Revision of Bylaws

Nils Lohner lohner at spi-inc.org
Thu Mar 18 20:13:50 UTC 1999


  The time has come to begin discussing the changes that need to be made 
to the bylaws.  The most important changes will be regarding the 
memberships, and the voting.  Later changes will address committees, etc.  
These will be attacked in order, with membership being first as this is 
currently the more hazy issue, and a lot of questions have been raised 
about it.

The bylaws can be found on the SPI web site at <http://www.spi-inc.org/corp
orate/spi-bylaws>.

Articles 1 and 2 will never change, as they need to stay consistent with 
the COI (Certificate of Incorporation- also online).  Article 3 is the 
membership article, and this will be discussed first.  As this article is 
discussed, please keep in mind that the entire bylaws will be gradually 
revised, so the articles don't necessarily have to be consistent with 
other articles.

Technically, the way the revisions will work is as follows:
- write resolutions to change the various articles (one at a time, to 
avoid confusion and multiple simultaneous discussions- tough to keep track 
of!)
- discuss the resolutions until they're ready to be voted on
- the board will then vote on them.
- once all necessary articles of the bylaws have been changed, they should 
be voted into the actual bylaws as a block.  This ensures that the bylaws 
are not inconsistent with themselves at any given time, and thus avoids 
confusion.

If anyone has any problems with the general approach, please let me know.  
I've been thinking about this a long time (about 5 months) and this is IMO 
the best way to approach the problem.

I plan on posting the proposed changes to the membership articles in the 
next day or so (hopefully).

Nils.

-- 
Nils Lohner                         Software in the Public Interest, Inc.
E-Mail: lohner at spi-inc.org          PO Box 1326 
Board Of Directors <board at spi-inc.org> Boston, Ma. 02117 USA




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