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Sorry for completely missing the call. Family matters took precedence last week.

I agree with the idea and everything said here so far. I believe it
definitely provides an opportunity for institution outreach and
visibility, at least terms permitting.

Of course, navigating the matter of visibility, and how it is
conveyed, is a whole other question and I suspect other research
institutions in the US would have similar constraints about
perceptions of endorsement and related logo use. I guess the question
this mentally leads *me* to is what does the institution gain by
joining? What can they perceive as value from the relationship? Would
we be building a special communication or feedback channel to help
enable and provide that value perception?

I guess, the creation of the member class may also need the additional
context of how precisely it will be used for the benefit of the
proposed member class. I think such detail would be beneficial to the
eventual legal reviews of members looking to join the membership
class, since this would also not involve updating the bylaws, at least
as discussed thus far.

-Julia


On Thu, May 13, 2021 at 12:45 AM Johan Christenson
<johan.christenson at citynetwork.eu> wrote:
>
> Adding my 2 cents here as well and I too can only find positives to this.  Reaching these types of organizations better would be a great win in many ways.
>
> /Johan
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> ________________________________
> From: Amy Marrich (amy at demarco.com)
> Date: 05/12/2021 22:08
> To: Thierry Carrez (thierry at openstack.org)
> Cc: foundation-board at lists.openstack.org
> Subject: Re: [Foundation Board] Associate Members
>
> Responding a little late but I thought this was a good idea during the meeting on Monday. I can't see any negatives to this as we'd be reaching out to folks we already collaborate with or who join our projects. I think the fact they would be non-voting protects us and no fees for them protects them.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Amy
>
> On Wed, May 12, 2021 at 4:24 AM Thierry Carrez <thierry at openstack.org> wrote:
>>
>> Hello everyone,
>>
>> During the informal call on Monday I introduced the idea of creating a
>> new Foundation non-voting membership tier called "Associate members".
>>
>> Rationale:
>>
>> The Open Infrastructure Foundation mission is to develop, support,
>> protect, and promote open infrastructure software projects (open source
>> solutions to build infrastructure for further innovation). Integration
>> between those projects has been identified as a key issue hindering
>> further adoption of those solutions. While the Foundation directly
>> supports and promotes a number of projects, its mission goes beyond the
>> projects it directly hosts. We currently don’t have any program allowing
>> us to formally engage with non-profit organizations sustaining open
>> infrastructure projects, and help us better collaborate around events,
>> promotion, and cross-community discussions.
>>
>> We also have a lot of connections with the academic world (through
>> OpenInfra Labs and our education initiatives) and a lot of open
>> infrastructure users in the public research space. Those traditionally
>> do not sign up as members, despite being very engaged (CERN, for
>> example, is not a member). This makes it difficult to apply
>> “member-first” thinking in some cases, and we miss out on showcasing
>> those illustrious institutions as Foundation members.
>>
>> Proposal:
>>
>> Create a new Foundation non-voting membership tier called "Associate
>> members". That tier would be free to join, and the Executive Director of
>> the Foundation would be empowered to approve any interested organization
>> fitting the criteria. Two criteria would be defined:
>>
>> - Non-profit organizations sustaining open infrastructure projects
>> - Notable academic and public research institutions making extensive use
>> of open infrastructure projects.
>>
>> Please let me know of any question, concern, or comment on this
>> proposal. My goal is to get it approved by the Board on our end of June
>> meeting, and roll it out with initial candidates during Q3.
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> --
>> Thierry Carrez
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Foundation-board mailing list
>> Foundation-board at lists.openstack.org
>> http://lists.openstack.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/foundation-board
>
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