| 27 Apr 2024 |
 @joepie91:pixie.town | in short, the fundamental problem here is neither the community governance, nor the anarchic nature of it, nor the lack of "top-down" governance, nor a lack of structure; it's that the structures that the community built to do the governing, never got the proper recognition and authority from "up top" that they needed to actually do their job | 12:54:54 |
|  @emilytrau:matrix.org joined the room. | 12:58:29 |
 Arian | I think we're saying the same thing? It seems the community has a different interpretation and expectation over what authority the foundation holds than it has in practise.
If we want it go do active governance it needs to be run way more ... Professionally than it currently has | 13:03:56 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | I do not think we are; I am not saying we need active governance from the foundation | 13:04:31 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | I am saying that the lack of clarity about the foundation's position, and particularly that of eelco, has been the significant factor in our governance issues | 13:04:58 |
| Arian | So. What is the problem? That they say they dont do active governance but then get in the way the moment there are governance issues? | 13:05:21 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | it has created an environment of uncertainty where nobody running a team can tell whether a decision they make within the team is going to be overruled out of nowhere | 13:05:32 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | because there is no explicit policy of non-interference from the foundation, and one of the board members has a tendency to do exactly that | 13:06:00 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | you cannot do effective community governance under those circumstances | 13:06:15 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | this can be solved in one of two ways; either the foundation starts structurally and professionally involving them in governance; or they explicitly refrain from doing so, and make this a formal policy that is actually followed by the board members, with no duplicate hats | 13:06:59 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | but not this weird "maybe a board member will come in to veto things, maybe they won't" inbetween situation that we've had thus far | 13:07:26 |
 @theophane:hufschmitt.net | In reply to @joepie91:pixie.town
but not this weird "maybe a board member will come in to veto things, maybe they won't" inbetween situation that we've had thus far I certainly can't say I know everything, but I can't remember ever seeing that (I've seen board members engaged in all kind of discussion ofc, but not using some magic board wand to veto anything). Do you have some example? | 13:09:22 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | if we're going to do community governance then the teams appointed to be responsible for certain areas need to actually have unambiguous authority over making decisions within those areas | 13:09:23 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | * if we're going to do community governance then the teams appointed to be responsible for certain areas need to actually have unambiguous and explicit authority over making decisions within those areas | 13:09:30 |
| Arian | What i have seen of Eelco are opinions. Not vetoes or mandates. And in the end he says "it's up to the organizers. I'd prefer the foundation to not have an opinion on this". Isn't that exactly the outcome we need? We just decide ourselves to stop inviting anduril and be done with it? | 13:09:50 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | Théophane: to be more explicit, a chunk of the open letter regarding eelco addresses this problem | 13:09:55 |
| @theophane:hufschmitt.net | (if anything, the sponsorship situation was the foundation not opposing a veto to a team's decision) | 13:10:08 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | Arian: if someone makes a statement who is also a board member, that carries the weight of the board with it, whether they intend it to or not. that is how soft power works. | 13:10:36 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | that is why "no duplicate hats" is necessary | 13:10:42 |
 Janik (they/them) | In reply to @theophane:hufschmitt.net
I certainly can't say I know everything, but I can't remember ever seeing that (I've seen board members engaged in all kind of discussion ofc, but not using some magic board wand to veto anything). Do you have some example? there was a sponsorship policy draft and Eelco went and misrepresented the board by stating his own opinion and making it sound like that's the board decision. (that was in the open board call so I don't know if it is written down somewhere) | 13:10:47 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | the separation between personal opinions and formal authority only exists on paper, it never actually works that way in reality | 13:11:21 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | (and a good non-interference policy is designed to account for that) | 13:11:51 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | In reply to @theophane:hufschmitt.net
(if anything, the sponsorship situation was the foundation not opposing a veto to a team's decision) the sponsorship situation is an exceptional one, because it concerns "using the reputation of the project as a whole for something" (namely, endorsement of the sponsor) and this means that making that decision is not within the mandate of a conference team to begin with | 13:13:15 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | that is also why people only expected a sponsorship policy for official events | 13:13:46 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | * that is also why people only expected a sponsorship policy for official events, because those are the ones where that problem applies | 13:13:56 |
| @joepie91:pixie.town | (in an ideal world, an official conference sponsor would be a community-wide discussion, but when you do not have functioning moderation - which again seems to boil down to a lack of mandate - that becomes almost impossible to pull off) | 13:17:13 |
| @theophane:hufschmitt.net | In reply to @joepie91:pixie.town
the sponsorship situation is an exceptional one, because it concerns "using the reputation of the project as a whole for something" (namely, endorsement of the sponsor) and this means that making that decision is not within the mandate of a conference team to begin with That's completely fair. I was just pointing out that the tendency is definitely that of under-intervention, not over- | 13:18:00 |
| Arian | Okay but shat I don't understand. Isn't "the board will not have an opinion" a first step to "the community decides" ? | 13:18:13 |
 @withoutwithin:matrix.org | I have had many thoughts about this and everything related over the last month. I've written up a post that I feel summarizes my emotions, feelings, and has my official response to this situation. I wish you all luck in your future endeavors.
Please take the time to read my post before you ask me questions that can be answered by reading the post carefully.
https://xeiaso.net/blog/2024/much-ado-about-nothing/ | 13:18:59 |
| @withoutwithin:matrix.org | be well, | 13:19:30 |
