something to think about:

a common English saying:
with rights come responsibilities

if you are not willing to formally identify yourself ( ie sign up for active membership ) you are not taking responsibility

giving someone control over anything without also giving them the responsibility that goes with it is a _VERY_ _BAD_ _IDEA_

its like giving someone a car and telling them "ill pay the fines"

Yes, I understand that is probably the most likely scenario.

I imagine it would go down like this:

Council says, "no we cannot do that, since it's illegal and it puts the MCev in jeopardy", assuming that the Council have the common sense to know this. If they don't, they can't FORCE the MCev to do anything illegal, how could they?

So let's say that these files end up somewhere on maemo.org system by the unsanctioned action of one or more individuals:

If the Board, acting on behalf of the GA to protect the MCev, learn of illegal activity like hosting files, they can immediately ask them to be removed. The Board can enforce this, since they (when I say they, I mean GA/Board) "own" those assets. They can "fire" any tech support that is doing anything illegal. Take their access away and show them the door.

I have much more faith in the people that will be running MCev (the 100 or so people that are active members who will probably join MCev) that they will never want to jeopardize maemo.org in any way by doing anything illegal. Even if one bad apple does feel that way, that's what the GA vote is for. It's obvious that the Council cannot have power to force anything on the GA, that will never work. The Council can (and does) have a place in the new MCev structure though, I believe.

Why doesn't your local golf club use it's treasury to buy drugs and start selling them? Is the club membership going to support that action in any way?

That's my view, opinion and understanding of things anyway.

That's exactly the legalese-stuff I (and maybe, many others) did not know. Thank you for saying it aloud!
I like a lot the approach you had offered here: Council defines General Regulations, General Assembly defines Bylaws, Board defines Board Regulations.

And great thanks to shawnjefferson: he has taken the pacifistic-constructive approach, while I was acting pretty much as "devil's advocate" by exhausting all possibilities of doing something differently.

I am just hoping that Community will maintain high awareness of both eV (please, join General Assembly and participate as actively as possible... if possible) and the maemo.org-vs-talk.maemo.org registration (link the accounts with each other, please).

Does anybody remember Greeters?

Thank you. Best wishes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Per aspera ad astra...

Wikiwide pointed me to this thread.

In my view the role of the Council was to be a trusted body representative of what people need. It was independent from HiFo Board. Is this independence even more important when the Board is only elected by a GA of 20 people (which is not representative of anything)?

In my view much of this depends on what GA and the new Board are.

- Representative of what the project needs. GA better grow a bit.
- Transparent. Everything the GA and the Board does should be as transparent as what the Council did. Should have regular weekly meetings including a public summary of the current and recent actions and an open discussion of the plans. Participation in meetings should not require joining GA.
- Accountable. If the people do not like something GA or Board is doing, I have trouble understanding what to do. Ok maybe they can join GA just for the sake of getting a decision changed. But then there needs to be a mechanism for GA to re-elect a Board urgently if it is off the track.

Deciding on the latter is a technical matter but in my view it is too early for the Council to disappear until the GA grows a bit. What would ease the transition would be regular GA meetings.

EDIT: Oh, and, err, I wouldn't even touch anything or require people to do anything. The Council should take care of merging into GA and of announcing it to people when GA is ready to take on the Council responsibilities.

quote "Is this independence even more important when the Board is only elected by a GA of 20 people (which is not representative of anything)?"

Out of 56 665 maemo members since inception...
if only 20 have the motivation to sign up to the GA ...
then from the remaining it boils down to:
A- left the community but their name is still on the roster.
B- stated inability to commit the time...(which is pretty sad ...since it isn't a huge commitment of time)
C- non-interest ...better known as Apathy. (which is even sadder)
D- are new members / device users just getting their feet under themselves..but desire and aim to be knowledgeable participating members in the future.
or the very rare..
E- one of the very precious few members who does contribute to the betterment of the community with help, fixes, etc ..but is not interested (for whatever valid reasons) in the running of the machinery of the community.
You aren't on the GA?
You don't look like a category "A" ...or you wouldn't be writing.
So...what is it..."B", "C" , "D" or "E"?

Some of your points are valid...and I believe should be stated...
but would be better voiced from a position of involvement....
but a stance of non-involvement while postulating what could or should be done is "critique from the bleachers"

As far as your statement "Participation in meetings should not require joining GA." goes...
That and/ or other similar statements like "Participation in <insert here> should not require joining GA."
I am most certainly against...and for these reasons for starters..

This place ... what we are is a meritocracy.
roughly meaning.. a voice and the right to speak is important ...
but being active ..deeds... speak louder....
and engender a sense of trust in the doing.
Hence from the actions, deeds, and continued involvement from many fellow members bettering our device lines, helping one another, and our community...
I trust them and their motivations.
That keyword is "many" ...I trust "many"...not "all"...the "many" I trust are the ones actively involved in our community.

Anyone can register on tmo...it takes a minute or two...
doesn't mean that they have earned (in my estimation) the right to insist, demand or critique anything...or of anyone who is working towards the community's betterment.

Making a username, a password, and confirming it is hardly merit enough for me to take someone seriously...believe in their decisions to change anything for the betterment of the community...
trusting the welfare of the community to people who simply registered at TMO is madness.
Hell...going through the paces of joining the GA ..I don't think that is merit enough either frankly...(I'm personally much more militant than that in my view) ..but it is a good start ...
It separates the active participating members from the 50 000- odd thousand who
a- don't come at all anymore ...
b- could care less what happens
c- have little to no inclination or motivation
d- are new members / device users just getting their feet under themselves...but desire and aim to be knowledgeable participating members in the future.

Sure the GA needs to grow...
Sooo.... join.
and don't stop there..help maintain, salvage, preserve, fix, or write new stuff...
I'm not just saying this to you either....
Lots of members should be more active...
To voice an opinion or view or stance here...
is an inherent given that you wish to be heard, understood, believed, accepted, and respected.
I know I don't say stuff without the desire for the same.
I hear and understand you...but belief, acceptance and respect ...(at least from me) ...are the result of the individuals' sweat equity done here for everybody. It's earned..not just granted.
And it goes further than that ..... the pack of buggers here.. have weaseled there way into my heart ...and I consider them my good friends...even Klinger, Amboss, Win7Mac and Juice ...ok you too peter ..

> You aren't on the GA?
> You don't look like a category "A" ...or you wouldn't be writing.
> So...what is it..."B", "C" , "D" or "E"?
> Some of your points are valid...and I believe should be stated...
> but would be better voiced from a position of involvement....

More like B (lack of time), but it is not lack of time, it is lack of orientation. It is only thanks to Wikiwide that I understood how the new thing works and I am joining the GA this week.

I was involved in the past, around 2010-ish, by developing applications for Maemo. I am moderately familiar with the platform. However during the last 2 years I figured out I can't conquer the whole world and I needed to narrow myself down to things I do well. I had to leave many projects which was a long and painful process for me. I ended up following or joining only the ones which I have a passion for in long-term and can contribute to usefully. Maemo is one of the few that I still try to follow. Debian is another I am trying to learn contributing to by learning to package stuff after the unfreeze (they released stuff last Saturday). With Maemo I haven't yet figured out how to get involved again, but it would probably be either localization or packaging (or development, but not in big chunks).

> As far as your statement "Participation in meetings should not require joining GA." goes...
> That and/ or other similar statements like "Participation in <insert here> should not require joining GA."
> I am most certainly against...and for these reasons for starters..

Ideally anyone should openly join GA and it should be taken for granted. You're right. But there are some people from category D who are only starting to poke around the website and want to get in touch with the passionate core of the community, the GAs, but if the meetings are only open to GAs then the newcomers end up being shelled out. This is the problem I am trying to solve, not that of the 40,000 of inactive people who have been here for a while. Whether this problem is important or not, I don't know.

EDIT: I was thinking of the newcomers who just started poking about the site and would rather get into the core easily, not of the 40,000 something people who are idle. But having reread this discussion more thoroughly I think you're right, it's not a big problem to require effort from them. Some people are really worried about "I will get 50 my neighbours join and ruin the project" sort of stuff but imo the Board can always set more strict GA entry requirements either way if the project is under a substantial risk of being hijacked.

The Council will take care of itself gradually I believe and the remaining bit is only about people needing to join the GA. Could we perhaps just put a user-friendly informative "join GA" page on-wiki and link to it from a button in the sidebar and give it a couple weeks. I will try to disappear from this page for a few days to do more reading...

Here originally I was thinking about newcomers who need to be able to participate in the project openly and easily. On a second thought, I don't mind Maemo becoming run by a more focused, active and responsible group of volunteers. It's a good change and people with a passion would not see a problem with it either way. Could we perhaps just put a user-friendly informative "join GA" page on-wiki and link to it from a button in the sidebar and give it a couple weeks. Or email everybody eligible for joining GA and link them to the form.

Well ...that bit of background cinema-graphicesque flashback helps...
then we most definitely need you ...
don't know how I missed the work you were doing here back-in-the-day...
dump that buncha dehydrated figs from Debian...they got plenty of people helping them..get on the GA ...and spend your time meaningfully with the crowd who will shout "huzzahs!" every time you come up with something good...well..I will...at least...ok...maybe once...but ...you'll at least get 1 "huzzah!" .

Anyway...
Far as the safeguards with the GA go...
with human nature....better safe than sorry...
I do think meeting you halfway and agreeing that new tmo people should be informed ..
but participating?..mmmm..nope...like handing matches to a kid...better to give them a coffee warming plate they can't burn themselves on in the form of released logs and transcripts....
at least until those new folks have their maemo sea-legs under themselves...
if they sign up for the GA and are screened and accepted (I know that sounds elitist ...but it is a sane safeguard) then great.
But...I've helped number of new people who were brand new to the device line (and it is great to do..gives fresh perspective, insight, a good grasp to explain things in layman's terms too)...some new ones who even thought (at the time) they had a good grasp of even the old models... and ...no offense intended ..nor any ill of any sort implied...I don't think any of them (excepting a couple) were...at the time...ready or able to understand much past what I threw at them...to help them get up and running with their devices...had to use the plainest of language even...and I wouldn't suggest they join up to the GA until they understood the basics of their devices 1st ...
I don't say any of this to diminish new folks in any way...it's just so much for them to absorb ...to take in..how to utilize their devices properly to just become competent users and get the most out of their devices...throwing them into meetings because ...they're allowed... wouldn't be helpful. I think it would be overwhelming for the majority of new members.
Also a join the GA button sounds like a very good idea...
a visible-presence-initiative like that would help ...If something isn't easily seen...it tends to remain unknown...

Who can add such button, then?

I personally see most need in fixing bugs.. talking is not much of my thing, I can't even word my thoughts properly in the last message. Either way see you on the other side soon.

Council is independent from Board. Council is still the trusted representation of garage.maemo.org account holders.
IIRC <100 people voted for council on last election

To make something clear from the beginning, as of now the MCeV is not in charge, maemo.org is still in hands of HiFo!

But on your concerns and probably misunderstandings, you do not join the GA, GA is a meeting of all regular members, in our case annually:

1. Representation of the general mass is council - we decided to not integrate that completely into MCeV as we do not want to force people into joining the association to become council. Councillors are free to join the association just like anybody else.

2. Transparent everything - your everything is currently posted to the wiki pages, announced on tmo and posted to the community mailinglist. GA should not be a weekly meeting, what for? The main concern of GA is to make decisions not hold discussions weekly - if there is anything to decide by GA in between annual meetings a meeting will be called. General discussion of such should take place outside of GA (last meeting took 2 hours and that was with the minimum amount of topics on the agenda). Don't know if you misinterpret the role of GA as workforce, GA is the meeting of all members. Participation in those meetings and getting a voice does not require to join the association (one reason why invitations get posted to public mailinglist and posted on tmo).

3. If someone does not like what the association does he/she has to join it to have a voting right but can also bring concerns to council (that is what council is there for ever since - remember Nokia?). GA not only overrules Board but is also able to dismiss Boardmembers - Board or Council are required to call a GA (read bylaws) if regular members bring an issue fwd that requires a GA decision. While we are at "reading bylaws", Board and GA have both the duty to obey A: the association's bylaws and B: the current laws of Germany, while the board can only deny decisions of the GA or change the bylaws (that might be required sometimes) on legal (as in German law) grounds and act in accordance of the bylaws as applicable, GA can change the bylaws (unless illegal) and overrule Board on any decision.

That is what we actually did not want to force as it would require (as said above) councillors to join MCeV as a regular member.
A referendum needs to decide if council is still needed in the way we have it at the moment, its purpose is the same as with Nokia, but there is no Nokia any more. But on the other hand the associated members (garage accounts) should have a representative too - so if we change roles in some way we might evolve in the direction of having work-groups within the MCeV taking care of the needs of the community while council is the steering group handing community needs to those work-groups (but that seems far fetched atm).
So no, GA is not gonna replace council ever, those two are very different entities with completely different purpose. Work-groups within MCeV could bridge liable people (regular members) with anonymous people's (garage accounts) representation (council) in the future or even make council obsolete if the masses are happy to bring there needs to MCeV work-groups directly.

As stated above, MCeV is not in charge yet. As long as this is the case we won't take over infrastructure in any way - when the time comes MCeV should have an omnipresent role within -> Community page with proper guidance, published bylaws (currently in wiki), minutes etc.

It was independent from Nokia too. But Is this independence even important anymore when the Board and GA consists of community members instead of a third party?
Is this independence even more important when only 80 people cared to vote for Council?

It is the fact that HiFo was considered as something where community should be indepentant from (and being perceived as something community should stand "against", instead of "with"), which made it a failure and each parting Board member meant another coffin nail. I fail to follow this logic, and frankly, I don't want to. The MC e.V. is a different approach, meant to put an end to this self-destruction.

MC e.V. is a receptacle and the aim is to have it filled with all those maemoans who really do care.
Take this as another appeal.

If the people do not like something GA or Board is doing, they need to infiltrate GA.
If GA does not like something Board is doing, they will tread on their toes, I hope. Board elections can be called by GA with 4 weeks notice.

None of that actually is planned. Council is a body of MC e.V. by its' statutes and I don't think this will change any time soon.


EDIT: talking about buttons, gryllida, where's the thanks button in your posts? - not showing for me...