Re: Question to GNOME Foundation Board candidates

[Cosimo Cecchi]

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 9:50 PM, Cosimo Cecchi  wrote:

> 3)  About GNOME Executive Director, how do you think about GNOME ED? And
>> what will you do if we still search GNOME ED? ( I am not mean for help to
>> search GNOME ED, cause we already have GNOME ED committee :)  )
>>
>
> I think finding an ED should still be one of the top priorities of the new
> board; it's unfortunate that the previous attempt did not go well. In the
> meantime, board members have been stepping up to fill some of the duties
> like liaising with the advisory board and participating in fundraising, and
> I expect the new board to keep going in that direction until another
> candidate is found. Something else that I would also consider is changing
> the job description/title if the search does not appear to be fruitful.
>

I just wanted to add to this point that the previous search committee did a
great job bringing a perspective candidate to the board, and I'm grateful
for their efforts!
I realized that my previous comment could have been interpreted as a
negative feeling towards the committee, but that is not at all the case.

Cheers,
Cosimo
___
foundation-list mailing list
foundation-list@gnome.org
https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list

Re: Question to GNOME Foundation Board candidates

[meg ford]

Hi Max,

On Sun, May 22, 2016 at 7:41 PM, Max  wrote:
>
>
> I know there will be more people ask questions about all domain with GNOME,
> so I ask 1 question with Asia first.
> I have 3 questions to all candidates
>

Thanks for taking the time to send these questions!

>
>
> 1)  How many hours per week do you expect you will be able to dedicate to 
> working
> on the board on a regular basis?
>

I expect to spend between 5-10 hours per week. My employer  has committed
to sponsoring ~2 hours per week for me to spend on board duties. The
remaining time will be my own volunteer time.

>
>
> 2)  What's your plan and view with GNOME in Asia? How do you think about
> grow GNOME in Asia? How to co-work with others?
>

I would do my best to make sure that organizers and contributors in Asia
are given the resources they need to continue to foster growth. This could
be in the form of financial support (through funding conferences, travel,
etc); helping with planning, and ensuring that requests for marketing
resources are met.

>
>
> 3)  About GNOME Executive Director, how do you think about GNOME ED? And
> what will you do if we still search GNOME ED? ( I am not mean for help to
> search GNOME ED, cause we already have GNOME ED committee :)  )
>

I think the GNOME ED plays an important role in helping the community to
focus on the vision and goals of the project. The ED  sets the tone for the
public image of GNOME through engaging the larger community and our AD
Board. I hope that if I'm elected I can help to make sure that a new ED is
hired as soon as possible. In practice I hope that as a new member of the
board I can learn more about where I can be most effective in helping with
the search, and focus my efforts in making sure I do whatever I can to make
sure the search is fruitful.

Thanks,
Meg

>
>
> * We start to have sponsors from Asia with GUADEC.
> * There are some open source events related and co-work with GNOME Users
> Group or Members in Asia.
> ** Hong Kong Open Source Conference  ( http://opensource.hk/event )
> ** openSUSE.Asia Summit (
> https://events.opensuse.org/conference/summitasia14 )
> ** FUDCon ( https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/FUDCon?rd=Fudcon )  We
> held GNOME.Asia Summit 2014 together with FUDCon.
> ** FOSSASIA ( http://fossasia.org/ )
> ** LINUXCON JAPAN (http://events.linuxfoundation.org/events/linuxcon-japan
> )
>
>
> Thanks again for all candidates volunteering to the Foundation Board.
>
>
>
> Max Huang
>
> ___
> foundation-list mailing list
> foundation-list@gnome.org
> https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
>
>
___
foundation-list mailing list
foundation-list@gnome.org
https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list

Re: Question to GNOME Foundation Board candidates

[meg ford]

Hi Daniel,

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 1:38 PM, Daniel Espinosa  wrote:

> Recently has been a campaign to expose GNOME weakness, like:
>
> * GTK+ is C and ugly
> * Bugzilla is old and user unfriendly
> * Developers don't here suggestions from users
> * No apps for GNOME/GTK+
>
> This is a short list of thinks I heart, no my opinions.
>
> As Foundation Bouard Member:
>
> ** How do you address negative campaigns from *users*? There are a
> response on blog.gtk.org, but developer oriented not user oriented, then
> there are few diffussion about GNOME technologies goodness and use in other
> projects (including KDE).
>

I think that hiring a new ED would be helpful in this area, and the best
way for the board to help address this would be to fill that role as
quickly as possible. In the past the ED has engaged the larger community
through talks, interviews, etc. I think this provided a consistent source
of new and positive information about the project.

There have also been efforts in the past by the Engagement Team to address
concerns and engage in discussion where possible. as others have stated,  I
think the Board's role in that case would be to provide a supporting role.

>
> ** Are you planning to produce a "User Experience Road Map" for GNOME? In
> order to help users see how they will be beneficied with GNOME's
> infraestructure and/or libraries. I mean, how, for example, Gtk+ changes
> and roadmap, is going to help users to get the best of their favorite
> Desktop Environment.
>

 I do not personally have plans for this, and I don't think that I would
undertake this if I were elected. However, if this was undertaken by the
community while I am serving on the board, I would support it.

>
> ** Are you planning to involve GNOME Foundation or sign an alliance with
> other non-profit organization, in order to support developers fixing users
> requested bugs/wish lists/fix beheavoir of GNOME related projects? Check at
> [1]
>

In the past I believe there was discussion around spending funds raised
during the privacy campaign on bounties. I am not sure if that is still
under discussion, or if a decision was made to call for contract proposals.
I think that bounties are a good idea, because they may be a way to
encourage contributors (for example, former interns) to stay involved.
However, it's important that the amount of work and the cost of such an
initiative would not outweigh the benefits to the community. Therefore I
would proceed by carefully looking at the discussion and work that has been
done with regard to the privacy funds, and see if something like a bounty
program would be possible.

In terms of engaging with other organizations, I think Open Hatch does a
good job of connecting new contributors with mentors, and lists some GNOME
bugs. However, they don't have any infrastructure that I know of that would
help in setting up bounties. And of course, within GNOME there are already
initiatives such as GNOME Love which support developers who wish to start
contributing to the project.

I hope that answers your questions! Please feel free to follow up if you
wish!

Thanks,
Meg

>
>
>
>
> [1] https://plus.google.com/110617990354745814227/posts/8Y7gSHVYt6e
>
>
>
> --
> Trabajar, la mejor arma para tu superación
> "de grano en grano, se hace la arena" (R) (en trámite, pero para los
> cuates: LIBRE)
>
> ___
> foundation-list mailing list
> foundation-list@gnome.org
> https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
>
>
___
foundation-list mailing list
foundation-list@gnome.org
https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list

Re: Question to GNOME Foundation Board candidates

[Nuritzi Sanchez]

Hi Daniel,

Thanks for your questions! Please see my responses below.


On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 11:38 AM, Daniel Espinosa  wrote:
>
>
> ** How do you address negative campaigns from *users*? There are a
> response on blog.gtk.org, but developer oriented not user oriented, then
> there are few diffussion about GNOME technologies goodness and use in other
> projects (including KDE).
>
>
I think this is a very interesting question and I would approach it in two
ways:

   1. What is the role of the Board in actively combating negative
   perceptions of the GNOME Project in the eyes of the community?

   2. How can the Board empower the community to be able to advocate on
   behalf of the GNOME Project and the Foundation?

I would love to explore the first, and learn from what has been done by the
Board in the past in such instances. I imagine we could potentially release
a statement publicly to defend the GNOME Project, if needed. That being
said, I would really like to understand where the negative remarks are
coming from and if there's a common theme. I'd ask questions like, are the
negative remarks coming from a single user or user group? What's at the
foundation of their attack? Do they have any valid point, or is their
campaign just based on hatred or misunderstanding? Once we better
understand the negative comments and campaigns, then we can decide if their
criticism is something that we want to take into account and change about
the Project, or not. There's often truth in criticism, and so my approach
would be to understand what's at the bottom of the campaigns first and
foremost in order to improve the Project, and in order to keep it safe.

The second point is important too — it would be great to empower the
Foundation members, and our larger community, to help us combat negative
campaigns. We can do that by increasing the communication flow and
educating the community on the criticism, on what we are doing to address
valid points in the criticism, and how we should handle any parts of the
negative campaign that are invalid or just hateful.



> ** Are you planning to produce a "User Experience Road Map" for GNOME? In
> order to help users see how they will be beneficied with GNOME's
> infraestructure and/or libraries. I mean, how, for example, Gtk+ changes
> and roadmap, is going to help users to get the best of their favorite
> Desktop Environment.
>

Since I'd be a new Board member, I haven't been planning anything like that
:) But, I'd love to hear suggestions like this surfaced to the Board! What
are your ideas to benefit the whole community? This User Experience Roadmap
idea sounds very interesting, and I'd love to hear more about the problem
you think it'd help solve. If it's not something that the Board should be
involved with directly, maybe we can point you out to the right team or
figure out the best way to address your concern.

I'd love to help promote a culture of listening in the Board and be
proactive in serving you guys. Because of my Engagement team hat, I'm
really interested in hearing more ideas for how to connect existing members
and draw in more users and contributors.



>
> ** Are you planning to involve GNOME Foundation or sign an alliance with
> other non-profit organization, in order to support developers fixing users
> requested bugs/wish lists/fix beheavoir of GNOME related projects? Check at
> [1]
>

I'm not quite sure about this one and would like to hear more about your
ideas. It looks like you've received quite a few votes on your initiative
and am interested in hearing more about what your findings are so far.

This seems like another initiative to bring up with the Engagement team. It
sounds like you have a lot of ideas for us — want to join? ;)

Best,
Nuritzi





>
>
> --
> Trabajar, la mejor arma para tu superación
> "de grano en grano, se hace la arena" (R) (en trámite, pero para los
> cuates: LIBRE)
>
> ___
> foundation-list mailing list
> foundation-list@gnome.org
> https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list
>
>


-- 


.

*Nuritzi Sanchez*  |  +1.650.218.7388 |  Endless 
___
foundation-list mailing list
foundation-list@gnome.org
https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list

Re: Question to GNOME Foundation Board candidates

[Allan Day]

Hi Daniel!

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 7:38 PM, Daniel Espinosa  wrote:

> Recently has been a campaign to expose GNOME weakness, like:
>
> * GTK+ is C and ugly
> * Bugzilla is old and user unfriendly
> * Developers don't here suggestions from users
> * No apps for GNOME/GTK+
>
> This is a short list of thinks I heart, no my opinions.
>
> As Foundation Bouard Member:
>
> ** How do you address negative campaigns from *users*? There are a
> response on blog.gtk.org, but developer oriented not user oriented, then
> there are few diffussion about GNOME technologies goodness and use in other
> projects (including KDE).
>

This isn't something that the Board takes responsibility for itself -
really it's an area that the Engagement Team is involved with. That said,
if there are significant user concerns in a specific area the board can act
as a mediator and there might be some occasions where it is helpful to have
a board member in the mix.

Your question does raise the issue of how proactive the board is, and this
is something that I'm interested in and have done some work on in the past
year.
I would like the board to be more proactive where possible, so that it is
makes regular positive interventions in critical aspects of the project. I
should stress that this isn't easy or straightforward (the board has
limited time and the Foundation has limited resources), and I'm not
entirely sure how feasible it is, but I do feel that it's important to try,
and this is something I would spend time on if I was reelected.

** Are you planning to produce a "User Experience Road Map" for GNOME? In
> order to help users see how they will be benefit with GNOME's
> infraestructure and/or libraries. I mean, how, for example, Gtk+ changes
> and roadmap, is going to help users to get the best of their favorite
> Desktop Environment.
>

I agree that talking about plans and having a forward looking vision is
important for the project (that's actually something I try to do in my
blog). Our users need to have a sense that we're going to exciting places,
and that they can come along for the ride. Again I think that the
Engagement Team has the main role to play here, and that the board's
responsibility should be to support it.

The one area that the board needs to focus on, in my opinion, is to
communicate the project's plans to our advisory board members (both current
and future). I've done a fair amount of work relating to the advisory board
recently and it would be great to be talking about our plans more there.


> ** Are you planning to involve GNOME Foundation or sign an alliance with
> other non-profit organization, in order to support developers fixing users
> requested bugs/wish lists/fix beheavoir of GNOME related projects? Check at
> [1]
>

The Engagement Team has run fundraising campaigns in the past, and some of
these funds have been used to contract out work. I've recently been
involved in helping to revitalise the Friends of GNOME scheme (I don't need
to be on the board to do this work, although it does help in some aspects
and has been inspired by my time on the board). Once this has progressed,
I'd like us to start running fundraisers again.

However, paying for development work is tricky. Contracting out work is
expensive, and I know that there are mixed feelings about bounties within
the community. My impression is that paying for hackfests and funding
internships is generally the way to go. I'm open to other approaches though
and would be interested to hear views from the community on this subject.

Allan
___
foundation-list mailing list
foundation-list@gnome.org
https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list

Re: Question to GNOME Foundation Board candidates

[Allan Day]

Hey Max,

Thanks for the questions!

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 1:41 AM, Max  wrote:
...

> 1)  How many hours per week do you expect you will be able to dedicate to 
> working
> on the board on a regular basis?
>

Board work is quite fragmented in my experience, so it's hard to say
exactly how many hours I've spent on it each week. What I can say is that I
feel like I've been one of the more active board members for the past year.
This has enabled me to keep on top of a handful of ongoing issues, as well
as being able to take up new initiatives. If I'm reelected I would keep
going at the same level.


> 2)  What's your plan and view with GNOME in Asia? How do you think about
> grow GNOME in Asia? How to co-work with others?
>

I'm supportive of GNOME.Asia and would like the Foundation to continue
supporting that event. I would also like us to be supporting other GNOME
events in Asia (and indeed, throughout the world). This isn't something
that the board itself can easily lead on, but it would be good for it to
advertise that support is available. It would be great if GNOME in general
could be encouraging local groups and events, and the board should
certainly be a part of that positive support and reinforcement.


> 3)  About GNOME Executive Director, how do you think about GNOME ED? And
> what will you do if we still search GNOME ED? ( I am not mean for help to
> search GNOME ED, cause we already have GNOME ED committee :)  )
>

I think that it's important that we have an Executive Director, and I'd
make the ED search a priority if I were elected. If the continue to
struggle to recruit someone, I'd be open to rethinking the ED role,
although I'm not sure what that would exactly mean in practice.

Allan
___
foundation-list mailing list
foundation-list@gnome.org
https://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-list