[ogb-discuss] new ha-clusters contributors

[Roy T. Fielding]

On Oct 31, 2007, at 9:45 AM, Nicholas Solter wrote:
> My original assumption, without reading the constitution, was that  
> terminating someone's core contributor status would also remove the  
> benefits that they gained from obtaining that status. I think  
> that's a reasonable assumption, and I'm not sure of the benefit of  
> doing it differently.

Only if you think being a core contributor to one community is tied
to being a member of opensolaris for the purpose of electing an OGB
or setting other organization-wide policies.  It isn't.

> Now going to the constitution, I agree that we didn't "remove" them  
> as members. But I think I can still argue that we "terminated"  
> their membership according to 4.3. The last sentence of that  
> paragraph says, "A Member's membership shall be terminated upon the  
> expiration of all prior grants of Core Contributor status or upon  
> his or her earlier resignation, removal, or death." It's not clear  
> whether the "removal" refers to removal as a member or removal as a  
> core contributor. Also, it's not clear whether removal of core  
> contributor status counts as "expiration" of that status. Given the  
> ambiguity, I think a reasonable interpretation is that removing  
> core contributor status terminates the membership.

No, there is absolutely nothing ambiguous about it.

Seriously, you can ask anyone trained in governance -- there
would be no word "expiration" if it meant the same as removal and there
would be no paragraph on removal of membership if changing of core
contributor status had such an effect.  The constitution simply
cannot be read to imply such a thing unless you ignore the whole.

The reason for the distinction is very simple: people are given
membership for having once made a significant contribution.
We want the membership to be of independent mind when it comes
to electing an OGB or making community-wide resolutions.  That
means that no one community, even if it is the one that they came
from originally, can have the power to remove certain individuals
from membership (their right to vote).  Allowing that would allow
a community to stuff the ballot with new members just prior to
an election and then remove them just after, or remove a local
minority just prior to a community-wide vote on an issue.

> Just so you don't get the wrong impression, I don't actually care  
> if the current members who we moved to contributor status keep  
> their "membership." I'm just trying to clarify the rules for the  
> future.

Right.  The fact of the matter is that having too many members
is far better than having not enough, so the constitution is skewed
towards maximizing those with a perceived long-term interest in
opensolaris.

....Roy