The election period has started for the next Maemo Community Council election and we have a number of excellent candidates, including - even if I do say so myself - me ;-)
Before I decided to run, I asked each candidate a series of questions - the answers we've given are linked to from the candidate summary page. I'd also encourage other community members to come up with questions for the candidates.
My full candidacy announcement is in the thread. The main point is that 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 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:
If MeeGo provides a comparable experience, without any loss of functionality, the resources around Maemo can be slowly redirected.
- 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.
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 will help here. Having been involved in the running of an agile project for over 2 years, I believe:
- Niels should chair the sprint meeting.
- The meeting participants should be responsible for setting their priorities and what will be included.
- 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 Arnold'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.
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.
Whether you vote for me, or someone else, I'd encourage you to vote! The transition from Maemo to MeeGo means the community's representatives to Nokia are more important than ever. Voting is open to anyone with a maemo.org account which is older than 3 months, and has accrued more than 10 karma points.
