XSF Discussion - 2020-02-06

20:45:18 Zash> Given the flexibility of XMPP, having clients and servers optimized for each other makes sense. "Optimized for Internet Explorer 5 on 1024x768 pixels"

Is there any XEP for voting already?

Surprisingly no, not that I'm aware of

Although politicians would like you to believe online voting is _just fine_, there are still people with concerns around this, particularly regarding voting secrecy (others not being able to know how a particular individual voted) and the ability to verify votes are in fact correctly counted.

There are different levels of secrecy/privacy one might want to achieve.

Buttons?

In the Netherlands, the rules are pretty clear on this: there should not be a way to derive how an indivual voted, to prevent coersion.

Zash: I had that in mind yeah

Wanna help me refiddle and resubmit it?

ralphm: that's only for governmental stuff though right?

and PR memberbot

call it "polls" and not voting

Alt, figure out how XEP-0050 over messages would work?

Ge0rG: yeah

pep., I thought the question was related to the US pre-elections. If not, then sure, please call it polls.

Ge0rG: I envisioned it as simple actions, simple fixed responses.

Polls and voting would be implementation details

I think that's pretty much a hack

simple polls (as done in Slack) are pretty much congruent with reactions, by the way ✏

I am not saying you should use Reactions for this, of course, I'm saying that the handling is similar, including MAM

(again, for the simple case)

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xfpy5c3thQo this was an interesting talk about online voting btw

The solution to online voting is easy: Don't.

at LinuxConfAU this month ✏

Zash: I remember. I actually liked the idea

But not enough to accept it and have issues fixed as Experimental?

Zash: that's indeed the stance of a group of indivuals here, that are (translated) named "we don't trust voting-computers"

Zash: that the issues for computer-assisted voting of any kind right now, outweigh the supposed issues with paper ballots.

Zash: an answer to online voting is no proprietary crap, and make the process transparent

pep., it is not that simple, at all

I'm sure you can solve it with magic crypto dust. But please explain it to your mom or anyone not a cryptographer.

note that this applies to lots of things :)

pep., but having provable code is at least a beginning

voting/polls don't make any sense if you don't have persistent MAM forever.

ralphm: Yeah I don't see how you can really beat paper ballots for privacy and understandability.

Yes i just was up to simple polls like you have with other messengers

There's some things you can do with computers to help, like print new ballots when they run out instead of having centralized printing you pre-order from

I just signed up to Telegram (don't ask). Got two messages within 5 minutes: "Huh" and "What are you doing here, in this silo?" 😇

don't!

(some people love their silos)

Does it tell people you joined?

Guus, happens to me too (I frequently install/uninstall those for research purposes)

> Does it tell people you joined? Apparently

Zash: that's an obvious UX improvement! who cares about privacy :)

Even Signal does.

They weigh privacy vs marketing and marketing wins, our scale tends to tip the other way

And all the privacy concious people already use Signal

Like jwz.

I like his image for that. https://www.jwz.org/blog/2018/08/signal/

https://mensuel.framapad.org/p/9ev2-xsfboarddirectorsweeklymeeting-2020-02-06

hehehe

0. Welcome + Agenda

Welcome everyone! Who do we have?

!

Here

me to

o

Seve?

Hello!!

Yay!

1. Minute taker

/\ above /\

2. XMPP Summit / FOSDEM

I want to take this opportunity to again thank everyone that made this a success!

+1 :)

I think the Summit was full of good discussions and vibe.

While at the Summit we were a bit cramped, I've already talked to the FOSDEM crew about this, and there are some ideas for next year. I think we did have good discussions there, too, with our visitors.

That is how it feels! :)

Unfortunately I missed Sunday, including the devroom.

cramped?

I think he means we were cramped at FOSDEM, not Summit.

pep., I meant at FOSDEM

k

(I really want that edit-all-previous-messages-not-just-the-last feature)

Guus or I will send out a message to handle any financials.

3. Excuse Fabian Sauter from SCAM

COM8 has mentioned his intent to leave SCAM, so I move we hereby remove him from this team.

+1

+1 (do we actually need to vote?)

pep., yes, we do assignments of work teams

+1

+1

Motion carries. Thanks Fabian!

+1 - thanks Fabian!

(unsure if we can stop a resignment?)

Guus: yeah that was my point

4. Guus, probably not. But hey, now everyone is definitely on the same page.

anyways - case closed.

oops, that's not an agenda item

4. 2020 Sponsors

At the XSF Dinner I thanked our current sponsors, and think this is also the right time to give our Sponsorship program some attention.

Good. Thoughts on how?

In particular, I think we should write a message to these current sponsors to ask if they'd like to renew.

That's an obvious step that we seem to forget all the time 🙂

Hence me bringing it up.

👍

:)

In addition, it would be good to send a message out (using various channels) with similar thanks, and an invitation to join our Sponsorship program.

Possibly in collaboration with commteam.

sgtm

from the ground: may we also ask for sponsorship to any software company selling XMPP products and services? I mean not just renew the current and past sponsors

nyco-2 that was my intent, indeed

CommTeam hat on: not sure how we can, but listening

Sending a tweet/toot out with a link to our sponsorship page for starters maybe

nyco-2: I was thinking an e-mail to members, standards, jdev, a blog post, and links to that in our socials.

maybe also operators (e-mail)

should we start adding our sponsors to the newsletter?

we can contribute something like that, yes

Guus our sponsors page is enough? no need to repeat in each newsletter?

Guus: I'm sure the website is already enough exposure

We could add this for specific levels, like say Platinum

no biggy to me. Just a thought ✏

Good suggestion, thanks

I'm sure there are other things to do before we start thinking about this. like using the money.

this means we guarantee the newsletter will go out in a timely manner we can't as today we have a SPOF in me

pep., they aren't mutually-exclusive

before using the money, let's get it

MattJ: but may encourage sponsors

pep., sure, let's have that discussion too, but not in this agenda item

"hey do you want to give us money?" "what for?"

"Help! We're almost bankrupt!" next year :)

That

pep., shall I add a new agenda item for this?

(for next time)

ralphm: agenda item maybe not, I do have a few ideas to bounce off board/members though ✏

Although I'm not sure what to name it. "How to spend our money" is very broad. I'd like more concrete asks, really.

pep., ok, can you add an appropriate card yourself then?

maybe also have a pre-discussion on list, if appropriate?

Guus: what I'm saying

ralphm: no content for an item yet. that's list matter

In any case, I believe we are spending a bit more on coenferences and materials than previous years, so that's great and a good thing to mention to prospective sponsors

pep., ok

I'll work with Seve and nyco to come up with some prose.

(and I do encourage anybody to propose ways to spend the money in any case, it's not just me)

Alright

Yes, spending money is a hobby of mine.

5. AOB

I have a related ask, which can be taken to the list and/or next week if necessary

MattJ, ok!

6. Date of Next

+1W

+1 wfm

7. Close

wfm

Thanks all!

Thanks, Board

https://mensuel.framapad.org/p/9ev2-xsfboarddirectorsweeklymeeting-2020-02-06

Thanks!

please edit!

Thank you as always nyco-2

I won't send without your validations

At FOSDEM I was approached by someone who would potentially be able to provide funding for some modernxmpp.org activities

They asked if it would be possible to do that via the XSF (they are a non-profit)

nyco-2: lgtm

thanks

i.e. send money to the XSF ring-fenced for specific projects

modernxmpp as a WG?

maybe not wg no

why not

that's an independent project (wants to be, as I understand it)

no

it's an opinionated project, which goes against the neutrality

why create a new entity with all the needed effort and cost?

does not seem opiniated

It's not really a new entity, that's the point of the funding going via the XSF

MattJ: who should the XSF pay with that money?

suggestion: a few project leads that are not companies (yet?)

Guus, the project is yet to be scoped - but e.g. UX experts, technical writers, whatever the project that they want to fund entails

It's the XSFs mission to facilitate xmpp development, so I'm not immediately against helping out with financial arrangements. Things need to be very clear though.

I'm more testing the water to see if this is an acceptable thing in principle, because if it's not then other arrangements would need to be made

If it is, then at some point a concrete project proposal and statement of work would be provided down the road

Well, if there's an entity that wants to spend money on XMPP, we'd be fools to not try and make that work.

I agree :)

MattJ: there's also SPI otherwise than can do that. I do understand the will to go through the XSF though, if possible

We must think carefully about how things are arranged properly though. Things revolving around money often tend to get messy fast. I don't want discord amongst ourselves over this.

Agreed

However I'd like to see things like this become more normal for the XSF, personally :/

eg: would this benefit a certain project more than others? I'd not even be against that, but only if that's explicitly established before we accept the money.

That would be good. I do think we should carefully think about if the XSF should be in a position to decide who gets (and who does not get) the money.

I'd prefer if the donor makes that decision.

(haven given this all of 2 minutes of thoughts)

I've seen objections to related things in the past due to "unfairness" if the XSF provides money to open-source work but not commercial entities working on XMPP

I personally think that is absolute nonsense, but I don't think modernxmpp.org falls into that category

(also make sure we don't get in tax/money laundering trouble if it's really just forwarding money through a non-profit)

Since it provides open documentation for XMPP projects of all kinds

jonas’, are you aware of a specific problem with that?

(I'm sure organisations transfer money between each other all the time) ✏

MattJ: no, especially since the XSF is US based

If this money is used to create documentation only, things might already be a bit easier - but still, we're setting a bit of a precedent with this. Let's think it over carefully.

In any case, I would very much welcome the opportunity

but this sounds like the kind of stuff you want to double check

Regardless of this specific thing, I'd like to see a process for people to apply for, and the XSF to grant, funding for projects

Even if each has to be approved by $some_committee on a per-project basis

It should be a thing that we can do

I like that.

Guus: re neutrality, I don't think that's a problem. We can just say we'd funnel money for any xmpp-related project who asks ✏

maybe take this to the list - also, we should definitely involve the treasurer before moving much further forward.

I can write something up to throw at the list

Also note that I've yet to actually hear back from them in writing (but they were extremly keen at the weekend)

Everything needs to start somewhere. Let's hope we can make this happen.

https://mensuel.framapad.org/p/9ev2-xsfboarddirectorsweeklymeeting-2020-02-06 only one review?

I've seen the typo :)

LGTM (apart from the typos :) )

🙂

aaaand, sent thx all

Thank you nyco-2