> Elections at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/elections
>