[maemo-community] founding a german e.V.

[From: Gido Griese]

I admit I wasn't fully aware of the situation about server ownership,
but I also admit that I don't believe the problem of who's admin-manager
is really that pressing for now. Joerg did a great job so far and
personally I think the initial and ongoing trouble is more of a
communicational nature. Forthrightness was questioned and trust was
lost, but thankfully nobody got injured and the maemo servers are still
running, which should be our major concern after all. Let's not forget
this is the main purpose of the foundation, respectively the e.V., it's
written in both bylaws.

The founding of the e.V. is far more important now since it's quite the
one and only alternative right now and the approach is to have a sane
organizational structure with clearly defined responsibilities. Then
there should be no more opposing "HiFo" since everybody is "in". This
has already been the attempt with current Foundation and, for council,
has been achieved by the unification referendum and the goal remains the
same for the e.V.

What we're aiming for with the e.V. is to get everybody involved in such
fundamental things to become a regular member.  This isn't even a
requirement, but at least these things should be handled upon official
acknowledgement of the e.V., where the General Assemly *has to be* the
highest jurisdiction. Since we can't have all user accounts per se as
regular members for obvious reasons, a new group has to be defined.
Directors, Sysops, major admins are the first adress to approach in our
case. It would be nice to have Councilors in too, but that's no
requirement since they are holding position in an e.V.'s body and thus
acting officially on behalf of the organization. Councilors emanate from
community/associated members and remain the right to hold that status.

What Ruediger and me have drafted is more democratic than what we have
today and empowers core members, their vote effectively gains weight. It
is planned to manifest in the bylaws § 7 (5) that "The Board of
Directors executes the Council's and General Assembly's rulings."
So much for "HiFo's" "power grab".

All papers are ready, what needs to be resolved now is the issue of how
to instate council. The idea is to have a briefed kickoff meeting where
the bylaws are officially accepted by all founders, followed by a voting
for the board of directors, then a voting for council.
The preferred way is to re-elect current council.
If a councilor thinks he can't agree to this procedure or the new
bylaws, he can specify his concerns and we can discuss how those can be
resolved.
If that fails or current councilors won't candidate in the kickoff
meeting, an interim council will be elected.
Either way, next regular elections will be held no later then scheduled
for actual council period and 100% according to today's election rules.

If still any concerns from Council or community side remain towards the
bylaws, please raise them now.

Sincerely, your outgoing director

-- 
Win7Mac/Gido Griese