OpenJDK Community Bylaws and Governing Board

[Jonas Tingeborn]

On 2011-02-05 13:56, Mark Wielaard wrote:
> Or as someone said less politely, without addressing all issues, you are
 > just setting up some nice rules for working in the sweat-shop.
>
> Seriously, if you are not addressing these things, please
> at least document the rational for not addressing these issue.
> And who is responsible for them if not the community of participants
> nor the governance board.

I specifically refrained from commenting on this one in my initial 
feedback since I wanted to get a clarification first on the rules 
surrounding objections made by the board members. My hope was that this 
objection power might act as a last resort should the OpenJDK Lead make 
harmful decisions regarding the product.

However since I haven't gotten a response on that yet, I'll echo your 
concern that the document currently reads as a lot of flowery words for 
a community with no say what so ever over OpenJDK. You might as well 
draw a razor over the document and divide it in two parts. One part for 
people who like to talk about OpenJDK or execute the orders from the 
OpenJDK Lead ("the community") and another part for the OpenJDK Lead 
which has a single sentence "This role decides everything concerning 
OpenJDK such as technical direction, features and release schedules. Oh 
and by the way, the role is always to be appointed by Oracle.".

I don't see much openness about this JDK under the proposed construct.

>>>> The Governing Board consists of five individuals:
>>>>    * The Chair, appointed by Oracle;
>>>>    * The Vice-Chair, appointed by IBM;
>>>>    * The OpenJDK Lead, appointed by Oracle; and
>>>>    * Two At-Large Members, nominated and elected as described below.
>>>
> Killing votes goes both ways.
> I just object to the appointed part.
>

Another thing I refrained from commenting on since I figured that if 
either Oracle or IBM started pulling in their own direction, then they 
would have to sell (through logic or "other means") the At-Large members 
on the idea, which hopefully would serve as a containment mechanism for 
some of the company agendas.

Though, I am concerned that specific companies are written into the 
bylaws. Wouldn't it be better to simply prop the roles with Oracle and 
IBM people when the bylaws take effect and then let people on the board 
earn their right to be there like the other groups? (ahm.. meritocracy 
someone said)

Looking elsewhere, the Eclipse foundation has so far managed to keep 
their product alive without having IBM, Nokia or other specific 
companies written into their bylaws.