[RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

I would like to initiate a discussion on the representative roles of the Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.

Background:

On the olden times, when Nokia ruled all things Maemo, the community had the Council as its representative to deal with Nokia, to voice the concerns of the community and ask for changes/updates/whatever.

The division of labour was clear; Nokia owned everything, dictated everything and could not be held responsible for anything. All that community and Council could do was to speak out their mind.

This all changed when Nokia decided to drop Maemo. Few worthy members of the community managed to negotiate with Nokia that the community might be allowed to keep the legacy.
For that to succeed, there has to be a corporate entity that is responsible for the upkeep and administration; it is not possible in the eyes of law anywhere in the world to have a "nameless community of individual people" to be such an entity.

Hence the Hildon Foundation was created; to be the corporate entity to own the Maemo name, own and operate the servers and software to run Maemo infrastructure and govern everything that we had been given by Nokia.

Current state of affairs:

Later it was found out that for many reasons the U.S. based foundation was problematic entity to hold this position, mainly for reasons of operating costs, rigidity of U.S. law concerning foundations and the fact that Maemo infrastructure is based in Germany.
The idea of moving all the responsibility to a Geman based registered association (e.V. = Eingetragener Verein) was born.

Now, a registered association is like a hobby club or association; it is formed by named real individuals a members, it can elect its members to governing positions and be responsible as collective entity of real and immaterial assets.
Hence, the Maemo e.V. can operate as the real owner of Maemo in all senses of a corporate body under the EU laws.

Now the problematic entity is the old Maemo Council; The Council consists of people elected to the office among the community, by community. But the community here defined is not a legal body; the electorate and the councillors are defined as "Maemo users having Maemo account (same as Garage account AFAIK?)"

Now the problem with this is that "people with Maemo Account" is not a group of real people, the only requirement for being in that group is having a valid email address, there is no check of identity, multiple accounts or anything.
Hence this group of users cannot be directly included as members of the Maemo e.V.

Currently the Maemo e.V. is finalizing membership application process, so that all members of Maemo Community who want to participate in the future of Maemo are invited to join in the organization as members.

Possible solutions:

There are few possibilities to address. I would like to hear the opinions of people on the correct course to progress with.

1.) The things continue as they are currently: There is a separate Maemo Council that has no real power or responsibility.
The Maemo Council would be a voice of "The people that are mildly intrested in Maemo but not enough to be members".
In this scenario the Council would behave towards Maemo e.V. like it used to when Nokia was still owner of Maemo.

2.) The Maemo Council election rules are changed so that the electorate is members of Maemo e.V.
The Maemo Council would operate inside Maemo e.V. and have real power and responsibility to act.

3.) The Maemo Council is disbanded as unnecessary element in the current state of affairs.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

It sounds to me that #3 is the best way forward. It sounded like that to me half way throgh your post, long before I reached the point when options were presented. Unless I misunderstood something of course.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

I'm also all for 3 - Council is obsolete in current state of affairs, and in fact, may even act as a problem for Community (all too known power disputes).

If necessary, Council could act as volounteer's Community relation team for Board (aka gathering ideas, problems, etc., from various scattered places Community participate in, like TMO, IRC channels, whatever - that Board may not have time to read - and forwarding it to Board), but for that, we don't need people elected by voting.

Anyway, whatever you do, make it clear who have deciding and governing power, and who doesn't. I don't think anyone want to see power disputes, EVER.

/Estel

// Edit

And to be absolutely honest, IMO Council doesn't ring positive bells in Community, even since time looong before Nokia officially dropped support for Maemo. I remember discussions "do we really need Council, it's absent, ineffective, and sad" from even before I've entered this Community, and various creative people would have *much* to say about Council and "respect" it awakes (qwerty's "love letter" comes to mind),

That said even though I was Councilor myself - I don't think Council *ever* did a good job at what it was supposed to be, and thinks only gone from 'bad' to 'terrible' with advent of Council<->Board power disputes. For sure, I won't miss Council.

/Estel

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Could we have clarity on what option 3 entails? How will Maemo e.V. interface with the community? Would Maemo e.V. assume the roles and responsibilities that the council currently has?

I'm also somewhat concerned that e.V. members != community, and what effect that will have. Right now anyone can be a member of the community and has a free voice without having to sign up for anything (unless they want to vote). It's not very clear to me whether this will be the same.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

My choice would be option 1, at least initially. Council stays the same, e.V. electorate is separate and consists of real people willing to give their info to the proper authority to become a legitimate member of the group.

In the end, if Council is really not needed, it will effectively terminate itself. Either by having the same members in it's body as the e.V., or simply from lack of people running for it.

I think any of the options is somewhat doable, but option 2 is harder to pull off. I'd frankly advise against that.

There is, of course, a 4th option: Turn off the lights and move on. But I don't think everyone is quite ready for that yet.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

What follows is a description of the past that has quite some incorrect points in it, thus transporting a distorted idea of what things were like, what happend, and how situation is now.
Let me comment on the points I think need clarification, and mention my concerns towards the end of this post.
The council's tasks/responsibilities were broader than just that.
Nokia only owned Nokia proprietary stuff. Most of maemo is FOSS
I didn't see Nokia dictating stuff.
Of course they could be held responsible for e.g. mp3 or other royalty/patent-encumbered software getting published on maemo repos, for any illegal posts or links on planet.m.o and probably even on talk.m.o though that actually never been owned by Nokia.
Please read http://wiki.maemo.org/Community_Council#Council_work
Actually all this changed when Nokia tranferred maemo management and responsibility to community and council, which been long before invention of HiFo and even before Nokia mentioned publicly that they gonna abandon maemo.
As I remember it, it been Nokia who asked for community offering an entity that Nokia could transfer maemo legal ownership to. It actually been Nokia who was interested in transferring maemo to community completely (partially it been done almost years before, as mentioned above), not "Few worthy members of the community managed to negotiate with Nokia"
so far correct
Operation of the servers been in councl's responsibility already since ages, guess why http://wiki.maemo.org/Community_Council#Council_work says "[Council has the responsibility/power for] Hiring of maemo.org staff" (which were the guys of Nemein and other community members doing professional work on server administartion and maintenance in cooperation with Council, _not_ Nokia employees)
there's no software formerly owned by Nokia that gets/got transferred to HiFo or anybody else and is used to run maemo.org (except of a few shell scripts which don't have any copyright in them and are made by nemein and supposed to be public domain)
[edit] see "svn checkout https://vcs.maemo.org/svn/maemo2midgard" - and the few scripts actually been already redone by new maemo techstaff and volunteers, since they introduced memleaks, so when anybody owns (C) in them then that's the community, not Nokia. Also see http://wstaw.org/m/2014/09/24/plasma-desktopvP1979.png on every maemo.org page. Some (ex) in HiFo don't get tired of claiming they inherited (or will inherit) more than just the hw, rights in 'maemo'[TradeMark] and maemo.org (the URL/DNS/domain) from Nokia by signing any NDA'ed contracts, however they regularly fail to quote what exactly this "Software owned by Nokia" might be, they can't name any. So any such claims have to be assumed as incorrect, probably propagated by Nokia to HiFo who taken them without actually checking.
Nokia didn't think of any governance this entity shall do to maemo community. Actually nobody governs the maemo community, it's self-governed and council is the administrative entity appointed to organize this self governance.
Well, the operating costs seem to be not much different to anywhere else on this world
which probably is exactly the reason why HiFo cannot legally transfer funds and assets to an entity that isn't adhering to the same bylaws (at least to the effect, if not to the word)
That's a minor convenience thing, basically only relevant for money transfers and the fees banks charge for them.
Basically mainly because a German e.V. has not the rigid laws you mentioned above, so friction on that entity's self-organization been considered possibly lower for an e.V than for a US chapter 504(?)xy company, and because American banks suck.
yes, it can. Exactly like HiFo did.
Hardly, see next few comments
So what? It doesn't need to be.
Exactly, and that's the way whole community and even Nokia agreed upon, voted on it in three referenda, and had a paragraph in the defining rules that those rules themselves cannot get altered except by a referendum of electorate as defined in those rules.
Why should it, despite it actually _is_ _exactly_ "a group of real people". It's not a legal person or entity but: see above and below.
Well, that's exactly how community and Nokia agreed upon and decided it to be like that. In a sense of welcoming everybody who's interested in participation. However note that for any position in maemo orga it's usually been required that the real identity gets disclosed and checked, since council of course is liable for doing mess to the server they are maintaining (and did since Nokia transferred maemo to community, something that happened long ago already, as mentioned above). Actually you could think of council as the IT-manager of a company (HiFo) that owns the whole thing. While legally the boss (HiFo) may do all and is in command over the employees, it's the employees that are supposed to do the work and suggest reasonable actions to higher level authorities (the boss). In a sane company the boss is usally supposed to follow any such suggestions, unless the boss knows stuff the employees are not aware of or missed out on considering.
Maemo techstaff is the sysops and workers, IT-manager (council) is their direct boss, usually they don't even ever meet the owner of the company (HiFo)
Oh, and on a sidenote, even company CEO (the owner/HiFo) can get legally sued when they do utterly bad management that does harm to the complete company, at least when the company actually is a holding and real owners is a huge group of people holding shares in that company.
Who defined including whole maemo garage electorate as being mandatory? It not been like this with HiFo, why would it be needed for e.V. ? Hifo agreed with council on this "company model" as of last section, and accepted that usually it's council that suggests what to do and HiFo has no power over council and community and usually is supposed to execute what THE COMMUNITY (represented by council) asks for (unless illegal). Why does any e.V need to abolish that and instead have an unelected group of privileged members called GA, appointed (or rejected!!!) by some unelected self-appointed entity inside the e.V. which are deciding instead of THE MAEMO COMMUNITY? I don't see why any e.V cannot act exactly like the HiFo concept we publicly discussed and agreed upon. You need a GA? fine! have a 6 members that are authorized by elections forming that GA, and make them promise to always listen to THE MAEMO COMMUNITY and not start own activity abusing their privileged position. after all they are supposed to be members of the community and not elected to be the (lifetime) emperors of (the huge discriminated rest of) community.[edited formatting due to obviously it's not recognized as constructive suggestion how to put the whole thing onto rails again]
This is where discrimination and abolishing/killing of the original maemo community starts

This would only be true when e.V would disregard/deny any existing established responsibilities of council, as been agreed upon first with Nokia and then with (the initial) HiFo.

Quote:

Originally Posted by juiceme (Post 1440111) The Maemo Council would be a voice of "The people that are mildly intrested in Maemo but not enough to be members".

Damage/killing of maemo community continued...

Quote:

Originally Posted by juiceme (Post 1440111) In this scenario the Council would behave towards Maemo e.V. like it used to when Nokia was still owner of Maemo.

actually not, see above. This conception of the relationship between council, Nokia and techstaff is incorrect and flawed

Quote:

Originally Posted by juiceme (Post 1440111) 2.) The Maemo Council election rules are changed so that the electorate is members of Maemo e.V. The Maemo Council would operate inside Maemo e.V. and have real power and responsibility to act.

Damage/killing of maemo community continued... This time even by redefining the council.

Quote:

Originally Posted by juiceme (Post 1440111) 3.) The Maemo Council is disbanded as unnecessary element in the current state of affairs.

indeed it is, when you want to turn a FOSS community of (depending on the way you count) ~6000 to ~100,000 members into a "community" of a few dozen appointed by a governing entity (=board **) ), paying membership fees, not concerned about their anonymity, possibly European *) members of a club. All the existing (council) rules and (HiFo) bylaws don't allow this, however win7mac frankly confessed that's his plan now: "That never was the plan, but it turns out partially that's a requirement for an eV indeed". (which is an unbacked requirement made up by him to drive this "improvemet of democracy")
*) [edit] emphasized since otherwise it seems it will get answered by a "we don't see those problems, we welcome everybody in GA", or by making up some allegedly existing German laws.
**) "Board which is 3 people (currently Chair and 2 Vice) accepting applications" (or rejecting, no matter of any "why should we do this")

Because of my concerns regarding all this, I decided to clearly state that I disagree on the whole idea of transforming community into a club, and due to legal concerns of this thing getting forwarded nevertheless while people rise a shitstorm against me for pointing at the problems, I will not contribute and participate any further. What happens from now on is not in my responsibility any more, it's up to the rest of actors to cope with the possible consequences from death of maemo community to legal lawsuits that anybody might start against HiFo (of which council is a sub-entity as well. and thus shares responisbility for any actions HiFo takes)

BR
Bye maemo
jOERG
(a last time with councilor signature, though as a sort of minority report since other council members like to disagree on most of my concerns)
PS: I also won't answer any comments on this post. No matter if they are the ususal polemic flaming with severe ADHS or any unusual reasonable contribution. My particular thanks to wicket for summing up all the concerns I share, in a concise manner.
PPS: in following post http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?p=1440274 literally every single word except "exactly" and maybe (dunno what he can find) ""I cant find one single statement in above" is incorrect and conceived as bashing on my side. That's why I had to leave. That and the "personal culpability for intentionally doing things harmful" which Woody thankfully confirmed actually exists and which I am not willing to take anymore (being part of the gang and not acting against some acton means participating in said action), and which Niel mentioned as his reason for leaving as well after I explained the issue in a mail to council..

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Joerg, You have most members deep respect. The number of thanks on your posts, the fact that you were asked to join council is just a few points that proof this.

But, that being said. I dont see you giving any feedback on how this can move on. In fact, your argumentation is more or less "its illegal", "thats wrong" or "you are wrong" and "iam being bullied".

This is not to say you are wrong. You have many valid and correct statements. But wouldnt it be better to come up with solutions to consider, rather than just negating initiatives from other people.?

Too much energy is wasted on this, and it have started to take too much effort to even read througj the mails and postings here - which gradualky is turning into flaming.

i do not want to spent anymore time on this flaming, it brings a certain death to this community, and it takes too much time away from personal life.

Joerg, you left because your ideal may not be met, I understand that, and actually can appreciate it.

With this, I also retire my activity here. I hope that the remaining members can then move on, without Joerg and I.

I wont promise I will return, I may. But I feel like this community probably will not exist if/when.

I feel deeply humiliated to take this decision, since some good members took their time to actually vote. But, many of you have a deep knowledge on how this might affect my already vulnerable family life, so I trust you understand and accept this decision.

BR
Niel

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Joerg, thank you for correcting the parts of my post that are wrong, it is true I was not here when most of the things that I described happened.

However, the concerns I am raising are real. And we do need to work on these points to have a working community that operates smoothly, without conflicts between the people taking care of running it.

You raised many times a concern of this leading to something you perceive as a privileged group (the GA, General Assembly) when in fact that is all but closed/privileged, We are welcoming everybody into participating this as members of GA.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

I vote for number one right now but basically... until the current council in an understandable way explain to me if they feel they have a useful position, and if not explain that they are not needed and could resign in 3 month time. After that I might be able to make a decision regarding option 1,2,3 or 4.

Edit: Joerg. Your post is indeed so very very long.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Again: Nobody.

That doesn't change really. Again, please read bylaws §7 (5):
It's more like (GA next to Council > Board)

It does not. See above :)

Again, it's not instead, but next to it.
Anyway, those brave souls that are willing to share some time for community work indeed have the privilage to become a regular member, just like any other community fella as well, everybody is welcome!

Wrong again, of course board gets elected, in a 1-year cycle just like with HiFo. Besides that, GA or Council can call for reelections or a meeting where things can be decided upon ANY TIME.

YOU know better, YOU voted on them... wrong as can be!

NO, you got it ALL WRONG!

Because...
Bingo!

How exactly "have" those 6? Why 6?
No matter how you turn it, you CAN NOT get voted in as regular member, that has to be done upon own choice/request BY LAW. And the founders HAVE TO remain members until they quit or they get discarded for turning against MC eVs' statutes, aims or bylaws, by law.
BTW, membership generally MUST be granted to everybody unless there are severe concerns, otherwise board would act unlawfully by discrimination.

That will happen self-regulatory hopefully. Anybody turning against MC eVs' statutes, aims or bylaws gets discarded upon either Boards' or GAs' decision. At least that's what they're able to.

What an immense load of nonsense in such a few words... Again, READ ABOVE to realize board gets elected year after year by the pack that cares enough about community and that is willing to commit officially and to probably spend a buck a year.

No, this is what the law sets. Beyond that, actually working on this **** is, while bawling about it when it's too late isn't?

That never was the plan, but it turns out partially that's a requirement for an eV indeed. KDE for example managed to do so at least, in a similar way.

Leaving it up to the readers interpretation if that's a resignation or just another smoke grenade is embarrassing. Not worth a councilor IMHO,

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

It is my understanding that persons who are not EU citizens are not eligible to hold leadership positions within a German e.V.

If that is indeed true then that is a concern for me, since there are many community contributors who live outside the EU. There needs to be some mechanism in place to ensure that non-EU members of the community who are motivated to take on public community leadership roles have the opportunity to do so in a meaningful way.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

That has to be cleared, if it indeed is true. Good point.
I will try to find out what the exact legal text on this subject is.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

What other responsibilities did Council hold? The only thing that comes to mind was the distribution of "gifts" from Nokia, often in a way that promoted their products. (Eg: Coding competitions, upping their app count and the like.) Can you name another thing Council has actually done in it's past? Relating to anything said below?


A falsehood you repeat regularly, implying that because some part of it is FOSS, it's all "free". Read the EULA that shipped with your Nokia device. There are some FOSS components, but Maemo in and of itself is NOT FOSS. This is one reason, for example, one can not distribute the NOKIA device images. (More on this below.)

Then your memory is failing. Nokia dictated things all the time. How many times were we told to remove content, or disable items because Nokia disliked it or feared it would cause legal issues for them. How many times were we asked to do things by Nokia, that were never part of Council's normal activities (like judging for community awards). Did you think that was Council's idea? It wasn't. It was Nokias idea. (Quim's actually...)


Again, false. I know, because I was one of the 3 that broached this topic with Nokia, being Council at the time. Nokia explicitly refused to work with Council since it was not a legal entity. Only when we showed full proof that the paperwork had been filed for HiFo were negotiations started. Maemo servers were explicitly NOT transferred until AFTER HiFo came into full legal being, because Nokia explicitly required we have the container corporation setup before that happened. Again, I know, being one of the founders of the corporation. I have the legal documentation to prove that, as does the rest of the Board. (All Board have a digital copy of all documents relating to HiFo, while Andrew holds most of the physical copies.)

Until HiFo existed, X-Fade and those at Nemien were still fully in charge of the hardware and the systems, and were instructed to prepare them for us. They may have given partial access to some members to log in to work on items (I had CVS access to some of the core elements, for example, to work on the voting system long before a lot of this started.) But they were not to hand over the keys until HiFo existed.

So again, your view and your perspective are understandable. But they are NOT FACTUALLY ACCURATE.


Really? We picked and hired the folks at Nemien? I'm doubtful any member of Council (who was not also a Nokia employee) had any say in anyone being hired. Can you name one person hired on Council's say-so? Just one? I can't.

Council had little say in changes to the systems before the transfer. Everything was routed through Nemien, and we had no say in who was working on what, as we were not paying the bills, Nokia was.

Face facts: Council, the whole concept, came about because a groups of people here petitioned Nokia to give the community a voice. Nokia mainly got tired of us making noise, and said that most parents say to a 5 year old: "Fine, here's some candy, now go play." And then told Nemien: "Watch your little brother and entertain him, and we'll give you some money for it."

That was the "relationship" we had. The community never had say in who was hired at Nemien, or when/what devices we got for competitions. Both Nokia and Nemien humored us when it fit their purposes, and allowed us to work on things occasionally (for free) that made their jobs easier.

We had zero influence with Nokia itself. When Nokia was going to shut the lights off, the ONLY reason we even had the option to keep them on was because of one single person in Nokia: Quim.

Quim alone got Nokia to agree to talks about transferring assets "to the community", which the legal department immediately rejected. Only when we agreed to form a legal entity did they begrudgingly agree to consider the process. When Quim left, the deal nearly fell apart. Nokia stopped responding, and contacts inside the company started to vanish. Quim called in a few personal favors to kick-start the process again, and even then it took until near the very end of Microsoft purchasing them to get everything signed and resolved.

If you think or "remember" otherwise, that's great, but it's not reality. Just like that 5 year old was never actually "in control" of his brother or parents. I know. I was there. I was Council. I was a founder of HiFo, and I was on the Board. It was Me, Rob, and Ivan, and all three of our names are on the legal document founding HiFo. During that period you spent most of your time on IRC, and missed/avoided most of the discussions on TMO and around HiFos creation.

Your understanding of "public domain" is lacking. Midgard is "Free Software" according to their wiki & web page, and is actually covered under LGPL. This means that companies can used it in commercial products, and are not required to divulge their additions. You may notice the line, right on the wiki page linked above, stating directly:

So, in short: YOU ARE LEGALLY WRONG ON THIS MATTER.

Nokia did hold, and had full rights to, the site, scripts, configuration, and "softwares" that composed m.o. They also contractually extended those rights to HiFo. Not Council, not you, not "the community", but to the legal entity that could hold those rights for the community.

Disagree? Show me ONE F_ING PIECE OF LEGAL EVIDENCE otherwise. ANYTHING to back this FALSE claim.

Really? There needs to be no legal entity? Nobody needs to own the servers or be legally liable to pay the bills? Nice world you live in, but it is not reality. A legal representative IS needed, and since the community doesn't want to trust that to one person (nor should they), a legal entity/corporation is required.


And there you have hit it on the head. It's what the community and Nokia agreed upon. This agreement wasn't between the community and a sovereign government. It was with a corporation. One which made up it's own rules, in it's own comfort zone, knowing that the liability "gap" between real world laws and their "agreement" with us would be covered by their corporate entity. THAT IS GONE NOW.

Now we need to operate in the real world. Where real people, with real names, need to submit verifiable information to be part of a legal entity. You say Council checks the legal status of every account made? Bull. It's never done that as I recall, and I doubt Nemien was doing it on our behalf. Because again, it was all under Nokia's umbrella. A play game, where real world rules didn't apply.

I see. So like when HiFo was negotiating a contract with Nokia, and the Board knew things TechStaff and Council did not? Remember that? When you raised hell as Council that the Board was agreeing to all kinds of things you made up at the time? Most bosses would fire and employee like that.

And for things that the employees do. It's called liability, and is the main reason I left the Board, when I stopped trusting a particular member of TechStaff (YOU) that was acting irrationally, and the Board could not reach a consensus on how to resolve that. I resolved it for myself by resigning.


Actually that's exactly what it is with HiFo. The language for the electorate formation was pulled directly from the Council election setup, including things like Karma and using the Midgard/garage user database as it's base electorate.

In a word, I can tell you the reason: You.

Most see you now the way you saw Rob. And they want no chance that one rouge person is going to take over or abusing the whole thing. That's exactly what happens when a group elects a "small group" that promises to be true to the community wishes.

Also, contrary to your claim about German law being less strict about things, in this point the German laws on e.V. are quite clear. There are key requirements and definitions, and a minimal structure that must be met. This is one of them. There are ways around it, to be sure, but that requires full trust of all those involved. And right now, the community isn't very trusting. Mainly because of the infighting, and people spreading lies and FUD.


Irony, since you're the one suggesting a GA of 6. Also, I don't know if you've looked lately, but even t.m.o. shows the active membership is well below 2,000 these days. I don't see that growing any time soon. That "60K" figure people throw around? That's the list of everyone who's ever signed up for an account, probably including a few thousand spam-bots, since Midgard never deletes an entry...

Nobody is raising a shitstorm against you. They're disputing your incorrect conclusions and warped sense of reality. One where we don't need a legal entity at all to operate in the world, and all of Maemo is "open source", when clearly it's not. The only time it gets personal is when people get frustrated at you screaming like a 5 year old and insisting your view is right, and the only way, and they get fed up with it.


It never was. You never held any position that would open you to liability, despite your claims otherwise. Council, while being noted in HiFo's bylaws, is a committee, which holds next to no legal liability (outside of personal culpability for intentionally doing things harmful). The closest you came to holding any liability was being a founder for the e.V., which perplexes me, since you now say you've always thought it was a bad idea.

Good Lord. Talk or don't talk. Don't pull this "I'm here, but I'm leaving, but I'm here" nonsense. Cher has had fewer "final farewell" tours.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

i see option 1 like the the existing council setup and option 2 more like a steering group. with 2 you could argue that you pay to have more say, but is it going to deter those who can't contribute much time or don't have the funds to do so.

However, I'm a little concerned that when the discussion about eV has been going on as long as they have, that there are still questions raised as to the involvement of non-eu members where the answer is not known.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

@woody14619

Thank You for this bery precise post, which really do sum up the situation very well.
It is, one of the most precise answers, I have seen for a very long time.

Also, thanks to Estel. We have had our fights, and it is very satisfactionary (is that a word LOL) to see how you actively participate in this discussion with also very good posts as answers.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

So whats the bs of this not being the correct way, You say yourself that HiFO handed over their obligations to eV

Above is contradictionary and not consistent. 1) You say that council suggests to HiFo and in 2) yoy say that HiFo has no power over council

the GA actually is the registered members, not only a few people, every member can participate in the GA meetings and this way have their voices heard

We agreed, and you didnt comment beside in first place accepting, but later started a rattle on how this is all wrong

No, the GA is all Maemo members, so it is not a priviledged position

Exactly

Last, You state these paragraphs that I quoute is giving suggestions to how to move on. I cant find one single statement in above that is a constructive way to move forward. It is, again, only neglecting the hard work being done by eV board and council.
Slowing the progress and creating a hinderance to move forward. As you say, endagering the existance of this community by slowing down the work that is needed to continue.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

There is satisfactory, but from the context I think you mean satisfying:

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

1. is what we did not want in the initial setup, we tried to find a way to integrate the council with the eV so nobody can complain about the general masses being left out of it - joerg complains about it anyway - so we setup 2. in a way council is voted like now by the people like now but being part of the "entity" so actually empowering it with what it legally never had with Nokia (1.)
3. was also in the cue as council could just be a workingroup within the eV that is voted on by GA - so the most active form the active members get that job - the ballots from past elections show that if the GA grows to 50+ members you probably have the same votes as from garage now... you won't get lazy people as you'd need to apply for the eV membership first. Anyone can become member if he/she meets the requirements (garage account, registered IRC account etc).
currently Councilors do not have to pay any rent... as they are not forced to become member, although I'd like to see people join the eV.

Non-EU members can join the eV at any time (this answer has been given more than 5 times iirc), only the board is limited. Let me elaborate what is current and what is possible - Board which is 3 people (currently Chair and 2 Vice) accepting applications, handling funds, do paper pushing - close to everything can be delegated to other members, even signing privileges for "on behalf of" can be given to members. If you want to, you can have the Board being a sole "premium member" position (you then call those three fancy names like President, Vice-President and alike) and a CEO (that can be really anyone) be hired to do everything (really everything) on behalf. Some things require Board signatures, always - like opening a bank account etc.

EDIT: I might did not answer the actual question correctly, you can easily have more power over the eV if you get the GA to support you (person or as group) - without becoming Board member - that is the keyhole - if you have the General Assembly on your side you can do anything (as long as legal - legal means German law + eV bylaws) you want. That is the German law on this, within legal boundaries the GA is in control of the eV, not the Board, the Board is only representatives (people signing papers). The whole idea of an eV is to have a group be a legal entity, not a single person or a board (HiFo does only consist of Board and Founders and was never meant to grow, the eV is)

I hope this shed some light on it.

PS I'd go 1. or 3. if we could do it again.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Thank you for the detailed clarification on how non-EU citizens can participate within an e.V.

It does seem as though a structure is in place to keep avenues of participation and "de-facto influence" open to all. As long as there is some codification in place that details what non-EU citizens are legally allowed to do/not allowed to do, and details on how non-EU citizens can still influence governance within the structure of an e.V, I think this should be acceptable.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

hell came down on earth or what ??
i been away for a day and its a cockfight sence ?

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

The codification is in german law and limits board only in the way that those directors being signed at court (at least 1, in our case Chair and 2 Vice) have to be either EU residents or EU citizens (with EU ID). Now if Board positions were extended to lets say 5*), no restrictions would apply for #4+5. The downside is that both can't replace Chair or the 2 Vice (in case they leave) if neither one is EU resident or citizen.

*) Believe it or not, for now, Board positions have a minimum of 3, that's it. There is no other rule in either bylaws, General Regulations or Board Regulations that limits this in any other way. We were happy to have the min. required volunteers and a limit didn't appear exactly as needed, so that simply was left open (for improvement, probably).
So much for the legendary coup d'etat and power garb... :eek:

Bylaws § 7 Board of directors:
(1) The Board of Directors consists of three or more**) natural persons at least 21 years of age. It shall represent the association legally and extrajudicial.
(2) Only active members may become Director.
(3) The Board of Directors shall designate a chair and two Deputy Directors. Any two of these three Board members together are authorized to fully represent the association.
(4) The Board's duties, especially rules to announce board meetings, their proceedings and executions of votes are regulated by the Board's internal regulations which shall be decided on by a simple majority vote of the Board of Directors.
(5) The Board of Directors executes the Council's and General Assembly's rulings.
(6) On termination of individual Board members, the duties of the retiring Board member can be taken over by the remaining Board members, provided that these agree. Alternatively, the Board may supplement until the next regular election by board resolution from the number of active members.
(7) Board members can be removed on request by the General Assembly with good cause. An important reason is especially given if the member is accused of criminal behavior, which makes further activity for the association unreasonable.

**) Just discovered a flaw in the translation... So far, it only said:
(1) The Board of Directors consists of three natural persons... (corrected now)
Since the german version gets considered at court, no worries there.

Again, here's all the legal docs:
Satzung/Bylaws: https://etherpad.mozilla.org/AMabik4zeD
Vereinsordnung/General Regulations: https://etherpad.mozilla.org/imtFYfpUKK
Vorstands-Geschäftsordnung/Board Regulations: https://etherpad.mozilla.org/uwQXMscA2n

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

I vote for #3 of juiceme's original question.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

I was wondering about the relative small response in the main thread too, while it was active.
Probably it wasn't moderated too well from my side, then sorry.

But now, months after joerg himself founded MC eV (refusing to collaborate from the very beginning though), he already wow

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

For those still confused about "if Nokia owned the Maemo site", I offer this:

MidGard1, on which the heart of maemo.org runs, uses the LGPL (likely v2.1). That license clearly states companies and individuals may use the software in commercial products AND modify it, AND copyright, AND declare ownership of, AND sell or re-distribute the re-bundled product.

Henri Bergius, co-author of MidGard and full owner of Nemein, made this change on the wikipedia page himself in November 2003, clearly stating this to be the case. He likely did so in order to be able to sell the products of his new company, which offered CMS services based on MidGard1 to various providers, including Nokia.

Anyone claiming that all of Maemo and/or the m.o site are FOSS and "100% open source" is legally incorrect. But please, don't take my word on that! Read the page on LGPL, and follow the reference links to the FSF page itself and read the legal document.

It boils down to this: Who will you believe when deciding if Nokia owned this material and had legal rights to assign it to HiFo? You have two choices: Someone named "Joerg_rw" on the internet, who refuses to say anything but "it's all free!" Or the creator of the software, the company that sold the CMS system/service to Nokia, the legal team at Nokia, and a generation of lawyers from the FSF who wrote and maintain the LGPL.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

AHA! See? that's the problem with you and your contributions, all the time since you joined HiFo: NFC but calling others names and trying to correct them:-/
For those who still are puzzled by woody's claims: The LGPL allows Nokia to link Midgard into own software and sell such software. It doesn't mean Nokia owns Midgard. Midgard is 100% FOSS (Henri's own words woody quoted/linked). And Nokia didn't ship any other (X86) software on maemo.org server that they could claim any copyright in (maybe except mentioned few hundred lines of php scripts that were a) without any copyright but buggy like hell, b) probably publicly available via aforementioned SVN repo and c) thus got replaced by versions created by new maemo techstaff & volunteers) Not a single byte of Nokia proprietary code runs on the server. (btw: just if in doubt about Henri allegedly sold a - according to his own statement which woody linked to - 100% FOSS software to Nokia, so Nokia can "sell" this software to HiFo now: after transfer of servers we did an update of whole midgard to latest available Midgard-1 FOSS version, so no matter what Midgard been on the servers, now definitely it's 100% FOSS) If that's Nokia who thinks they have proprietary code on maemo.org (would be in line with nokia's [lawyers] sometimes pretty flawed understanding of what's FOSS software and how to make business around it), then they shall hand over a list of filenames so techstaff can clean it out.
[edit] the sad thing is: I explained that to you maybe a dozen times already. Seems you are really not willing (or capable) to learn.
[edit2] before you start another round of your favorite game "bash joerg" with that one: for content just see bottom left of this very page you're looking at: "All Content CC"
No, rather it boils down to a choice between: Joerg_rw (software developer since 30+ years, managed dozens of projects, handled copyright issues in OpenMoko, talked with Eero, knows the server) or Woody (err, airplane mechanics? Neither knows the server nor the meaning of LGPL, uses "He likely did so" arguments[!] and blames others for "warped sense of reality")

BR
jOERG
PS: another possible hook to link the next baseless bashing on, which I want to correct before such bashing starts: I never said 100% of all maemo.org are FOSS, I'm well aware that HiFo paid for a commercial version of vBulletin. However Nokia didn't provide that software either, so that statement stands: not a single byte of code is running on maemo.org servers that Nokia could claim was theirs. When techstaff really missed out on some hidden file that holds Nokia proprietary code, you should point to it, rather than claiming midgard was owned by Nokia.
I'm not even going to comment all the other incorrect attributions like "since you now say you've always thought it was a bad idea." It's this constant spreading lies that makes you look pretty dishonest and sneaky, and anyway I'm fed up with it.

To juiceme: sure it's OT, but it sheds some light on a) who started OT, and b) on the compentence of some of those most vocal in here and the coherence and value and correctness of their claims. It's probably safe to assume that such doesn't differ much between particular posts. It also shows who thanks those incorrect posts and thinks they are "most accurate". So it actually helps on the topic.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

As intresting as this discussion about Midgard ownership is, I do not think it is relevant to this thread.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Agreed. I really didn't want to get involved in this but in an attempt to set the record straight and hopefully end this bickering, I'll bite. :/ (Mods: please feel free to move this along with all other irrelevant posts)

It looks like you've misinterpreted the LGPL. LGPL is very similar to the GPL with the main difference being that LGPL software can be compiled and then dynamically linked with software of another licence (which can be closed/proprietary) and then be redistributed together as a bundle. Companies can indeed use it in commercial products, they don't need to change the licence of their commercial product however the LGPL part remains licensed under LGPL. Contrary to your claim, this means that they must divulge additions to the LGPL'd software.

See here for a summary of the licence and note the "Disclose Source" part under the "Must" section.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

So, to cut it off before it evolves into another 30 pages of joerg's "spoiled kiddo" bickering:

We can expect to vote about Council status too, during upcoming referendum? I, for one, hope so.

/Estel

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

You claim I attack you, when all I've done is lay out my side of the argument. Something you've yet to do. Then you insult me and try to imply I don't know things. Pot calling the kettle black?

I NEVER SAID NOKIA OWNS MIDGARD! That's YOUR wording. You keep saying things and attributing them to others, when it's only you saying it.

I said, rather clearly: the bundled system, that Nemien sold to Nokia (with service) that was then re-bundled up and shipped TO US was owned by Nokia. And yes, there was and still is PLENTY on that server that was custom. Everything from the skin, to the structure, to the linkages.

MidGard, out of the box, does not have:

• Linkage to an external wiki.
• Linkage to any form of auto-builder
• They have a CVS based garage, but nothing like what we have.
• There is no concept of "Karma" or ranking
• There is no linkage with vBulletin (TMO).
• There is also no pre-built structure, and only one basic skin.

All of those things, and the configuration put into them, and the scripts, and the stuff you claim "we 100% rewrote" (a pure lie on it's face) were a rebundled distribution. That entire package, as shipped, was and is covered under the LGPL and was owned by Nokia.

That's utter bullshït, and you know it. I'll site ONE example among many, just to prove you wrong. But EVEN IF IT WAS TRUE, fact of the matter is that we started with the system given to us, which was owned, in it's entirety, by Nokia. And our existing system is based on that derivative work, which they hold full legal rights to.

Karma, one of the items I worked on as TechStaff, and got 98% working again? I changed all of about 3 lines of code in the end to get it working. It was mainly a permissions issue and re-pathing. It took time to trace it all, but in the end the actual changes were quite small.

Karma is NOT available as a "plugin" for MidGard. It, and lots of other scripts, used or not still, were commissioned by Nokia. They don't need to include a "(C) Nokia" in the php to make it theirs. That's not how the law works. Again, an area you clearly don't understand, but claim to.

"I had MS Word running in WINE on my Linux box. I updated to Fedora, and *viola*, MS Word is now suddenly FOSS!"

You see how utterly dumb that statement is? The one above it is just as inaccurate.

Updating a FOSS component of a system doesn't magically transform everything on the system into FOSS. At a bare minimum, the skin, the logos, and the linkages with other systems that are custom to this site (including Karma) are still under LPGL.


And I explained to you that the "content" being referred to is quite well legally defined to mean the stuff we're typing into form boxes and posting into the forums, wiki pages, blogs, and the like. The code and other components created by Nemein are covered under LGPL, NOT the CC license.

Tell me, if the "All content CC" includes software, doesn't that include vBulletin? That's a commercial piece of software that we purchased a license for to keep TMO running. Even you admit that's not FOSS later in your rant. So clearly, that license is talking about content as user input on the site, not the code running the site.

You have a clear lack of understanding of what is and is not FOSS on this site. And yet:

Funny... Just two years ago you were unable to fix anything on the system, while I was fixing Karma, and the voting booth, and... But clearly, now, I suddenly don't "know the server". How does that sync with "correctness of claim"?

Lol. Airplane mechanic?

No. I'm a software developer, have been for over 20 years. I hold a degree from RIT, 8 patents (software/hardware systems mainly), and have worked at Xerox, Kodak, and Nortel. If you ever use a color digital copier from Xerox, you're using my code. If you've taken a digital picture, I helped make the system that produced your CCD. (Well, unless you bought a Fuji based CCD...)

I now write software that's used in aerial systems, combined software, firmware, and hardware, spanning PCs to hand held devices to embedded systems. I have occasionally had to go out into the field to help fit, install, and configure systems for custom "planes". But I'm far from an airplane mechanic, not that that's an easy job, by any means.

As for you handling copyright issues with OpenMoko? :rolleyes: I'll let people Google that for themselves and see how well that project wound up. Not sure I'd tout that if I were you.

This is my favorite part:

You can't even keep your story straight for one paragraph, yet alone one post. It's not 100% FOSS, but it is, but it's not, but it is!

As for "Nokia providing the software", they didn't have to. Nokia paid Nemien for the software. Which Nemien created, configured, maintained, and had perfect rights to sell. Nokia bought it, and through paying for it and the service via a contract agreement with Nemien, Nokia has/had full rights to everything on the site. That includes custom parts written by Nemien as part of that work. Again, a VERY SIMPLE AND COMMON BUSINESS PRACTICE that you seem to not grasp.

I have to ask... do you have a mirror near your monitor? That would explain a lot.

I agree. On both points. Though I doubt the reasoning is the same behind the similar conclusions reached.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

The issue is not about "MidGard ownership". It never was. That's something Joerg made up. The issue is someone claiming that the servers, and the software running on them, are not legally held and operated by HiFo. By making the argument that Nokia was never in a position of ownership, Joerg is trying to "prove" that they had no right to to grant HiFo that ownership.

His argument, for some time, has been that we didn't need to negotiate at all with Nokia, because it's "all FOSS" and open source. Despite the clear indicators to the contrary, like the EULAs and clear ownership chain Nokia and HiFo can and has documented repeatedly.

Understand, the issue here is about authority. Joerg wants to claim that HiFo was ancillary to the whole process, and wasn't and still isn't needed. He's applying that same "logic" to the e.V. now. Reality is, without a legal entity, Nokia would have just shut the servers down, and we'd all have the equivalent of a Zune right now. And this argument wouldn't have a place to even be happening.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

In my opinion solution 3 ( council is no longer needed ) will in the long term be the best , and easiest to work with option.

The current structure has resulted in far too many power struggles, along with arguments about who is legally responsible, which only serves to make a bad situation worse. I believe having one entity definitively in charge, and which all who wish to be a part of can be makes a lot of sense. This unfortunately means disbanding council, and that means some big referendums to allow the structure to be legally changed like that.

As stated that is only my opinion. I highly recommend you personally go and do your own research regarding the e.V, HiFo and the community council before making any decision on this topic.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Indeed this leads to unreasonable insults hard to stand for anybody actually working on communitys' progress.

Right, @mods, please move posts #6-#13, #15-17, #20, #23-#25, #27, #29, #30 and this one* to http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=93566.
* or simply delete this post

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Regarding Referendum/Possible solutions for Council:
With todays' MC eV's bylaws, electorate is all community members. Councilors may keep that status as well as they're welcome to become regular members. So while it's absolutely fine that council may consist of non-members only, 2 suboptions open up for 1.):

1.a) Council stays apart from MC eV (not a body of it) and respectively can't have real power and responsibility (pretty much like Juiceme put it in 1.)

1.b) Council adheres to MC eV bylaws, becomes a body of MC eV (while the individuals may not) that can have limited power and responsibility as defined in the bylaws*. I'd rather call it option 4.) though.

* For now, this is defined in two paragraphs only:
§ 7 Board of directors:
(5) The Board of Directors executes the Council's and General Assembly's rulings.

and § 8 Council:
(4) The council has the duty to execute elections of all kinds. The council's duties, rules to announce council meetings, their proceedings and executions of votes are regulated by the Association Rules*.

* Association Rules alias General Regulations are not specifying anything beyond this (so far).

For the record, Full § 8 Council:
(1) The Council consists of at least 5 natural persons at least 21 years of age and is elected by the passive members' meeting.
(2) The Council internally votes upon a chairman and two deputy chairmen from who one is assigned secretary.
(3) On termination of individual council members, the duties of the retiring council member can be taken over by the remaining council members, provided that they agree. Alternatively, the council may supplement until the next regular election by council resolution from the number of active members.
(4) ^^...

me too! :)

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

I'm still trying to understand the whole situation...

A brief history as I understand it:

1. The community council was created to give the community a voice, a place to share ideas about Maemo and other Nokia systems. Nokia owned and operated pretty much all the infrastructure where this happened. The community created their own rules and structure (Community Council.)

2. Nokia was closing down Maemo. Community starts scrambling to create an entity and structure that could legally be given the assets. HiFo was created, and Community Council has essentially the same rules and role. Many discussions and bylaws were created to try to keep both parties "in check."

3. The HiFo entity proves problematic. A solution that seems to work, the German eV is proposed.

Being around at the time, I understood the tension that existed between HiFo and Community Council. There wasn't anything inherent in the HiFo structure that would ensure it did the community's will. Thus the idea that HiFo was the "cashier" only, and the CC was the voice and will of the community.

Now the MCeV is an entirely different type of structure. The GA, however it's defined, and I would hope it's defined as inclusively as possible, (with or without an annual membership fee) guarantees that community as a whole (and not just a 3-5 person Council) is in control, by law.

In the MCeV world, why do we want to hang onto the CC? What's the value that it provides in that structure? Hopefully this won't just provoke flames, but a honest discussion not based on fear.

It seems plain that the MCeV through it's GA, can create any council, commission, or project team to solve problems or do any job required.

Personally, the more I learn about the MCeV, the more I think this is probably the best solution for us. True there is the issue that no one can be a board member who is not an EU citizen (I'm Canadian). I've come to terms with that, and it's been explained that this is a requirement of German law, and there are other ways a non-EU citizen can work for MCeV (and can always be a member of the GA anyway, so have a voice in the community.)

Did I get anything completely wrong?

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Now THAT it the hugest pile of BS you ever posted here. It's exactly NOT about all this, it's just YOU who makes up all that.
It's you perverting any common sense of english language by interpreting a plain simple sentence like "after transfer of servers we did an update of whole midgard to latest available Midgard-1 FOSS version, so no matter what Midgard been on the servers, now definitely it's 100% FOSS" in a way that assumes last "it" would refer to the complete servers (plural! shouldn't it be "they (servers) are" then, instead of "it (midgard) is"?) despite TWO TIMES before I clearly referred to MIDGARD. Then you use that perverted assumption to base BS like the above on it. That's your usual pattern you use all the time, no matter if it's about interpreting "It's" as reference to something totally OT in context, or insinuating that my use of the word "veto" would be an indicator of any special powers I thought I had (while I clearly stated next sentence that I don't even expect anybody caring about my notin about the whole thing), and so on ad nauseum.
The sad thing: you succeeded with this tactics, perverting this whole debate into ... I fail to find words. Anybody reading this and other related threads will be able to tell. You claim you "invented" HiFo now think it was a very bad idea and you wouldn't do it again, but you think abolishing council which got installed by community just like HiFo and replacing both by an e.V which basically got established by win7mac who got indoctrinated by your weird new wisdom and has a highest authority of 3 BoD members "voted" for by less than a dozen which is your new "community" now, was the right thing to do. Pathetic. Anyway when community (the true one) doesn't care and wishes to abolish their only legitimate representative, the council, nobody can help. Good luck with redefining the tasks council had so far which evolved during 4+ years based on careful reasonable considerations, and replacing that by a concept of "It seems plain that the MCeV through it's GA, can create any council, commission, or project team to solve problems or do any job required." I'm sure this wil pan out awesome.

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

...which was absurd idea, as someone who have legal responsibility, can't be "cashier only", and someone who doesn't have *any* legal responsibility, can't be "voice and will of community". Then, "some" people without legal responsibility tried to act like "voice and will of the community" despite this, and demanded others to immediately kneel and accept your new overlord respect it.

When no one obeyed, the same "some" people threatened to wipe Maemo's infrastructure from hard disks, and started to demand real-life money for their "services". Board decided to move infrastructure somewhere else (free and responsible hosting), which said "some" people took as coup.

The above pretty much sums up the reasons of current joerg vs. the whole world conflict. Just replace "some people" with joerg ;)

I think you got everything absolutely right. We don't need Council anymore, it's relict from the Nokia ownership times (and even then, it hardly worked right).

/Estel

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Spreading the usual ESTEL'S ULTIMATE LIES bullc**p. We didn't expect different. Just pathetic you are only copying woody's BS who has the copyright in that nonsense of me threatening anybody by anything, or just "asking money for my services". I just stated that a service we booked for maemo wasn't free of charge and I'm stopping to pay that service (off site backup of the maemo-server VM images) from my own pocket. I further stated that our sysops and I think we cannot guarantee safety of maemo when no such off site backup service is in effect. The logical consequence of stopping payment for a paid service will be that the service gets discontinued. Your very special brain making a threat out of this shows what sort of troll you are.

PS: AHA! Could you please quote anything to support that statement? Wiki article, dictionary quote for "responsibility" or "cashier", anything?

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

Thanks shawnjefferson, your brief history sums it up quite well.

There was*, the idea that HiFo was the "cashier" only appeared nevertheless.

* HiFo bylaws:
That should be true, yes.

Those are valid questions. I didn't dare to question Councils' existance while working on MC eV bylaws though.

True again.

Thanks

Not quite, please see this post.

Obviously not! :)

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

You conveniently ignore that the term is "Foundation Council" which we had a referendum to make that council be the Maemo Council which it meant to be from beginning. (only Rob being the single person who didn't accept that HiFo's council being the Maemo Council, so we had to have another referendum fixing this for good)

THANKS A LOT, you just approved my take on council being the entity that tells HiFo BoD cashier what to do (usual disclaimer, as always: unless illegal)
You vowed that MCe.V bylaws were ONe HUNDRED PERCENT compatible with this rules. You lied into my face.

@shawnjefferson: yes, that's exactly why HiFo (BoD) quite clearly is forced to do what community told Maemo (= HiFo) Council to do, and Council forwards it to BoD and BoD is supposed to obey (usual disclaimer: unless it's illegal or rogue). The Community elects the BoD and the Council, and either of both entities have means to control the other, worst case by calling for new elections by community (the so called "red button")

Re: [RFC] On the roles of Maemo Council and Maemo e.V.
 

we are trying to move foward, not prove who said what when.

joerg_rw in your last post you seem to be interperting the quoted section to mean the merged council has authority over HiFo,

to me, as a native english speaker it only says that its is responsible for communation beteween community and the board, i see nothing there giving it authority. is there some other documentation giving it authority?

aaron m