Loco Council, or an alternative idea of what it could be :)

[Yann]

Good morning list, I will try to answer a couple of questions that have been
raised yesterday. I'll first answer to yann, and then to matthew.

Jan,

>
> A) some new ubuntu non for profit,
>
> I can say that this is clearly a bad idea for couple of reasons, first
> the guys in canonical are paid to do the job, since most of the people
> are satisfied with it, I see no reason why to found a new thing.
>
> Which job are you speaking of? If you speak for the cd/flyers/etc, I hope
you can understand that even if they are very good for every
english-speaking loco, english material is not widely usable in all the
others... If you speak of the hosting, well, locoteams have very different
needs regarding this :)


 Second,
>   yo won't get recognition, since you will be something second in line
> and most of the supporters if any will go to the bigger "proper"
> community.
>
> I am not sure we need or want recognition.. Basically, ubuntufr and
ubuntude have been working together for a long time, and some other locos
are and may want to join us. We want a more formal way to make our
collaboration work, so that it also enables people to step in. Locos who
think the project is not good, well, can still rely on canonical, nothing
should change for them... it's just about making collaboration possible for
the locos who actually feel it is needed.



>  Third, creating a lot of NGO and legal bodies about all of
> the projects won't help, I explain this later on
>
>
You get the point: creating a central legal body is partly to prevent most
of the locos of creating their own, by helping them to get what they need
and what canonical does not provide.


B) Materials, CDs etc,
>
> Yes it's true that in some cases (maybe in a lot more than I know of)
> you have problems with the materials, which you think you should produce
>   yourself and then complaing about the financial issues.
>
> Sorry, I am not sure I ever complained about the financial issues :/ I
have (personnally) taken  financial risks in the past, now this time is over
and we have enough money not to take these risks anymore. I think we could
also help other locos so that they don't have to take the same kind of risk.


It is still
> possible to these, by national support for example my NGO made a good
> deal with local corporation office (like Sun and Ibm) and from this
> support we also promote Ubuntu (which Sun and Ibm won't do on the
> corporate level), since they are satisfied with our other works they
> don't care if we promote some other FLOSS related project.
>
>
We do have deals with local corporations; hosting providers, book stores,
hardware vendors, merchandising manufacturer, who provide us either with
free stuff or very good deals. But that doesn't cover everything...


C) NGO about floss
>
> If you are truly ready to form and lead and NGO, then you should do it
> in couple of steps
>
> [SNIP]
>
>
We already have one for our loco, it has been active for more than one year
:)


  2. Be part of the wider international community, and as well you can
> get a lot of support both in people and finances. As stated before I
> work in this sector for 3+ years and with the international effort there
> are projects who invites us into financial cooperation since they care
> what we are doing and what is happening here.
>
> I am responsible for my community for 3 years by now, and I think I am
part of the wider international community, at least I hope so :P Just check
who registered #ubuntu-locoteams ;)


Matthew,


> Hi Yann,
>
> On 01/10/2007, Yann <yann.hamon at gmail.com <https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/loco-contacts>> wrote:
> >* > To bluntly summarise your suggestion, you are proposing to set up a
> *>* > rival to the Ubuntu Foundation.
> *>* >
> *>* Yes.
> *
> Thanks for being so forthright about that - I'm sure you'll understand
> that as a result the proposal affects the whole Ubuntu project and
> merits substantial discussion and consideration.
>
> What so upset me about reading your original email was the way in
> which it basically says "we're going to do this, our way, like it or
> not". I'm convinced that the best way for you to express your concerns
> about the current situation of Ubuntu fundraising is to do so in a
> different way. Which brings me to:
>
> I tried to raise my concerns on a lot of different ways. If you are
telling me I missed the right one, then sorry for this :) Anyway, until now,
my concerns are still here, and as I haven't been successful in having them
heard for a long time, I thought it may be time to try to solve them myself
(with some other people, like juliux).



>* I mailed canonical several times, spoke to jono
> *>* several times too, I was even the guy who asked about the Foundation
> *>* directly to mark at the LinuxTag. Every time I did so, I was answered that I
> *>* misunderstood what the Ubuntu Foundation was, and that it wasn't supposed to
> *>* be active (sigh). This has been ongoing for more than one year.
> *
> {snip}
>
> >* > and participate in a
> *>* > discussion which can identify and analyse the relevant issues. I
> *>* > invite you to do so now.
> *>* >
> *>* This post was first intended to do so :)
> *
> Clearly you are frustrated with the way that your attempts to raise
> this issue have been received, and I would like to at least enable it
> to be properly discussed. I do think that there are better ways of
> doing it.
>
> Your post started from the perspective that you would be imposing a
> solution to the problem which you see in the Ubuntu project, rather
> than discussing the problems with the project as a whole and thinking
> about solutions together. If you are hoping to participate in a
> discussion about the relevant issues, then I think that will be much
> more helpful.
>
>
Longer explanation about this at the end of the post.


Looking at the mailing list archive, I don't think you have raised
> this discussion yet with the Community Council. It hasn't been raised
> at any CC or loco meetings that I'm aware of. I see a public and
> comprehensive discussion of the issues as very important because it is
> the only way in which you, along with the participants and drivers of
> the Ubuntu project (including Canonical), can properly address your
> concerns.
>
> I think a good way to proceed would be for you to outline the
> different concerns which you have about the current Ubuntu fundraising
> setup (please try to do so as fairly as possible) and the different
> possible solutions. By solutions, I mean how you'd like to see the
> Ubuntu Foundation or Ubuntu funding in general changing (if you think
> it can), and what the role of local teams would be in the setup. You
> might also want to look at how other projects manage similar issues.
> In that way, the interested parties can discuss what the issues are,
> whether they are valid, whether it's possible to address them, and
> how. It's worth trying to develop all these questions before embarking
> on a private initiative.
>
> Alright, here we go, a small text I wrote yesterday.

What is Canonical?
Canonical is a company whose aim is to develop and promote Ubuntu. Canonical
proposes support and certifications programs.

What is the Ubuntu Foundation?
The Ubuntu Foundation is a not-for-profit set up by Canonical 2 years ago,
with an initial funding of 3M$. This foundation is supposed to take over the
project in case Canonical can not or doesn't want to continue funding it -
it is only a security measure, and is not active.

What is a Locoteam?
A locoteam, or Local Community team, is a group of people whose aim is to
promote Ubuntu in a specific area: group of countries, country,
state/region, city, part of a city, by all available ways: information in
medias, organisation of events, localised documentation and support forums,
...

How does Canonical help Locos to promote Ubuntu?
Canonical proposes a limited amount of Cds in english, good hosting in their
datacenter for a limited number of applications, root access on small
servers, sometimes some merchandising (stickers, flyers) in english, and a
wiki to gather information about how to setup a loco.

Do Locoteams need things that are not provided by Canonical?
People at boothes have been asking for localised information flyers and Cds.
Locoteams may need money to rent a room or a booth to organise an event.
Locoteams may need different types of insurances. Some locos need a more
powerful and reliable hosting (raid, backup policy, powerful cpu, fast
disks). Some people have been asking for additional merchandising: mostly
tshirts from the loco and metal stickers. CDs sent by canonical may not be
enough, may arrive too late, and are not localised. Locos may need things to
make their booth look good, like banners, posters, ... Locos may need to
advertise for events with leaflets. In some cases locos may want to pay for
travel expenses (when inviting famous people to give a speech, for example).

How has it been working until now?
In most of the cases, the people organising the events have paid with their
own money, as they can not accept donations from the public or from
companies. Others have been successful in having their needs sponsored by
companies, so that these companies don't have to give money. Some others
rely on advertising on their website. Ubuntu-fr and Ubuntu-de have been
relying on donations from people and companies, as they are not-for-profits.
This enabled them to make different projects (ubuntude made 2000 localised
DVDs for feisty release, ubuntufr is selling over 1000 tee shirts, ...), but
most of the efforts are duplicated. A part of the money of both locos is
being shared, and used for hardware expenses; the servers (also hosting a
couple of other locos) are run by a french-german team, and are working ok.
People have been doing individual actions, like ordering posters in a huge
number and sending them to locos for a small fee.
Locos without money have poorly decorated boothes, to a point that in some
cases people have made fun of them.

What could be improved?
The money shared by Ubuntude and Ubuntufr relies on 2 separate bank
accounts, given that every user gives money to its respective locoteam. Time
has proven this is not particularly nice. Merchandising, clothes, printing
costs could be cut down if locoteams would group their orders instead of all
ordering separately small quantities to different manufacturers. Having one
person ordering for a large number of locos would also spare the loco the
time to look for a manufacturer, the time to learn technical details about
the merchandise (I think I must know all the different brands of tee shirts
and printing methods by now...), ... Having a reserve of money would also
prevent people from taking huge financial risks if the merchandise doesn't
sell as fast as planned.
Some companies also want to give money, but can't, if the locoteam hasn't
any official existence. Most of them don't want to give money to a company.
Having a central point of storage for all the material would make it easier
for locos to know where to get it, as right now they need to ask one person
for stickers, one other for posters, a third one for cds, ...

How could this issues be solved?
A not-for-profit, or foundation, run by a council, could solve some of the
problems. People and companies could give money to that foundation. Locos
could give money to the foundation for specific projects (as part of a
larger order for example), or as a global donation. The council would then
decide what to do with the money. Donations made directly to locos would
preferably be made in the form of goods or services instead of money, when
possible.
Having a foundation like this would allow locos who are not set as not for
profit, to help fill the gap between what Canonical provides, and what they
need to be successful. This would also solve the complications involved by
having several different accounts, and solve the problem of people/companies
wanting to help locoteams but who don't know to whom donate.
There may be other solutions, and I would be happy to hear them :)

Who could run this structure?
Canonical coud run this foundation, even if I would be more comfortable with
having it run by people from the Community Council, or the Locoteam Council,
or by a group of locoteam contacts.



So, sorry for the (very long) post and thanks for reading. I would really
appreciate the issues defined above to be solved, in one way or in another.
Until now they have been ignored "locos don't need money", etc, which I
believe is not true, and raised some kind of frustration you have felt in my
first mail.


Yann
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