Board/Minutes/2022-02

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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.

Acronyms

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

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
3 votes in favour:
Roland Olbricht (Had 150 mapping days in 2020, works locally, and does more than only buildings)
Tobias Knerr
Eugene Alvin Villar
3 votes against:
Amanda McCann (Some of those links don't work, or show “zero tasks”, I presume because HOT is no longer showing old tasks. Regardless, the lack of current activity of any kind (no diary entries, no wiki, etc) makes this is a “no, not now” from me.)
Guillaume Rischard (Doesn't demonstrate significant non-mapping activity, and mapping is below active contributor threshold.)
Mikel Maron (Needs to show more non-mapping activity to qualify at this point.)
1 did not vote: Jean-Marc Liotier

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
5 votes in favour: Mikel Maron, Eugene Alvin Villar, Roland Olbricht, Jean-Marc Liotier, Tobias Knerr
1 against: Amanda McCann ("by the means which electronic circulars are implemented" is no longer defined, nor how that would be decided.)
1 abstained: Guillaume Rischard

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
1 in favour:
Mikel Maron
1 against:
Roland Olbricht (It is too early. According to the text, the activity is mostly about evangelizing people for OSM. Where this meets literally no mapping experience (tagging an apparent highway=residential as highway=motorway), it is unclear whether the evangelized people get a proper idea about what OpenStreetMap is.)
3 abstained:
Tobias Knerr (I would like to see more tangible contributions listed.)
Eugene Alvin Villar (Very little mapping experience, but quite enthusiastic about promoting OSM-related and tangential activities such as YouthMappers and HOT. I would encourage the applicant to do a bit more mapping and thereby gain more insight into the nuances of OSM itself but I otherwise appreciate their initiative in leading some local activities.)
Amanda McCann (On one hand, there is lots of words about why they should get it, and that's better than some applications which can be ~5 words. On the other hand, there are no actual links to things they have done. There's claims, but no way for me to verify the claims, such as videos, photos or social media posts. I defer to the other board members, i.e. abstain.)
2 not voted:
Guillaume Rischard
Jean-Marc Liotier

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.
Disagree = Decline their application (leaving open the possibility of this group reapplying later)
Abstain = Abstain (including for conflict of interest reasons)

Did not pass on 2022-02-23 with
4 votes against:
Jean-Marc Liotier (I'll be happy to support an Openstreetmap Uganda local chapter, but that is not what Mapuganda is - as per my reports.)
Guillaume Rischard
Tobias Knerr (Concerns about insufficient separation between commercial and community activities remain.)
Amanda McCann (A large amount (majority?) of their income in 2019 came from a paid mapping project (“Mapping Kampala's Public Transport”), in which some of the collected geo data could have been added to OSM, but they were contracted to only give the data to their client. The OSMF is dedicated to the collection of free geodata, and hence IMO getting paid to collect proprietary data is incomptable with being a local chapter (paid mapping which is released as open data is a different thing). I might support a local chapter application from this group in a few years if they decide to stop collecting proprietary map data.)
1 abstained:
Roland Olbricht (I understand the concerns mentioned at the mid-month chat, but I will not find sufficient time to build an independent opinion on the application.)
2 did not vote:
Eugene Alvin Villar
Mikel Maron

Circular by Amanda McCann (Secretary).

Action item updates

See Board/Action_Items.

Reportage

Austria Local Chapter application

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

  • 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

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

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

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

  • 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
4 votes in favour: Amanda McCann, Guillaume Rischard, Jean-Marc Liotier, Eugene Alvin Villar
2 abstained:
- Roland Olbricht: Self-declared conflict of interest due to being a member of the EWG.
- Tobias Knerr Self-declared conflict of interest due to being a member of the EWG.
1 not voted (absent): Mikel Maron

Motion by Guillaume Rischard.

Software Dispute Resolution Panel

Deferred to March board meeting.

April General Meeting plans

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

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
1 not voted (absent): Mikel Maron

Motion by Roland Olbricht.

Advisory Board - monthly update

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

None.

Next meetings

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.

Acronyms