governance-issues
Issue Summary 2007-02-28
Editor
Contributors
- Please add yourself
Preamble
Over the last year, several people have expressed concern/frustration/confusion about how the Microformats wiki, mailing list, and community are governed.This page is here to discuss ideas for documenting, formalizing, and/or improving our collective governance.
Abstract
Governance has [www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/vs-sb/voluntarysector/glossary.html been defined] as "the traditions, institutions and processes that determine how power is exercised, how citizens are given a voice, and how decisions are made on issues of public concern." In the context of Microformats, it covers:
- Rules (both written and unwritten) expected of community members
- Who the various Admins are
- What powers Admins have
- Rules for how/when Admins can/should use those powers
- How to questioning/appealing a decision by an Admin
- How to become an Admin
- How to question/change any of these
While not all of these need to be explicitly spelled out, a healthy community our size requires a broad shared understanding of these facts -- as well as acceptance of them as "legitimate."
Examples
Note: This is not to take a position on whether or not any of these decisions were appropriate or inappropriate. Rather, the existence of these events demonstrates the need to document why and how such decisions were -- or should be -- made and/or appealed.
- Labelling microformats schema discussions as off-topic
- Mailing list user's censure
- Issue rejection governance
- Negative, PoV and derogatory edit summary content such as "smelled of excessive political correctness worrying" and "removed non-productive comment".
- listing of items as "rejected" when requests for evidence of said rejection reveal none.
Proposal
- Create a microformats-admin mailing list, for easily contacting all admins
- Create a microformats-meta mailing list, moderated by a non-Admin, to capture discussions that do not fit into current lists, plus act as a "court of appeals" for Admin decisions.
- Create and maintain a governance page that captures and describes
- the identity of current Admins
- how to contact them
- the kinds of behavior warranting Admin intervention
- how to appeal an Admin decision/action