[maemo-community] Council nomination: Andrew Flegg

[From: Andrew Flegg]

On Fri, Mar 12, 2010 at 16:32, Reggie Suplido <rsuplido at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Andrew previously served for two consecutive terms as a member of the
> council, one of which, acted as the Council Chair.

Thanks Reggie for the kind words. After both your encouragement, and
that of others, I'm happy to accept the nomination and will run for
the council.

I've described the merge of Moblin and Maemo to produce MeeGo as
having as large an impact as the announcement of the 770 itself. I had
planned to run for the council before the announcement, however had to
reconsider my platform after the announcement. I was, as many of us
were, initially bewildered, but as the smoke has cleared and we
approach "day one"[0], I've come to realise the changes that MeeGo
will bring also provide many new opportunities to grow the community
and the platform in which so many of us have invested so much; and
that we can do that without losing anything.

Before outlining my platform, some background: I'm a software
architect and developer in my day job, and bought a 770 the day they
went on sale. Having moved up through each generation, I've tried to
be active and involved in all aspects of the Maemo community, and in
all media - whether mailing lists[1], IRC[2] or fora[3]. As well as a
community member, I've been "scratching my itches" with projects such
as tablet-encode, MUD Builder, Hermes, Catorise and now MWKN (Maemo
Weekly News). In 2008, I suggested a community council to help
coordinate community efforts with Nokia, and was honoured to be
elected to the first council; and act as chair for the second.

The last six months, having stepped back from the council, have given
me a new perspective. The biggest issue I've seen is one of
communication and clear facilitation. We need to reduce the overhead
and streamline community action. Therefore, if elected, I will push
for:

  * A clear cooperation with the growing MeeGo community through MeeGo's
    Community Working Group[4] and develop a transition plan to ensure
    the level of collaboration the council has with Nokia isn't lost
    in the new world.

  * A Moblin/Maemo/MeeGo summit which looks to the present as well as
    to the future.

  * Appropriate support and resources for existing device owners as
    Nokia transition to MeeGo. Exactly what form this will take will
    depend on whether running MeeGo is a day-to-day reality for
    N8x0 and N900 users:

    o If MeeGo provides a comparable experience, without any loss of
      functionality, the resources around Maemo can be slowly
      redirected.
    o However, if MeeGo for existing devices is - at best - of
      developer interest only, the existing Maemo community MUST
      continue, and must continue to provide support, help and
      resources to Maemo users.

    Carsten Munk's Mer^2 should help with the final point, and
    I'm proud to have been on the council which approached Nokia
    requesting a distmaster role; and suggesting that Carsten (Stskeeps)
    was the right man for the job.

  * Increasing the visibility of the maemo.org sprint process and
    reducing the burden on volunteers. Niels Breet (X-Fade) being
    made the maemo.org team leader[5] will help here. Having been involved
    in the running of an agile project for over 2 years, I believe:

    o Niels should chair the sprint meeting.
    o The meeting participants should be responsible for setting
      their priorities and what will be included.
    o Input should be provided by Nokia (Tero Kojo) and the
      community (the Council chair) on their issues and priorities
      before the meeting which should be taken into account
      within the prioritisation.

    This will reduce the workload for the volunteers on the council,
    increase the ownership of the tasks and provide greater
    accountability of the paid contributors.

  * A summary table listing the high-level issues facing the
    community and who on the council will act as a point of
    contact for them. An example for the current council could
    be:

       Extras QA process         VDVsx
       Optification              gcobb
       Community outreach        Texrat

  * Support for Randall's community outreach programme, which
    is trying to grow the Maemo community rather than just
    the Maemo platform. With the launch of the Ovi store for
    Maemo, much focus is given to that rather than the community
    provisions such as Extras.

  * Empowering of community members to lead initiatives such as
    Google Summer of Code, conference attendance etc.

  * A monetisation/donation framework for community-provided
    downloads[6].

Hopefully the above also answers the questions I was asking the other
candidates[7], whilst debating whether or not to run. If not, or if
you have any other questions, please don't hesitate to ask me.

Best wishes,

Andrew
http://maemo.org/profile/view/jaffa/

[0] http://meego.com/community/blogs/valhalla/2010/towards-day-one
[1] http://bit.ly/d4lUEP
[2] http://mg.pov.lt/maemo-irclog/search?q=Jaffa
[3] http://talk.maemo.org/search.php?do=finduser&u=15155
    http://talk.maemo.org/search.php?do=finduser&u=79
[4] http://lists.meego.com/pipermail/meego-community/2010-March/000320.html
[5] http://maemoteam.wordpress.com/2010/01/06/a-role-change-for-niels-x-fade-in-the-maemo-org-team/
[6] http://lists.maemo.org/pipermail/maemo-developers/2010-January/023980.html
[7] http://maemo.org/community/maemo-community/council_nomination-me_again/

-- 
Andrew Flegg -- mailto:andrew at bleb.org  |  http://www.bleb.org/