Notes from the April 2025 Governing Board meeting

The first Governing Board (GB) call happened Wednesday, April 16, from 7:30 PM to 9 PM. All of the members of the GB were on the call - Bodhish Thomas, Bowrna Prabhakaran, Nemo, Swastik Banarwal, and Shree Kumar - joined by Poruri Sai Rahul and Vishal Arya. The key points of discussion in the call were:

(This summary is authored by Poruri Sai Rahul, the first person references , “I” hereby refer to Rahul) 

The election process

A forum thread was started after the elections to solicit feedback regarding the election process, and the GB members shared additional comments. All of the members shared numerous technical issues with the Ballot platform, issues ranging from submitting a nomination to casting a vote, issues with mobile usage, and more. Shree Kumar raised the important question of “build vs buy” when it comes to the tech platform where elections are conducted. For example, OpaVote is a popular platform for online voting and elections, used by the Python Software Foundation among others.

Bodhish Thomas mentioned that the Community wasn’t informed about the total number of voters ahead of the elections. On the same topic, Nemo mentioned that 400+ voters, while a good start, needs to be increased significantly in the coming elections. Vishal Arya and I highlighted that significant improvements could be made regarding the communication shared with the Community, e.g., the modes of communication, i.e,. emails, social media posts, physical meetups, and also regarding the content of the communication, e.g., better information about the candidates, clarification regarding STV, and the election process. Bowrna highlighted the fact that the election process itself is new to much of the Community and a significant amount of communication is necessary to help the Community prepare for the next election, e.g., people might have missed the fact that the order of votes is important in the ballot.

Nemo mentioned the need for clarity on canvassing, e.g,. a forum thread or space at a meetup (physical or virtual) to communicate with the voters to help them make informed decisions. We, at the foundation, heard similar concerns from the Community during the elections - that they weren’t familiar with many (or in a few cases any) of the candidates. Swastik mentioned that one week was too short to canvass and one week was too short to vote. I agree, and we should likely move to a two-week voting period and at least a two-week canvassing period. Bowrna mentioned that she wasn’t even familiar with the endorsement feature (comments on nomination forms) until someone reached out to her, mentioning that they had endorsed her.

If you have any additional comments or questions regarding the election process, please add them to the Feedback on the election process forum thread.

The Governing Board charter

Ram Iyengar and I worked on an early draft of the Governing Board Charter, and the Board discussed how we could complete it over the coming months. Nemo mentioned that the GB should be able to get to a non-empty document by the next GB meeting (1 month away), and Shree mentioned that the GB should be able to reach a “complete”/MVP document within 2 months. The members of the GB will pick up different sections of the document and start filling them in asynchronously. I will work on cross-referencing external references that influenced the early draft of the document. As much as possible, the GB discussed that we will cross-reference prior art, where available, e.g., the election process, the duration of elections, voting criteria, etc.

A few members of the Community confused the elected GB with the Board of Directors. Shree mentioned that early on, he wondered if the members of the GB were fiscally responsible or legally liable. The GB discussed the possibility of picking a different name for this group of elected representatives, one that doesn’t include the word “Board”, but in the end it was decided to stick with “Governing Board”. And it will be clarified in the Charter that the GB is different from the Board of Directors and that they are not financially or legally responsible for the FOSS United Foundation, unlike the PSF Board.

Shree asked me a personal question - how happy was I with the diversity of the GB. I responded that I’m pretty happy, although the gender diversity could improve. I highlighted that in the coming years, I would like to see members from the broader Indian FOSS ecosystem run for and get elected to the FOSS United Governing Board, e.g., folks from the Debian community, the OSM India community, Wikimedia community, etc.

Nemo mentioned that the expectations and responsibilities of the GB aren’t clear and explicit in the Charter at the moment, and that he wants to ensure that a majority (70-80%) of the work expected from the GB is codified by the end of the year. I highlighted that I would like to define expectations of the GB using both inclusions and exclusions/boundaries. For example, the GB is responsible for setting Community guidelines, and the GB is not responsible for personnel decisions at the Foundation.

Bodhish highlighted that it’ll be good to communicate the long-term and short-term vision of the Foundation, and I pointed out the 2025 draft strategy forum thread. There is a need for better communication of this information.

Nemo brought up the need to codify the responsibility of the GB in setting up Working Groups (WGs) and appointing Chairs for the WGs. What is the process for creating a WG, who can the GB appoint as Chairs of the WGs, etc. I responded that, like a Python Enhancement Proposal (or an equivalent in other programming languages), a member of the Community (including members of the GB) can create a charter for a Working Group. See, for instance, the draft Tech Policy Charter. A member of the GB is then expected to work with the proposer to edit and update it if necessary, create a Request for Comments from the broader Community, and eventually share it with the rest of the GB for a vote. All of this needs to be codified in the Governing Board Charter, and the GB can use proposals for Working Groups to codify this process.

Bowrna highlighted that as the first board, we need to ensure that the Governing Board charter continues to be a living document and we discussed how the GB can arrive at an MVP Charter within a few (3) months and how we can codify an amendment process to ensure that the charter can continue to be a living document. I mentioned that the GB could have a periodic review of the Charter, e.g., 3 months after an election and 3 months before an election. This way, the GB can ensure that newly elected members have time to acclimatize before providing feedback on the charter and lessons learnt during their tenure can be codified before an upcoming election.

Monies, memberships, and March-end. 

Swastik asked if the Foundation plans to have membership tiers at the FOSS United Foundation, similar to the Linux Foundation or the Open Source Institute, but Nemo highlighted that membership is commonly linked with voting rights, which isn’t the model that the Foundation is following. Shree raised the need to seek donations from individuals which isn’t directly linked to memberships. In a previous personal conversation, I highlighted the once-a-year individual donation drive that the Numfocus Foundation runs, and how that could be a model that the Foundation follows. Personally, I would like to directly associate a donation from an individual with a grant, but that shouldn’t stop us from seeking individual donations.

Bodhish asked about the budget of the FOSS United Foundation and whether it will be published publicly. I responded that the Foundation has fallen behind on sharing this info publicly and that the Foundation intends to do so by the end of the month. Vishal mentioned that the estimate for the current Financial Year (Apr 2025-Mar 2026) is 2.15 Crore Rupees. Bodhish shared his experience raising CSR funds from large Indian corporations for the Open Healthcare Network and alternative models to raise funds for the Foundation.

Nemo had added FOSS United Grants and transparency around the grant approvals process to the agenda, seconded by Shree, but the GB wasn’t able to address it during the call. Nemo pledged to follow up via email. We decided to call it a day at 9:15 PM, with take-home assignments that will be worked asynchronously.

If you have any questions or comments for the Governing Board, please send an email to governing-board@fossunited.org