FSFE General Assembly Fellowship Representative Election

[Paul Boddie]

On Monday 10. April 2017 17.16.18 Albert Dengg wrote:
> 
> On Mon, Apr 10, 2017 at 04:16:04PM +0200, Paul Boddie wrote:
> > Unfortunately, the "hustings" were announced as taking place on two
> > consecutive days [1], subsequently reduced to one [2], and then took
> > place on the day that was "unannounced". There hasn't been any other
> > discussion about the candidates' positions, as far as I can tell.
> 
> well, changing the dates is unfutunate yes, however, what kind of
> discussions would you have hopped for?
> i hope we can give you all the information you need to make an
> informed decision.

I understand that things do get mixed up, but I think it was pretty 
unfortunate that an event was announced and then occurred at another time. I 
found out about it on the wiki, obviously, whose recent changes page I tend to 
follow. (I accept that this makes me somewhat unusual, but it is a habit that 
has proved useful when moderating and administering wiki sites.)

Now, I did have a brief conversation with Jonas about this on IRC, and it is 
possible that I didn't get an e-mail announcing the meeting - my Fellowship 
renewal was occurring during this period, so I might not have been on the 
right list at that point - but what worries me is that there doesn't seem to 
be much said in public about the topic at all. I could be as unkind as to say 
that an election with little discussion around it probably isn't being taken 
very seriously by very many people.

[...]

> i would recommend to ask them directly to take part in that, either
> to write more in the wiki or take part in i a discussion here as i'm
> not shure if they are subscribed to this list.

I think that this is perhaps another problem. No-one wants to spend all their 
time on the Internet discussing and arguing about things, but if people aren't 
on this list or on some other list where they can engage with the electorate, 
then what kind of representation do we have?

> > (In the context of this being an election to a board with only a couple
> > of Fellows present and the remainder being appointed [3], it might be
> > interesting to know what the candidates *can* do about the above. But
> > maybe that is another topic.)
> 
> "appointed" is the wrong term here i think.
> the GA is the general assembly of assosiation so "members of the GA"
> are actually "members of the FSFE e.V.", which are apart from the
> fellowship representatives permanenet members of the assosiation,
> which are not "appointed", even though membership applications have
> to be confirmed by the current members[0], to my knowledge all
> current members have been heavily involved with our work before
> becoming members themselves (apart from the founding members of the
> organisation of course as a special case).

I used "appointed" for want of a better word, but this is a topic that 
possibly needs revisiting, not because I disagree with the legal structure of 
the organisation, but to make it clearer to Fellows what their influence and 
role is. One might say that Fellows (along with sponsors) are merely providers 
of the means by which the organisation may continue to operate, which is not 
something I have a problem with, either, but it might influence individuals' 
decisions about whether the FSFE is the right organisation for them or not.

> please feel free to ask as i think good communication will only
> improve our work and i welcome you and any other fellows to try to
> make informed discussions.

Thank you for your response! (And Daniel and Florian, too.)

Paul