moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Dear community,

Hildon Foundation has decided to move the association from a US-based foundation under the law of Pennsylvania towards a german "eingetragener Verein" (e.V.). This decision basically is drawn because it makes a lot of things a lot easier to keep a non-profit status with exempt from taxation and self-govern community tasks including bank issues (for now, the status of both, bank and paypal accounts, are kind of frozen since the bank declined to accept the new board members).

So I have drafted an articles of incorporation which is supposed to be the equivalent to the US bylaws, it just has a different base and structure. It is by no means complete or ready to go, just something to start with that needs your input. This is your chance to state your idea about what HiFo's laws should be like. The starting point are the basic requirements of a german e.V., which I assume to be given by this draft and are open to take over desired parts of the actual bylaws.

I'm asking for your input regarding content as well as a proper english translation. Please type your tmo user name in the upper right corner (no need for registration!) and share your thoughts by ##commenting in the document##, in the chat or preferrably right here.

The draft: https://etherpad.mozilla.org/AMabik4zeD

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

e.g. § 2 Purpose of the association could use some descriptive clarification, this is a crucial point; a purpose of general interest is important.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

If this helps to move on I'm all in :) As my English is not as good as I would wish it would be I can not help in this matter.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Thanks for picking this up Win7Mac... This needs to move and sadly I have neither the time nor skills to help. My German is that of a toddler on a good day.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Exempt from taxation seems to add a lot of overhead and personal/financial risk to board members, so it seems appropriate to sacrifice that in favor of freedom to act on our behalves. And after all, we're indeed non-profit, but not really charitable.

One of the downsides with a german e.V. is that all directors/board members must be EU residents. It appears to be that their position is meant for a longer term rather to change once every year, especially exchanging treasurer(s) seems kind of a hassle on a yearly basis.

Also, it appears to be unclear how to integrate a council with superiour rights over "extraordinary members". Usually, there is no such group in an e.V. (not nesessary but can be established), but actual bylaws have that integrated.
And we should make sure all this gets some kind of Community legitimation/mandate from coucil.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Wasn't one of the concerns of a non U.S. based organization was transfer of user information (talk.maemo.org) to a non American organization was problematic?

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Indeed, the talk.maemo.org server was in the USA, while the rest of maemo.org resided in Finland, EU. Since the migration, servers for maemo.org and talk.maemo.org moved to IPHH in Germany earlier this year. But this is rather unrelated to where the organization is based, we could choose any hoster anywhere. HiFo itself holds no records of members or their data.
But frankly, if you ask me, if there's anything problematic in that regard, it'd see it in the USA with their three letter agencies. I have more faith in german/EU laws than in US ones.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Isn't this a deal breaker? I'd feel uncomfortable having such restriction.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

I don't think the "board" of an e.V. has to be identical with the BoD we know from HiFo. Rather any such e.V. needs to include HiFo BoD and council and whole community in a reasonable way in the statutes.

HiFo been (still is) subserviant to council which is proxy of community. In short HiFo is community's cashier. Any e.V. needs statutes that make sure nothing changes in this absolute and ultimate control of community over their funds. There are a few further tasks HiFo is serving on behalf of community, like signing contracts (nota bene that even negotiation of any such contract has to get done or at least get approved in/by community or at least their proxy: council).
Anyway who's director of such an e.V and who are the inaugural members is *absolutely unrelated* to whatever structures, procedures, entities get established in e.V.'s statutes and decisions to manage the bank account and contract signing. It's just a daunting task to get that stuff right, but not a showstopper.

cheers
jOERG

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

I feel the same. We would lose Woody, GeneralAntilles and probably even Jaffa, which cannot be good... :(
A general rule for an e.V. is that it needs at least 2 bodies:
1) a board of directors and
2) a general meeting, where the general meeting is supposed to have supperior rights over board by electing and controlling the board.
So here's one solution: have minimum directors (1 would be enough, 2 or 3 probably better) and have council instead of community as the general meeting. Community would loose voting rights for board in favor for council to represent them. So council only elects board and this might pan out well with a bigger council. This is just one suggestion among others, another one might be to have council as another 3rd body.
But either way, community has to put trust in board. And let me add from experience, that there really is no power to grab as discussed to hell last year, it's rather about responsibility and adds workload. In fact, the culture of clubs/associations is decreasing due to people not being willing anymore to share their time.
I know we can do better!
e.g. join #maemo-meeting right now, hoping your council will show up and we can dicuss this... :rolleyes:

Edit: We can also discuss if we want to keep the US foundation or nuke it, both possible.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

I guess the option of some other EU or just European (e.g. Switzerland) country where there is not such restriction has been already considered and if it exists it's anyway unpractical? Or is there some specific advantage coming from German legislation?

Does the e.V. general meeting require the physical presence of all attendees at the meeting place or can it be held 'virtually'?

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

That is actually a good point which I haven't investigated so far. Laws for associations in Germany, Austria + Switzerland are quite similar, but probably have significant differences. For other EU countries, please elaborate.
For the moment, the situation is that we have some people in germany (willing to actively fund this association + suited for board, who in the end have to handle some things with local authorities and bank stuff). If we find some fellow members in some other country which offers an easier attempt - we might prefer that. Just because I'm from germany that does in no way mean I want to push it over here, I'm just offering my services as treasurer (with no chance to report anything so far, because our bank + paypal accounts are frozen).
It's up to community to discuss options.

No, it can be done virtually/digital, even the inauguration if the statues say so.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

A couple of things alarm me:

1. I think the restriction to only EU citizens is a deal-breaker, unless possibly there are things in place to compensate for this.

2. What, the existing Hildon Foundation funds are inaccessible?!?! (except by Rob I guess.... nice.)

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Yeah Rob put the community in this mess by removing himself from the bank account without adding the new directors... It's pathetic how much damage a single ***** can cause to the community...

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

It somewhat is and I'm not aware of anything that would compensate for it.
As I mentioned earlier, a commitment as a board member is more of a long-term approach. Excessive annual changes of personnel is not desireable, as all changes to the statues (which state the positions of board members) have to be registered to the official register of societies and associations at the district court through a notary.

The bank just closed the account due to what thedead described and sent a check to Rob, which he said to forward to Woody in the next few days. Meanwhile, Woody is going to open a new account at another bank where he can then redeem the check for deposit. This check is worth $4,018.70.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

omg ! so much pressure.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Well, that's not as bad as it sounded at first then... As soon as Woody receives the check, things are pretty much back on track as far as the money goes!

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

I hope so. It appears that banks generally have a problem with granting random international access to their accounts because of identification/validation issues, no matter where the foundation is based. It's hard to find an office manager that would open such account and show responsible if things would go terribly wrong for them for whatever reason. I hope we can fix this soon, for now Woody is our treasurer in effect.

While I still think an eV generally is a good way to go, let me try to smooth out some doubts. KDE and their articles of association is a good example for a somewhat similar association and they are a german eV. I didn't investigate in their history and there are substantial differencies though, like they have tax-exemption and no voting rights for extraordinary members (community). But they show the longterm approach that any board in such an associacion has: "The members of the board are elected by the KDE e.V. general assembly (in our case: council) for a maximum term of three years". Here, extraordinary members have no voting rights at all, but can apply for regular member status; instead of limiting general assembly/council, they are gathering active members.

So if we want to continue this road towards EU, where our server-HW is based and the money actually needs to be accessible, what we'd need for board is at least 3 EU residents who are willing to take the burden of showing responsible and doing all the paperwork for quite some time. Still, the General Assembly (council) is the highest decision making organ of the Association and is generally in charge of all duties, unless these Articles of Association have assigned specific duties to another organ of the Association.

For the requirements, we would then need 4 more people (7 is minimum) to actually fund and inaugurate the eV with its board; preferrably, but not limited to EU residents (each of them has to sign the inaugurational docs, board as representatives by notarization). These 4 additional funders could be extraordinary members as well as council.
So I reworked the drafted articles of incorporation and introduced a few things to fit our desires:

• § 2 Purpose of the association - (please do elaborate!)
• § 3 Self-abandonment - discarded tax-exemption (as mentioned earlier)
• § 4 Membership - introduced council as general meeting and set community as extraordinary members with rights to only vote council as their representitives once per year, introduced honorary membership - they may get voting rights for general meeting and/or act as conciliation committee (as 4th body, up for discussion!)
• § 5 Fees - raised to >=100€/year for promoter status
  
• § 6 Institutions of the association - introduced 3rd body: extraordinary member meeting (to vote general member meeting/council) once per year
• § 7 Board of directors - some minor tweaks, elections still once/year
• § 9 Extraordinary member meeting - introduced regulations

If we agree to fund this eV, I suggest to drop the US foundation, as keeping it would simply mean double work incl. accountancy, taxes, meetings, elections...

BTW, as we can't get hold of the major part of email conversation from previous board secretary (thanks again SD69), it seems that we will have to start all over with Nokia regulations again.

DISCLAIMER: I'll be a happy funder if we decide to take this step, but will not be available for any position in such new board of directors.

Sorry for the wall of text, if anything appears unclear to you, please holler. Anyway, nothing is set in stone, rather I ask for your input and discussion.

Again, here's the draft for the articles of incorporation still in need of your input and english translation at the end of the doc: https://etherpad.mozilla.org/AMabik4zeD

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Why Germany? Lots of board members from Germany?

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Hildon Foundation was established to act and do business on behalf of community, like collecting donations, signing contracts, do negotiations and payments. The eV-idea was to get the foundation with its bank account to where the servers are located and account access would be needed. As maemo servers actually are hosted at IPHH in Germany (for free even, thanks to the engagement of Falk Stern alias warfare!). This, of course, does not require the foundation to be based there too, it just would make things a lot easier if it would be in the EU. Please also see post #12.

I cannot stress enough, that an engagement in a board of any foundation is meant for a longterm approach. While there of course are options to replace or elect new board members in whatever interval, regular changes are not desired. We would need to find 3 EU residents who are found to be trustworthy by their commitment towards maemo so far who are willing to show some resposibility and serve community unlike council, more in the background.
If we manage to sign me to the new bank account and fix paypal, there is no urgent need to do anything and I can finally start treasuring... ;).

GeneralAntilles, Jaffa + woody14619 are in the US, chemist + me in germany.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

While your council and HiFo board believe an e.V. (or another similar association in the EU) is a good idea, we also want to hear communitys' thoughts. I have added a public poll and ask you to please check your opinion.
If you vote 2)-4) - please raise your concerns; if you vote 5) - please tell what we should elaborate on; if you vote 6) - you are suspicious, check your attitude ;); if you vote 7) - congratulations, you're a brave soul and thanks, your assistance is highly appreciated. :)

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Voted 1 - afaik the GTA04/Neo900-involved company is placed in Germany and maybe that could help the cooperation and this project's development. Of course that's not the only reason, but just wanted to point that out. I lol'ed after reading option 2 :P

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Option 2 would usually be pretty funny. But in this particular vote it's the only way to go. We can't have one man party. Admin. Board member, moderator, Country.... It's against what I think is best. We need to split the power. Nothing personal.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

History shows it works quite well unless America™ shows up :P But seriously, what power? There's not much to split really... Besides, from my point of view, I use mainly repositories and tmo, if they're both hosted in Germany then I don't see a point in locating the authorities in any other country (especially on the other continent with different law system). That also happens to be the case with most maemo.org services (afaik) and even the upcoming Neo900 hardware project - so let's concentrate (LOL xD) full power in Germany and keep the stuff rolling.

[Not fully serious]Besides, when we don't like the actions of future Germany-based leader, we will both be able to go there and give him a slap in his face, while America-based one would require some of us to get a visa (which may be hard or impossible).[/Not fully serious]

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

No it won't. Please note that GolDeliCo and Neo900 project is not sponsored by, or in any other way linked to HiFo. Neo900 the hardware also is not a community project, though the Neo900-crew acts almost as if it were. In the end there will be little that maemo community can do via HiFo or council as proxy, to help cooperation and development of Neo900 project. At least I don't see anything right now. Maybe that changes for whatever reason, e.g. HiFo finding funds that allow them to buy GolDeliCo, or any cooperation contracts regarding brandnames or whatever. For now though... not a good argument why we need an e.V in Germany.

Besides HiFo (or any such e.V., at least aiui) is meant to be the treasurer of maemo community. A treasurer has no power, it's you (the community) who has all the power - and it's council and HiFo to execute what community wants. In this regard HiFo has less power of any kind than any of you and even than council, and I'd hope that stays unchanged and the same for any e.V.

my 2 Euro-cent ;-)
jOERG

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Please all (who have doubts) read that above again. Unless it's clear that HiFo is only an "administrative matter" to give us (community) some sort of legal character, there's no point in discussing anything.

The community (we all) stays the same (no need to change nationality :) and the council continues ot have no restrictions of nationality of any kind.

This whole issue can be summarised as "are you OK with moving the bank account to Germany? (yes/no)".

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Hi there,

Just to add to this discussion from my experience. I am UK citizen, resident in Czech Republic, I am Board member in Czech Company and I am on a board of Directors for a German Company in Dusseldorf.

The board of directors position is more of corporate responsibility than of actual executive work. So generally the Board of directors is only advised of key facts and asked to approve significant decisions.

Generally this will not change the way the foundation runs or operates day to day. I would expect below BoD is an Executive team who are 'running' the foundation professionally.

As for the language issue. In my case all documents and processes are done in English with notarized translations of German documents where needed. My level of German is enough to order me a beer or insult someone, but that is it. Generally German laws are part of harmonized EU laws. So any European resident would be pretty comfortable on the BoD of a German entity.

So I am happy to support the move of the foundation to German. And willing to hold a position on the BoD if needed, subject to approval of the articles and some due diligence on my side.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

The time has arrived to do the transition. HiFo needs your help with this and we'd be honoured if you'd be part of the team to give us the foundation on which we can continue. To achieve this, we are seeking german speaking contributors, esp. those who are familiar with an e.V. Unfortunately, all this has to be done in german language, so I've started a new thread for this purpose:
http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php...33#post1409333
We will provide an english translation of the articles of incorporation and other relevant papers when they're ready to being finalized so that community can review it.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Why in german?

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

The answer to this question is probably the same as to "why paperwork needs to be done in english in the USA?" or "why paperwork needs to be done in french in France?" or "why paperwork needs to be done in italian in Italy?".

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Because all papers have to be filed in german language to authorities. It'd be quite a mess to go the other way round and have an english articles of incorporation and then make it comply to german requirements/typical language.

Comments and ideas are still welcome here.

edit: misiak beat me... :p

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

And for clarity, by german law

• any EU citizen or resident can be founding member
• any EU resident can be director

The founding members have to vote for the directors on the initial founding meeting. We just want to make sure to
a) have a stable core staff of HiFo who don't completely change each year.
b) keep logistical problems minimal, some signatures on some documents need notary approval and have to be paper-mailed.

Disclaimer(again): I'll be a happy founder, but not available as a director. I know there are others who can do much better. :p

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

We did this in forming the original Foundation by having the three founders agree that they would abide by the decision of the community and vote for the directors chosen by a general election. A similar setup to retain the existing directors (or by holding an election) would seem reasonable.

This is a tougher one to do while staying true to the idea of community elections for Board. The closest I have come up with is as follows (which I though of well after existing bylaws were in place):

Each Board position is for a two year term.
Elections are held each year for new board members.

This sets up a ladder of overlapping members, where about half of them are stepping down or are up for an election at any given time (one would hope). Not at all fool proof, but it's an idea.


If you can pull off actually getting an e.V. started, it shows you're more than capable of being a Board member. I hope when that moment comes you reconsider.

It does just one task more than Treasurer, in that it is also a key holder. It holds the responsibility to ensure continued operation of the systems running on the communities behalf. (Not to administer directly, but to be sure things are being administered.) It also holds any legal rights and responsibilities that the community simply can not, since the community is not recognizable as a legal entity. (That includes things like having a bank account, paying bills, signing agreements or operational contracts, doing any tax paperwork needed to exist, etc.)

Otherwise HiFo should be (and has been) intentionally not directly involved in day-to-day operations. Those tasks are mainly handled by techstaff and council, with HiFo only stepping in when asked or when it is legally necessary to do so. Currently there are some overlapping members, where some are Directors and techstaff. But one is not, and should never be, a requirement of the other.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

I'm starting to wonder if community needs any such entity, after all. Being the FOSS project maemo is, we effectively didn't need HiFo for a whole year now, and it gave us much PITA and nothing else during that year.
What exactly can maemo community expect HiFo will do for the community in future, once the whole mess got sorted and turned into the exact opposite of what it been so far - except somehow handling the already donated funds which we also had to make a living without them for the last year?

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Just as a recap, in theory HiFo was established as an entity that Nokia could transfer intelectual property to. E.g. limited *legal* use of firmware, and binaries needed to keep autobuilder running. In addition *legal* use of the name maemo.org (but not necessarily Maemo). the thought was maemo.org (especially the autobuilder) would be paid for by the locked up funds. As I understand it, currently maemo.org is being run free for a year as a gracious favor.

But you know that already. So I'm guessing what you are really asking is "is it realistic to assume we'll ever actually get ownership of maemo.org actually transfered and ditto for the firmware/ stuff needed for the autobuilder.

Speaking as just another general citizen of the community, someone NOT involved with ANY communication with Nokia, I'm pessimistic. On the maemo.org front, it can stay up as long as someone pays the bills, and once that stops I'd imagine we could buy the right to the name when it becomes available. The important thing is to have an update to date copy of maemo.org. As for the binaries, they're being used by Mer/Sailfish for N9 project but cannot be redistributed.

If maemo goes poof, it would depend on whether MS bought those binaries from Nokia and whether they see Maemo as some kind of threat/possible source of revenue. if they think it's worthless, they likely wouldn't bother with a C&D order. If they begin treating it like Android, then we'd have to negotiate for a license. Again speaking completely out of my ***, I just don't see Nokia caring past a certain point. They may not officially allow it, but I just don't see them wasting time on preventing it.

But what do I know, HP managed to get Qualcomm to pay money for what's left of the IP assets related to Palm that HP had acquired.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Almost as much or as little as I (don't) know, and you came to exactly same conclusions as I. Well, it's not about paying for the maemo.org domain, but that's basically irrelevant. Also not really relevant that usage of the non-distributabe stuff for autobuilder (if there even exists such stuff, which I doubt) is not revokable.
The question is: what can we expect HiFo to achieve for community - mainly regarding the topics you targeted. The little bit more I know from hearsay out of sekrit HiFo board negotiation circle makes me think that we most likely won't win anything we really need, but may lose quite a bit of what we already got, when signing any such contract with Nokia (something I doubt will happen anyway, since Nokia already gone poof and gave us a last order call for end of 2013). From my point of view it looks like Nokia is just trying to cover their a** by negotiating a contract with maemo at large that offers use of maemo.org only when we don't use maemo.org to e.g. host CSSU, something that Nokia themselves installed a few months ago and deliberately and explicitly fostered the project. I doubt they could legally "convince" us to shut down CSSU repos unless HiFo signs a contract that appreciates such obligation. What we gain in turn? A domain name and nothing else, aiui. Since nothing else in maemo at large that we use / provide right now is owned by Nokia, and quite obviously Nokia is definitely not willing to allow us to continue what they already stopped: provide the fiasco images and flasher. And it's up to anybody's guess when they will stop/shutdown the Nokia fremantle core repos, but once they do we for sure can't provide those either. Heck we can't right now, since Nokia isn't able to update their signature key that expired, despite much help from community on finding a way Nokia could fix this issue.
So again: what will we gain in turn? I'm not sure I'm willing to sacrifice CSSU for http://maemo.org DNS admin-c changing from "Nokia" to "HiFo". Rather I move the complete content of maemo.org to arbitrary other domain and if needed even other servers (yes we still *have* backups of that). The impact would be that every maemo device owner had to edit the URL in her HAM-catalogs, and all our google hits would point to /dev/null (we probably can edit the internal crossrefs of the site). And legally I couldn't move user database when HiFo doesn't agree, sinct that's no publicly accessable data and thus actually "owned by maemo-owner". TMO is a separate case and would need separate evaluation of what's not possible, since Nokia never owned TMO and thus it's clearly and 100% owned by HiFo already. When HiFo would sign a contract that includes an obligation to remove certain subfora from TMO, then community at large resp your council and techstaff can't do anything about that, TMO is hardly copy-able, only archivable.
I wish HiFo board would understand that community needs to know what HiFo tries to achieve and plans to sign regarding Nokia.

cheers
jOERG

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

maemo is not a FOSS project. It's is a commercial product with a number of FOSS elements interwoven. Nokia handing out a copy of third party binaries under EULA to people who purchased an N900 does not make it FOSS. They didn't just hand it all out to anyone wanting to run this on their ARM device. If all it took were this action to make something FOSS then MSOffice can be consider FOSS, as it's being "handed out" to those buying MS hardware, like the Surface. Windows8 is FOSS for that matter too, right? You can download drivers and updates for free off their site... all FOSS.

Keeping the lights on for one. The servers and software running on them were donated by Nokia to HiFo to carry on the community. Their continued operation, without interference from Nokia, has been contingent on closing on-going business with them. Do you honestly think that if that business is not resolved before HiFo or Nokia "goes away" that Nokia itself won't send a C&D to IPHH within a week? MS wouldn't even need to be involved...

FWIW: MS did not "buy" Nokia. It bought certain IP and divisions of Nokia. Nokia, as a company, is not going away. And even if it's not in the field they own any more, they will go after anything that could tarnish their brand. (And if the IP is part of what MS bought, they'd go after this in a heartbeat.)

Actually, no. Many of the closed source binaries in maemo are actually pass-throughs. Meaning that at least part of them belongs to a 3rd party. Consider the flash plugin, for example. If Adobe found there was a version being distributed from a large static site do you think they would ignore it? Would Nokia have to even be involved?

But Nokia does care. The fact that they're taking as long as they are on this is because of the way things like copyright and trademark work. In some countries if you don't enforce your trademark, you can lose it. Same with copyright. And again, this isn't just something they own. There are lots of 3rd party bits thrown into the mix, which opens up potential legal issues for them. Ignoring that is not something they're likely to do.

At a minimum companies try to hold anything they can if they think it could make them money down the road. If that means taking it to the grave with them, it's really no loss to them. There are lots of dead OSs, tools, gadgets and programs already in that bucket to prove this. Add the potential liability of 3rd party contracts to the mix, and even without MS involvement I could see Nokia holding maemo on it's way to the grave. (Besides, who wouldn't prefer maemo running as an interface on their web-enabled TV instead of WebOS?)

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Note the key phrase there: aiui. Just after saying:

Whole continents drew the conclusion that the sun and moon orbited the earth because they lacked key observations or information about the nature of the universe. Two people without knowledge on a topic drawing the same conclusion does not mean that conclusion is correct.

Really? You have a contract stating that? I know I don't.

X-Fade was quite concerned when migrating and handing over said auto-builder, since to his knowledge it did contain non-distributables.

If those are still in there, and Nokia demands their removal, what do you plan to do? Start them on another server? With what funds? At what hosting site? Do you expect Nokia won't go after someone doing that? How much are you willing to be on that? Just Maemo.org? The Neo900 project? Your flat? Your retirement savings?

Who's using scare tactics now? You say you know nothing about it (clear from your ranting here), and then spread your "what if" FUD to whip up a frenzy and make people worried about HiFo potentially "might sign away" in a contract.

Should I threaten legal action against you for spreading such FUD? Hypocrite.

I wish you had the business sensibility to know that any time companies negotiate contracts they generally can not discuss them with the general public. In most cases revelation that discussions are even going on is forbidden. Release of any details is usually done strictly on a need to know basis to limit legal liability. Meaning if your *** isn't on the line to get sued for things you don't get to know every detail.

This is why the community was asked to consider carefully about who they elected to the Board. It was also the reason those running for positions get a long speech about what it means to be a Board member, and the legal implications of doing so. If you wanted to know details that damn bad, you should have run for a position.

Instead, you now spread your crazy imaginings across the community, poisoning the very well you drink from. All the while threatening others when you perceive the same being done to you. Double hypocrite.

Moderators: Feel free to give me points or ban me if you feel the need, but this needed to be said. The continued pounding of the irrational made up FUD drums serves no purpose but to destroy this community, and I frankly tired of it.

PS: You can cancel my Neo900 vote. If the last month or so shows any indication of your business sense, that project was pretty much doomed from the start.

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

TL;DR
sorry I don't feel like reading the rest after this futile effort of sarkasm.
To the best of my knowledge there's not a single piece of Nokia-(C) non-public code shared on maemo.org, and the maemo.org site says "all content CC-BY-SA" though it adds a standard disclaimer of Nokia that states that proprietary material of nokia on that site is property of Nokia - just that there is no such material anywhere on maemo.org (btw it seems Nokia asked HiFo to remove that NOKIA licence together with several other mentioning of Nokia, quite some time ago). Neither your bitching nor Nokia on their nokia.com site offering closed blob drivers for a FOSS-by-definition linux system is changing that fact or turns maemo at large into nokia's property.
I could start turning your pathetic sarkasm into the exact opposite direction, elaborating about manufacturers of routers or settop-boxes who thought Linux turns into their property just because with their pirated Linux system they shipped one or two binaries they maybe developed themselves (and which undoubtly is owned by them irrespectively of the rest of this case). But I don't feel like copying that style. So it's just: Sorry, Maemo at large is still linux and GPL and thus FOSS, and for sure the complete maemo.org website is not proprietary and consists of only FOSS and CC-BY-SA material, except the domain name itself.
I may copy *.maemo.org as long and to any extent I want, I may distribute and share it, and neither Nokia nor Microsoft or even you will find a law that says otherwise.
If you do, please let me know before you waste your or my money for a lawsuit.


(Oh, and I thought x-fade didn't participate in migration at all. I was rather close to migration and I didn't see much of those concerns mentioned by x-fade, tbh I didn't see him at all. Also it doesn't really make sense to me, considering that it's been NOKIA who ordered the migration and helped shipping the hardware)
No, I won't. Just like I won't delete apache from the server or any of my own PCs when apache the inc suddenly requests to remove it since they don't like me to use it any longer. The stuff been shared to use it and the permission to use it can't get revoked. No matter if that's on my N900 or on autobuilder.
And then the next point: please show me which of those binaries on autobuilder we actually share! There's 3 problems you'll face: 1. there probably aren't any, 2. you have a hard time to find them and ask me to remove them, since 3. WE DONT SHARE THEM, they are just USED in autobuilder (though they actually don't exist)

So who's the one with no knowledge? You or me and jcharpak? When the latter than whose fault is it that we don't know what HiFo plans?

Maybe not. but that's irrelevant since: check where you might find any such flash plugin! For sure not on maemo.org.

Hardly the software since, as elaborated above, all software on maemo.org is FOSS. The only commercial or proprietary piece of software we use and own is vBulletin running this forum, and that evidently not been donated by Nokia. Maybe when you would not wear your hate-cap, you could see why I'm very concerned about your negotiations with Nokia.

If that means you think that maemo could get shut down completely by Nokia, either by them not providing support or by not "allowing us to continue", then that's just one more argument in line with last one for my concern. I'm afraid HiFo could feel the urge to sign whatever Nokia asks for, just to avoid such anticipated doom pending when you don't.
A C&D to IPHH? Hardly, since IPHH has nothing to do with all this. (blaming me about scare tactics and spreading FUD, eh?) I actually can't see the C&D getting sent to anybody, since there simply is nothing wrong with maemo.org that they could ask us to cease. Actually even the DNS is owned by Nokia, so they hardly can blame us for it pointing to wherever it does point to. And that DNS (aka domain, aka "maemo.org") is the only thing they can "donate" to us - except all the binaries we don't have and never will get.
Again, when you know of any (C)-Nokia binary on maemo.org then I think you as HiFo would be obliged to rise your concerns to techstaff so we can find a solution, either by removing it or by negotiating with Nokia about the conditions under which we may use it. When Nokia tells you "software on maemo.org got donated by us, so now we rule what of that software you may continue to use and what you have to delete" then I think it would be a pretty good idea to also contact techstaff and maybe even community and ask about this. This doesn't mean you need to disclose anything about the contract you're negotiating, but nobody expects that you or anybody in a similar situation knows each little detail about maemo (or generally the subject negotiated) and could do such negotiations without referring with your experts. That's something you should know from general way how business in industry is done.

I'm really puzzled what madness Nokia(?) managed to plant into some minds. :-S

/j

Re: moving Hildon Foundation to a german e.V.
 

Are you really asking me to post internal mail between HiFo and council, from you and win7mac?
If you honestly insist, i'm willing to do. Just to prove WHO is going scare tactics here and hypocritical.
I already offered it in one of my last mails to take the whole topic to public. I didn't yet since I felt it's in *your* best interest I don't.
[edit] since i heard you stepped down from any position in HiFo, it's maybe just in win7mac's best interest I don't publish those mails. And I'd hope you guys at HiFo would take my "rant" here as the honest concern it is, about nobody but HiFo knowing what's going on and OTOH your posts above once more showing off that there might be a massive dangerous misconception in HiFo about status of maemo.org content. And I hoped you would use the occasion to internally straighten a few things and maybe even reach out for proper info from those who obviously know better than some of you seem to do (not necessarily me, there's a huge community to ask "are there any (C)-Nokia bits on maemo.org?"), instead of resorting to assumptions and diplomacy behind closed doors.