[maemo-community] Discussion about Maemo community management...

[From: Tim]

Personally, I don't think the Council should sign an NDA: I think it's
really important that the Council remain as closely similar to other
community members as possible. This is, afterall, an unpaid volunteer
role, and introducing an NDA introduces too many (Nokia) liabilities and
the possibility of too many unintended mstakes.

Tim



On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 22:02:46 +0100
Dave Neary <dneary at maemo.org> wrote:

> Hi Jamie,
> 
> Jamie Bennett wrote:
> > If Nokia aren't disclosing important information based on NDA's to
> > the council then that is something to take up with them, but as a
> > council member I would of thought you would be privy to information
> > that we as 'normal' community members wouldn't and I don't begrudge
> > you to that. Fight to attain the information you need to guide the
> > community.
> 
> Just to clarify the NDA-related stuff.
> 
> Let's say someone takes the role of "maemo.org advocate withing Maemo
> SW" - advocating a closer relationship between development teams and
> "the community" (which means, in the case of Nokia, us, the press and
> the general public).
> 
> One of their jobs will be to argue for the opening of currently
> proprietary components of the platform, or the revealing of currently
> private product plans. This is something which Quim does now.
> 
> Well, to argue point-by-point for opening components, you need to know
> all of the issues with that. And to argue publishing product plans,
> you need to be privvy to them (and have access to decision makers in
> the product cycle). And that means either being a Nokia employee, or
> being under NDA.
> 
> > The council should be a filter to the wider community, if it isn't
> > working like that then maybe Nokia need a little help with it, they
> > are new to 'wholly' open sourcing idea so who would blame them.
> 
> How would you feel about Nokia offering to have community council
> members sign an NDA on election? How would Nokia feel about it?
> Current council members?
> 
> Personally, I'd be against it. Having community council members under
> NDA, as opposed to the current informal "use your discretion in
> general, and sometimes we'll specifically ask you to keep things
> quiet for a couple of weeks", would be a bad idea - greater
> justification for discussing important community issues out of the
> public eye, and to my mind against the principle of a council
> representative of the community.
> 
> Cheers,
> Dave.
>