[part 2] Article 3: Membership

[Nils Lohner]

In message <19990324150845.A30726 at gecko.fortunet>, Darren Benham writes:
>On Wed, Mar 24, 1999 at 05:22:13PM -0500, Nils Lohner wrote:
>
>> - board members
>>    Board members, by virtue of their office, are automatically 
>> contributing members.
>> [board members are working for SPI so by definition are contributing.]
>Why?  Why not "Only contributing members can be board members"  Is the job
>of being a board member going to be so full they won't have time to
>contribute to another project?
>

No its not, but it's a little of the same in Debian: the DPL shoudn't 
necessarily have packages.  Remember it's volunteer work here, so I'd like 
to make it easier esp. sine the board members will be putting a fair 
amount of effort into SPI.  Also, I think that there should be an option 
(however small) for non contributing members to become board members.  I 
think this is highly unlikely, but say we need a financial expert on the 
board who hasn't worked with free software before for example.


>> - term of membership
>>    The membership will not expire.
>I'd have it expire in 2 years also... basicly a ping to take them off the
>email lists if they don't respond...
>

Then you have to define what happens when a contributing memebr slips into 
non contrib.  I think this way is easy, and really see no need to remove 
inactive supporting members.  Otherwise I'd me for a longer term (4-5 
years possibly).

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