Board/Minutes/2022-02
Date and time: Thursday, 24 February 2022 at 13:00 UTC - Countdown
The topics of the agenda get locked one week before the meeting.
Location: Video room https://osmvideo.cloud68.co/user/ror-nt7-6tu
using BigBlueButton.
Participants
Board members
- Amanda McCann
- Eugene Alvin Villar
- Guillaume Rischard
- Jean-Marc Liotier
- Roland Olbricht
- Tobias Knerr
Officers and board
Biographies
Minutes by Dorothea Kazazi.
Not Present
- Mikel Maron
Guests
- 9 guests
Open to all OSMF members.
You are welcome to ask questions or to comment (via voice or on the chat) at the end of the meeting.
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Administrative
Previous minutes
- 2022-01 Approved
Circular Resolutions
2022/Res04 Approve active contributor membership application 2022011710000148
| The Board currently decides on active contributor membership applications based on non-mapping contributions on a case-by-case basis. |
|
Did not pass on 2022-01-29 with |
| Application initially processed by the Membership Working Group. |
2022/Res05 Update Board Rules of Order to be generic regarding technical implementation of circulars
| We do not want to have to change Board Rules of Order if we choose a different platform for circulars. This new text is sufficient for allowing for electronic circulars.
To change §7.3 of the Board Rules of Order from: Any board member has the right to request a circular resolution at any time, by the means which electronic circulars are implemented (currently OSMF's NextCloud Polls, or if needed Loomio) together with a reasoning to the board mailing list. The reasoning should describe why the proposed resolution is in the best interests of OSMF. to Any board member has the right to request a circular resolution at any time, by the means which electronic circulars are implemented, together with a reasoning to the board mailing list. The reasoning should describe why the proposed resolution is in the best interests of OSMF. |
|
Accepted on 2022-02-02 with |
| Circular by Mikel Maron. |
2022/Res06 Approve active contributor membership application 2022012010000061
| The Board currently decides on active contributor membership applications based on non-mapping contributions on a case-by-case basis. |
|
Did not pass on 2022-02-04 with |
| Application initially processed by the Membership Working Group. |
2022/Res07 MapUganda Local Chapter application
| This is a circular resolution on whether to accept MapUganda as an official Local Chapter of the OSMF for the region of Uganda at this point in time.
Agree = Approve their local chapter today. |
|
Did not pass on 2022-02-23 with |
| Circular by Amanda McCann (Secretary). |
- Local chapter application and supporting documents here.
- Local consultation.
- Membership consultation.
Action item updates
See Board/Action_Items.
Reportage
Austria Local Chapter application
| Background |
|---|
| OpenStreetMap Austria has applied to be the Local Chapter for Austria.
The application is currently being reviewed by the board and the local community and the OSMF members have not been consulted yet. The steps for processing the application are outlined here. Community members can comment on the talk page of the application on the OSM wiki. Previous board discussion:
|
Update provided by Amanda McCann.
- Amanda has contacted FOSSGIS1 regarding OSM Austria Local Chapter application.
- FOSSGIS mentioned that there was no need to ask them, and they are in favour of the application.
- There was also an email by a community member regarding the application.
1 FOSSGIS is the OSMF Local Chapter for Germany and the OSGEO local chapter for the German-speaking area, which includes Austria.
Contributions without individual OSM accounts
| Background |
|---|
| External tools like Wheelmap and the recently introduced Microsoft MapBuilder allow their users to submit changes to the OSM data via a single account, instead of having one account per individual contributor.
The Data Working Group (DWG), after a request by the board, sent a well thought-out list of requirements for contributions to OSM via external services - such as the Microsoft MapBuilder - for the contributor to be a meaningful part of the community. E.g.
Related board discussions:
|
- Tobias Knerr emailed Microsoft with the Data Working Group's expectations regarding contributions without individual OSM accounts. In the meantime, DWG had blocked the single account for MapBuilder edits.
- Harsh Govind (Microsoft representative on the Advisory Board) will talk to the engineering people in Microsoft.
Fundraising committee
Update provided by Guillaume Rischard.
- The committee had its first meeting.
- Members of the committee have done fundraising before.
- www.osm.org: If we want to do more work on the website, we will need more funds.
Senior Site Reliability Engineer
| Background |
|---|
| The OSMF board plans to hire a senior site reliability engineer (SSRE). The person has already been selected.
Related:
|
Update provided by Guillaume Rischard.
- The selected person has the contract signed by Guillaume - we are waiting for it to be countersigned.
- They will start working for OSMF in April.
Moderation team
| Background |
|---|
| On 2021-12-15 the board adopted the Etiquette Guidelines proposed by the Local Chapters and Communities Working Group (LCCWG) moderation subcommittee for the talk* and osmf-talk** mailing lists. Enforcement will begin as soon as a new moderation team for these lists is affirmed by the board.
* talk is the mailing list for all OpenStreetMap community members. All past messages are available here. The board intends to extend the scope of the Etiquette Guidelines to all international communication channels hosted by the OSM Foundation after informal consultation with the respective communities. Regional communities, and communities on platforms not hosted by the OSM Foundation, are free to choose to use the Etiquette Guidelines for their channels as well. Proposed moderation team
Additional information about the composition of the proposed moderation team was mentioned during the November board meeting. The board asked the committee for the "resumes" of the proposed moderators and the names of other people who applied to be on the moderation team. In case the LCCWG moderation subcommittee is not willing or legally able to share the details about unsuccessful applicants with the whole board, the board will ask the subcommittee to share it with the members of the board who happened to be also members of the subcommittee at the start. Related discussions:
More information can be found in the background sections of previous board meetings. |
Update provided by Guillaume Rischard.
- Guillaume talked with Maggie Cawley (LCCWG moderation subcommittee) about the suggested moderation team.
- They discussed the option of creating a blogpost where the proposed moderators introduce themselves, but no decision was taken.
- Comment that it is not necessarily in the board's interest to have a blogpost now, since the proposed moderators have not been approved yet and some board members have expressed concerns with the selection.
Suggestion: The board to see a draft of the blogpost, before it gets sent to the Communication Working Group for publishing.
Treasurer's report
| Previous reports during monthly board meetings |
|---|
Please note that additional financial-related topics have been discussed during previous board meetings. |
| Presented by Roland Olbricht (Treasurer). |
Roland has now access to Xero (online bookkeeping platform).
Needed
- Roland to get access to online banking.
- Roland and Guillaume to have a meeting regarding the Treasurer's handover.
Microsoft donation
OSM is the winner of Microsoft's December 2021 FOSS Fund. The company selects one open source project per month to receive a $10,000 donation. Microsoft engineers participate in the nomination and selection process.
- Microsoft was previously unable to transfer the $10,000 donation to OSMF, as OSMF is not a charity in the UK, but can now proceed with the donation via Github sponsors.
- Roland will submit an application by OSMF to activate the Github sponsors feature.
- The donation will probably not be taxed.
Accountant on leave
The accountant will be on leave for 4-6 weeks.
- Roland can't do the online banking yet.
- One invoice is overdue and some will be due in the end of February.
Guillaume offered to do the online banking, while the accountant is on leave.
Engineering Working Group's funding request for work towards data model changes
| Background |
|---|
| The Engineering Working Group (EWG) requested EUR 9600 from the board to support a proposal put forth by Jochen Topf to investigate possible changes to the OSM data model.
At the end of 2021 Tobias Knerr talked with Jochen Topf about the revived EWG and its interest in maybe pushing OSM data model changes, possibly, but not necessarily, in the direction that Jochen talked about in his talk at State of the Map 2018 conference in Milan (slides, video). Jochen offered to write a study which looks at current proposals and do a first evaluation of the expected problems and benefits of each proposal, the changes and efforts needed, and come up with some kind of timeline and project plan. According to him, this can not be complete, because nobody knows all the software out there which uses OSM data, but it can look at the effort needed for OSMF infrastructure and the most important pieces of software used in OSM stacks. The study would be mostly based on his expertise and some limited input from other people in the community, to get it done with a reasonable amount of effort and cost. After that, the EWG can talk about it and decide whether it wants to go forward with this project, what plan to adopt and how to fund the effort. Jochen estimated an effort for 120 hours of work, offered for EUR 9600, and that the study will be finished three months after the placement of the order. Jochen also noted in his email that many of the proposed changes (or similar ones) will need a huge and concerted effort on the part of the OSM community over several years, involving many players, and that he believes this is something we can do as a community, but only if there is some common agreement that we *want* to tackle it. Additionally, that the scope is much larger than anything anybody could do in their spare time and that the effort will need some kind of project management, some people to come up with documentation, specs, plans. It will also need the support of many implementors in many Open Source and proprietary projects and, maybe, also funding. In his estimation we are surely looking at a six figure sum over several years. |
| Suggested by Tobias Knerr. |
- The Engineering Working Group (EWG) has checked the proposal and would like the board's approval to unlock the funds.
- Last year there was a suggestion of granting the EWG €50,000.
Suggestion to grant a €50K budget to the Engineering Working Group
By Guillaume Rischard.
Rationale
- The EWG members are the experts.
- Don't want them to come to the board for every project's approval.
Points mentioned during discussion
- The EWG has a track record of being reasonable and openly communicating their plans, so we can trust them.
On conflicts of interest (CoI) in this vote
Roland and Tobias are members of both the board and of the Engineering Working Group (Roland as the EWG chairperson)
- Good practice for people with CoI to abstain from voting and trust the rest.
- Technically, abstaining from voting in this case is not required.
- In this case it is not a CoI, as Roland and Tobias do not have a different interest which is in conflict.
On board members chairing working groups
Comment by Simon Poole (guest), that historically the thing was that board members should not chair Working Groups, but even that is not a question of conflict of interest.
Suggestion
- The EWG could try to find a chairperson who is not on the board.
$9.4 of the board rules of order states: "Board members may serve in OSMF working groups, but should refrain from chairing them."
Points mentioned during discussion
- The wording of $9.4 is "should", not "must".
- The EWG has already elected a vice-chair, that might take over responsibility (not instantly) from Roland. The EWG is easing into the transition.
On the Treasurer directly approving bills by working groups
Can the Treasurer directly approve bills by the EWG? Question by Roland.
> Guillaume (previous Treasurer) replied that this was the way he operated in the past (for example paying for sticker-related requests by Amanda (also a CWG member).
Vote
| Motion to grant the Engineering Working Group a 50,000 EUR budget for 2022. |
|
Accepted on 2022-02-24 with |
| Motion by Guillaume Rischard. |
Software Dispute Resolution Panel
| Background |
|---|
| The board in January 2021 decided to evaluate the work of the Software dispute resolution panel after one year (January 2022). The panel reported that there had not been any cases of disputes brought forward. On 2022-02-10 the board decided to start the public consultation of the membership about the software dispute resolution panel.
The panel's initial mandate was to deal solely with disputes over changes to the iD editor. The current five members of the panel are: Richard Fairhurst, David Morais Ferreira, Wille Marcel, Minh Nguyen and Ilya Zverev. Related board discussions and other communications:
|
| Suggested by Tobias Knerr. |
Deferred to March board meeting.
April General Meeting plans
| Background |
|---|
| The board decided to have a General Meeting on 30 April 2022 - unless rescheduled. The OSMF members will be asked to vote on suggested changes to the membership prerequisites, proposed by the board. |
| Suggested by Tobias Knerr. |
Motion (withdrawn at the end of the session)
- The board to send a formal invitation to OSMF members for a general meeting on 30 April 2022.
Points mentioned during discussion
- The text for the membership prerequisites resolution, that the OSMF members will be asked to vote on, has not been defined yet.
- The board has already voted and selected the date for a general meeting.
- The formal invitation needs to include the membership prerequisites resolution.
Decision: The Secretary to inform the OSMF members that they will receive a formal invitation for a General Meeting which will take place on the 30 of April, and that they'll be able to vote on a resolution on membership prerequisites.
Decline request for tagging and similar working groups
| Background |
|---|
| The board has received two documents with proposals regarding voting and tagging issues, written by a community member. |
| Suggested by Roland Olbricht. |
The board has received an email by a community members, suggesting the creation of:
- a working group to make final decisions on tagging issues.
- a voting working group.
The person who sent the email had been banned from the tagging mailing list.
Suggestions
- Decline any involvement in tagging and any appointments in tagging.
- Reject the specific proposals.
- Refrain from adding a reason to the rejection of these proposals, as it might be tricky to get right the wording or formulating an underlying policy.
- Make it explicit to the community that the board does not decide on tagging issues.
On resolving tagging issues
- The need for resolutions on tagging has been an open topic in the community for a long time.
- The board and OSMF do not decide on tagging issues and do not appoint people to decide on tagging issues.
- It's not the job of the board or the Foundation to have an opinion on such matters - the community is in charge.
- Setting up mechanisms, such as liquid democracy platforms, could still be in the remit of OSMF.
On arbitration
We arbitrate when there are conflicts in the community that the community can't resolve, but not in tagging conflicts.
Vote
| Motion to reject the specific proposals for creation of a tagging working group and a voting working group. |
|
Accepted on 2022-02-24 with 6 votes in favour: Amanda McCann, Eugene Alvin Villar, Guillaume Rischard, Jean-Marc Liotier, Roland Olbricht, Tobias Knerr |
| Motion by Roland Olbricht. |
Advisory Board - monthly update
| Background |
|---|
| The Advisory Board members are separate from the OSMF board of directors - individuals are either nominated by Local Chapters and Gold or higher Corporate Members of the OSMF or invited directly by the OSMF board of directors. The OSMF Board of Directors will publicly minute, in the board meeting minutes, any communication sent to, or received from, the AB members. This monthly section is reserved for this purpose. Overview of board communications with representatives on the Advisory Board. 2022 Jan |
| Presented by Amanda McCann (Secretary). |
Meta (ex-Facebook) has a new Advisory Board representative: Angelina Calderon.
Any other business
DWG ticket
Suggested by Eugene Villar.
The Data Working Group has forwarded to the board an email they received about the border of Crimea.
Comment that the ticket was superseded by events.
Suggestion: Talk about it during the board's screen-to-screen meeting.
Guest comments or questions
| Open to all OSMF members (join the OpenStreetMap Foundation). You are welcome to ask questions or to comment (via voice or on the chat) at the end of the meeting.
|
None.
Next meetings
- 2022-02 26 and 27 Board screen-to-screen meeting
- 2022-03-08 Mid month board chat
- 2022-03-24 Public board meeting
Open board meetings take place online once a month. The recurring day and time for board meetings and mid-month board chats has not been set yet.
See the Monthly Board meetings page to find out where board meetings are announced and for a subscription link to have future board meetings automatically added to your calendar.
Meeting adjourned 48' after start.