Open Stack

On Tue, 2015-02-24 at 12:29 -0600, Lauren Sell wrote:

> Regardless, let's take this opportunity to bring transparency top of
> mind and execute some significant, yet fairly easy and quick to
> implement changes to prove it to the community.

Indeed.

>  Aggregating some of the constructive recommendations on this thread
> as well as my own thoughts, I would propose the following path
> forward:
>       * We should take quick action to create an open Board mailing
>         list and operate it just like the TC and User Committee lists.
>         This was a recommendation early on by the transparency
>         committee that stalled because we were waiting for an
>         OpenStack-based document store that could be used for the few
>         confidential pieces of information that needed to be
>         exchanged. In the interim, Board members were encouraged to
>         use the public foundation list, but I don't think that's
>         practical for every discussion and makes it too easy to keep
>         things on the private list.

The "just use the foundation list" approach was a worthwhile experiment,
but I think it's going to prove to be impossible to encourage board
members to use (particularly for mundane matters) a list that's
perceived to be a huge public audience.

A public mailing list specifically for the purpose of coordinating board
matters makes more sense. We explored the idea of opening the
foundation-board list, but the concern was about opening the archives of
a previously private list. I think we should just create a new public
list, calling it e.g. foundation-directors.

But yes - we still don't have a mechanism for sharing necessarily
confidential documents amongst board members, so we should retain the
private list for that purpose. Perhaps we should set the moderation bit
on the private list so every email would be moderated and only approve
those emails which are simply sharing confidential documents.

>       * Again, we've learned a lesson here with the anonymous doodle
>         to schedule the meeting, and we should make a point to have
>         any future polls and discussions along those lines public on a
>         new, open Board mailing list.

Agree.

>       * To showcase the board commitment, it would make sense to get
>         the list set up quickly and re-run the mid-year board meeting
>         scheduling poll and discussion publicly.

I've offered in the past to set up the list. I'm still happy to do it,
so perhaps we just need a brief motion and discussion of this plan at
next Tuesday's meeting.

>       * The original pitch to co-locate the Board meeting with
>         OpenStack Day India was to make a strong show of support for
>         the growing community; however, I agree with others that there
>         are effective ways to do this whether or not the meeting is
>         co-located. I know several of the Foundation staff have been
>         discussing mid-year travel schedules and would like to attend,
>         and I definitely think we should make a strong effort to
>         recruit Board and TC and other community members to attend the
>         event.

Cool.

>       * I'm happy to see Sean pick up the torch with the transparency
>         committee. I was on the committee in 2013 and helped draft the
>         transparency policy, but the committee waned and did not take
>         much if any action in 2014. It would be great for Sean to get
>         some time on the March 3 board meeting to discuss it.

Agree, and I think the committee's previous report does a nice job of
showing us where we should focus next.

Great list, Lauren. Thanks!

Mark.