[OpenID board] Revised local chapters policy

Thu May 8 06:14:41 UTC 2008

Hi Dick,

In this respect, it comes down to the National Chapter governance 
structure, just same as for OIDF itself.
If the governance of the National Chapter is done democratically and 
openly, then those that are not happy with then current administration 
should be able to pursuade other members and correct the situation.

At the same time, the organization must have the administrative 
capability, since otherwise, even if the decision made by the 
organization is sound, it cannot be executed.

So, in essence, we should
1) just define what is an appropreate governance structure for this 
purpose,
2) define what is an appropreate admnistrative capability
and use these as the certification criteria.

Actually, the same applies to OIDF itself.

The content of 1) and 2) above needs more discussion, I think, in the WG 
level just like Mike indicated. I do not think Local Chapters policy 
needs to wait for the completion of  such.

Nat

Dick Hardt wrote:
> Hi Nat
>
> Not sure the issue I raised is addressed below. Clearly there are a 
> number of tasks to be taken care of at the national level. My question 
> is how does the OIDF decide who which chapter will be the national 
> chapter if more then one group wants to be the national chapter? First 
> come first served? What if others in that nation are not happy with 
> what the OIDF anointed national chapter is doing? 
>
> A key tenant of open source communities is the ability to fork. Not 
> that anyone wants a fork, but the right to fork means that a community 
> can split up and go its separate ways. The rest of the local chapter 
> model let's a chapter fork if people want to accomplish different goals.
>
> Suggestions on how to deal with those issues?
>
> -- Dick
>
> On 8-May-08, at 7:14 AM, Nat Sakimura wrote:
>
>> Hi Mike, 
>>
>> Below is from my original Chapter Policy Manuscript, which seems to 
>> be much too robust for acceptance. 
>> However, it does contain such criterias: Specifically, National 
>> Chapters must fulfil III-2, III-3: 
>>
>> *       III-2.       **Intellectual Property*
>>
>> **
>>
>> *                *The National Chapters are required to secure the 
>> fair use of trademarks and other intellectual property 
>>                  in the jurisdiction for the OpenID Community with a 
>> commercially reasonable effort. **
>>
>> *III-3.       **Translation*
>>                         i.       The National Chapters are required 
>> to provide the translation of then current OpenID Specifications and 
>> the IPR documents in the local language.
>>                       ii.       The National Chapters are required to 
>> assist the communication of the Local Chapter Members with the 
>> Working Groups by setting up a local language mailing list parallel 
>> to the OIDF Working Group mailing lists.
>>
>> III-2 especially, requires a single entity to be doing this, since 
>> otherwise, it will result in a chaos. This probalby is the most 
>> important reason for having a single National Chapter. 
>>
>> Also, IMHO, a National chapter should conduct a preliminary survay of 
>> local patents for the possible infringement of those by OpenID 
>> specificatioin. This is a rather costly operation and best dealt at 
>> one entity for the economic reason. Probably, this should be added to 
>> III-2 as well. 
>>
>> Nat
>>
>>
>> Original text are as below:---
>>
>> *II.               **Duties of a Local Chapter*
>> 1.        *Intellectual Property*
>> The chapters must agree that their activities will be for the purpose 
>> of supporting the adoptions and the usage of OpenID. They must agree 
>> that any intellectual property or trademarks developed or held by the 
>> local chapter must be available freely for the OpenID Community for 
>> the fair use.
>> 2.        *Activities*
>> Each Local Chapter must engage in the following activities:
>>                         i.       Annual General Meeting
>>                       ii.       Annual Report Publishing
>>                     iii.       Web site which is enabled with OpenID 
>> Authentication.
>> *3.       **Autonomous Financing
>> *The chapters must operate autonomously without any financial support 
>> from OIDF.**
>> *4.       **Membership Management
>> *Local Chapters must maintain the list of the Local Chapter Members.**
>>  
>> *III.           **Obligations of a National Chapter*
>> In addition to the above Local Chapters duties, National Chapters are 
>> required to fulfill the following obligations.
>> *1.       **Form
>> *Although it is not required to be registered as a non-profit 
>> organization, a National Chapter must be a non-profit for its purpose.**
>> *2.       **Intellectual Property
>> *The National Chapters are required to secure the fair use of 
>> trademarks and other intellectual property in the jurisdiction for 
>> the OpenID Community with a commercially reasonable effort. **
>> *3.       **Translation*
>>                         i.       The National Chapters are required 
>> to provide the translation of then current OpenID Specifications and 
>> the IPR documents in the local language.
>>                       ii.       The National Chapters are required to 
>> assist the communication of the Local Chapter Members with the 
>> Working Groups by setting up a local language mailing list parallel 
>> to the OIDF Working Group mailing lists.
>>
>>
>> Mike Jones wrote:
>>> Nat and Snorri, since you're the ones advocating OIDF having the 
>>> concept of designated national chapters, I'm going to first ask you 
>>> to take a stab at answering Dick's question.  I agree with him that 
>>> having a designation but no criteria for the board to make that 
>>> designation nor any definition of how the OIDF should treat a 
>>> designated national chapter any differently than any other local 
>>> chapter is a recipe for future problems.
>>>  
>>> Summarizing, I think the questions are:
>>>   - What criteria will be used to decide which application is 
>>> granted the national chapter if there is more then one applicant?
>>>   - Does the OIDF treat designated national chapters any differently 
>>> than other chapters, and if so, how?
>>>  
>>>                                                 Thanks,
>>>                                                 -- Mike
>>>  
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> *From:* board-bounces at openid.net [mailto:board-bounces at openid.net] *On 
>>> Behalf Of *Dick Hardt
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, May 07, 2008 9:28 PM
>>> *To:* board at openid.net
>>> *Subject:* Re: [OpenID board] Revised local chapters policy
>>>  
>>>
>>>     *_12 - Territories_*
>>>     *OIDF will recognize any proposed eligible Local Chapters,
>>>     regardless of the geographic scope of the chapter, including
>>>     chapters with overlapping territories and missions.  Chapters
>>>     organized at the nation state level may apply to the OIDF to be
>>>     recognized as the OIDF-designated national chapter.  OIDF will
>>>     recognize at most one chapter as the designated national chapter
>>>     in a nation-state at any time.*
>>>     * *
>>>
>>>  
>>> What criteria will be used to decide which application is granted 
>>> the national chapter if there is more then one applicant?
>>>  
>>> If the national chapter leadership is lacking and another group 
>>> wants to take over, how is that done?
>>>  
>>> These are very subjective / political criteria that I think would be 
>>> best for the OIDF to stay out of if possible.
>>>  
>>> -- Dick
>>>  
>>>  
>>
>> -- 
>> Nat Sakimura (=nat)
>> Nomura Research Institute, Ltd. 
>> XDI.ORG Vice Chair
>>     
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>

-- 
Nat Sakimura (=nat)
Nomura Research Institute, Ltd. 
XDI.ORG Vice Chair