TB election in progress

[Mark Shuttleworth]

On 15/04/16 17:08, Adam Conrad wrote:
> In a TB meeting earlier this year[1], the current TB voted to reduce
> the number of non-sabdfl seats from 6 to 5. The rationale for this is
> to avoid deadlocked votes. One could argue that Mark exists as a
> permanent TB member to break deadlocks, but given that our governance
> structure is set up in a way that Mark has absolute veto (even if the
> TB were to vote N-0 against him), it seems more useful to have the TB
> functional and deadlock-free in Mark's absence, allowing him to veto
> as he sees necessary, but not have to be in the position of breaking
> tied votes.

I've never considered my vote as an override, rather a casting vote (an
extra vote to break deadlocks). Of course, I suppose I could withdraw
support for the entire TB, but that seems like a poor option no matter
how significant our disagreements. I could just wait out their term. The
only scenario I think that sort of nuclear option makes sense is if the
TB is making decisions about something that isn't a technical matter,
which I suppose is not implausible given the intertwined social /
technical nature of free software, but unlikely given that we tend to
filter out unreasonable fundamentalists along the way to these boards
and that it would imply the CC was in agreement about the matter anyway.
If I'm busy overriding both CC and TB then I think we have bigger
problems :)

> This decision would, I assume, have to be ratified by Mark and/or the
> CC, hence the recipients of this email. I propose that if this is
> acceptable to all involved, the current election continue as planned,
> but we just take the top 5 winners, not the top 6. ... Adam [1]
> http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2016/01/19/%23ubuntu-meeting-2.html#t17:16 

I'm OK with a TB of whatever size you prefer. I don't think that's about
deadlocks so much as about practicalities like quorum.

Mark