supporting our fellowship representative

[Bernhard Reiter]

Hi Paul,

Am Mittwoch 29 August 2018 19:02:48 schrieb Paul Boddie:
> Certainly, using the construct of the Fellowship to facilitate wider
> participation in executive decision-making appears to have failed.

even this I would not unconditionally agree too.
The fellowship has help us to grow and to bring in more opinions.

> However, writing as someone who perceived the Fellowship as being a way of
> getting involved with the activities of the FSFE, as well as something of a
> differentiator from other organisations with similar goals, the decline and
> elimination of the Fellowship

The Fellowship continues, under the name of "supporter".
The change was also made to honor active FSFE people that were not able to 
support us financially, as there were missunderstandings of the terms with 
some which kept active Free Software back. 

> seems to have had a negative impact on general engagement, 
> at least as far as I can see from visible public 
> activity related to the organisation.

My observation is different, as you have written, there is too much politics 
on this lists, less people prefer mailinglists and the technical sphere is 
getting bigger and more complicated. Also FSFE (which includes our active 
people and supporters) has been growing and endures growing pains while 
trying to find better ways to communicate with each others.

> Of course, I could be completely wrong and may have missed obvious
> indications of a vibrant supporter community, but then we return to those
> matters of transparency and effective communication that seem to lie at the
> heart of many of the misunderstandings and grievances articulated in this
> and in earlier discussions.

In history of FSFE, we were reaching more goals when we were limiting our time 
spending on bureaucratic issue and discussion general concepts 
(like "democray", "transparency", "governance") because in my experience 
there are some vocal people that we will never win over by discussing this in 
too much depth. In contrast we are losing other people that want Free 
Software policy and other stuff done, while doing so. Thus personally do not 
share the conclusion of your observations.

Best Regards,
Bernhard

-- 
www.intevation.de/~bernhard   +49 541 33 508 3-3
Intevation GmbH, Osnabrück, DE; Amtsgericht Osnabrück, HRB 18998
Geschäftsführer Frank Koormann, Bernhard Reiter, Dr. Jan-Oliver Wagner
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