[Theforum] Framing the House?

rudy r937 at interlog.com
Thu Oct 25 08:52:00 CDT 2001


>Whatcha think?

i think it's a great start, and thanks for jumping in

one of the things that peeves me -- i'll make no bones about it, and take
my lumps -- is the way people (not you specifically, ron, people in
general) focus on the "how" of getting something done, rather than the
"what" of what should be done

i guess it's my background in sql, where the focus is on what rows you
want, rather than on how to get them (which you should leave to the
database engine)

as those of you non-admins subscribed here to theforum must know by now,
there has been some, um, turmoil within the admin group about who really
runs evolt and what kind of power they should have

there are two recent (i.e. 2001) developments at the heart of the
turmoil -- the decision to make evolt a not-for-profit corporation, and the
decision to bring more non-original-admins into the running of evolt

now, without considering the "how" of these two decisions, are they good?
anybody disagree with them?  specific reasons why you disagree?   if you
do, please speak up now


let me briefly come back to your post, ron --

>  ** technical committee ...

from your description, this is in place already, it's thesite
(the people on thesite discussion list)

> ** correspondence committee ...

again from your description, this is place already, it's the admin group

in the past, the admin group has handled two functions, the day-to-day
running of evolt, as well as setting strategic direction

this latter function is now shifting here, to theforum, but ultimately,
assuming we reach nfp status, will be assumed by the board of directors

> ** fundraising/finance ...

board of directors, again, assuming we agree to go nfp

(my question from the other day is still outstanding -- did we or did we
not already submit an application to incorporate an organization in the
state of wisconsin?)


now, at this point, i recognize there is a strong temptation to start
asking questions like "how should we get there?" and "how do we elect board
members?" and "how should the board get input from the general membership?"
and so on

notice anything?


we should probably focus on "what" for a while, at least till we get
rolling

i suspect that it will be a short discussion, because i think we're all
going to pretty much agree on a few things, e.g.

  1. thelist, and the people on it, as well as the various evolt
         sites (*.e.o) are the "sine qua non" assets of evolt

  2. the founding principles of evolt are "by web developers, for web
        developers" and "giving something back"

  3. the assets of evolt need to be protected, nurtured, enhanced

  4. not-for-profit incorporation achieves many objectives for 3.

these are just off the top of my head, and i'm sure y'all can come up with
lots more

while i was writing this, ron made an excellent suggestion --

    a) Publish existing evolt vision and mission statement.
    b) Get feedback from all evolt on vision.
    c) Publish final evolt vision and mission statement
    d) Define system/s needed to support vision and mission statement
    e) Let groups assemble to develop needed system/s  (this allows
           all evolt members to contribute in their area of
           expertise/interest)

my only comment on the above is that d) and e) are really about "how" and
that's where all the controversy seems to be


anybody want to go ahead with a) through c) ?


rudy






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