[ogb-discuss] new ha-clusters contributors

[Nicholas Solter]

Roy,

Thanks for your comments.

Roy T. Fielding wrote:
> 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.

That was what I thought, though I am convinced now by your 
interpretation :-) As I mentioned to Keith, I think some simple 
documentation on these various roles could really help clarify things 
for those of us who are newer to the community and weren't around for 
the various discussions on these issues.

> 
>> 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.

Well, I found it ambiguous. Miriam Webster defines expiration as, "the 
fact of coming to an end or the point at which something ends : 
termination" (http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/expiration). The core 
contributor status has obviously terminated, as that's what we voted on. 
Therefore, by Webster's definition of expiration, it has expired.

But instead of splitting hairs here, it would be best if someone wrote a 
plain-English summary of the intended interpretation of these rules. 
Sort of an "OpenSolaris process 101" cheat sheet.

Thanks,
Nick

> 
> 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
> 
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-- 
Nicholas Solter, Solaris Cluster Development
http://blogs.sun.com/nsolter