Re: Charter: Participating Member conditions

["Daniel Koger" <dkoger@speakeasy.org>]

Speaking as an ICE-Authoring Group member (We work under an almost identical
charter - it is a little more restrictive than this one) I am a
participating member of the ICE-AG and joined more than a year after the
founders were set.  I am treated no differently than the founders.  The only
difference was that I had to attend two face to face meetings in a row
before I could vote.  This did not prevent me from either being involved, or
making changes to the specification.

No one questions the contributions that STEP has made.  Personally I think
we would be remiss in not accepting member companies as individual sponsors
under the charter.  However, I think we are making this a much bigger issue
than it need to be.  The comment was made that there were not two
consecutive F2F meetings in Europe to allow European companies the chance to
become founding companies.  Well there can be.  The next two F2F meetings
could be held in Europe, and under the auspices of the un-ratified charter,
a vote can be taken to add the attending companies.  At this point there is
no difference between the companies added in Europe and those originally
attending in America.

The ICE-AG has never differentiated founding vs. non-founding.  XTM need be
no different.

There is however an obvious problem with the rules of continued
participation.  Under the un-ratified charter if a participating member
misses two face to face sessions in a row, they are out of the XTM as a
participating member.  Due to the global nature of this group I think we
should relax that guideline slightly.

I propose that teleconferencing in be acceptable attendance.  I also propose
that we move the number of missed sessions to three potentially with no more
than two on a given continent.

Daniel


----- Original Message -----
From: Hans Holger Rath <hhr@step.de>
To: <xtm-wg@egroups.com>
Cc: <topicmapmail@infoloom.com>
Sent: Friday, March 10, 2000 4:26 AM
Subject: Re: Charter: Participating Member conditions


> Hi Steve,
>
> You wrote:
> > TopicMaps.Org would really have to be crazy to exclude STEP
> > deliberately, either by action or inaction.  STEP's contributions to
> > the field of Topic Maps are a matter of record.
>
> Thanks!
>
> > > I refer to section "3.5.2. Adding Participating Members and
> > > Assigning Classifications":
> > >
> > > -     "No more than one official Participating Member is allowed
> > >       per organization."
> > >
> > >       STEP is a group of companies in Germany, Hungary, Poland,
> > >       and UK all belonging to a large holding: Bertelsmann.
> > >
> > >       Does this count as "one organization"?
> >
> > I'm afraid so, since they all represent a single economic interest.
> > We're trying to develop industry-wide consensus, and that naturally
> > translates to a "one economic interest, one vote" policy.  The voting
> > rules are not designed to help Bertelsmann achieve internal consensus.
>
> Ooops. What about Lycos, Barnes and Noble, Random House, BMG,
> BOL, (scientific) Springer, Gruner & Jahr, Bertelsmann Lexikon Verlag,
> etc. etc.
>
> They all belong to Bertelsmann (Bertelsmann is the third or fourth
> largest media company in the world right after AOL-Times Warner
> and Disney) and STEP will definitely not represent their interest.
>
> I think that in the time of global concentration of companies
> to global players the term "organization" has to be defined
> more precisely and it should tend to be open and not restrictive
> -- why? because we want to promote TMs and not prevent people
> from participation. Think about it.
>
> BTW: STEP Infotek does not longer belong to the STEP Group.
> They are owned 100% by Infostream, they just kept the name
> and the logo.
>
> So it's just Graham and myself we are talking about. What I wanted
> to achieve was an easy way that Graham and I can participate the
> meetings. Graham is the tekkie, he will develop TM software. I am
> the consultant bringing the content-oriented issues/requirements
> as input.
>
> > > -     "To be considered for Participating Membership, a person
> > >       must have actively participated in the two preceding
> > >       face-to-face TopicMaps.Org AG meetings in their entirety, ..."
> >
> > >       Do we have to attend the next two meetings to be considered
> > >       for Participating Membership or could we ask for Participating
> > >       Membership immediately?
> >
> > Let me understand what you're asking here.  Please choose one:
>
> I just asked (and not proposed) what the formal way would be to
> be considered (for voting) as a Participating Member? That's it.
>
> > (1) Are you proposing an alteration to the draft charter that would
> >     permit STEP to be regarded as a founding Participating Member?  If
> >     so, what is your proposal, specifically?
>
> I think you answered to this option in one of your other replies
> proposing a change in the charter regarding the question of
> "Who is a founding Participating Member". Of course, I like it
> and would be happy if the change will be approved!
>
> > >       I do not know the current ratio between content-oriented
> > >       and technology-oriented members. But if the tekkies are
> > >       already in the majority and no more technology-oriented
> > >       members will be considered before the ratio is fine, then
> > >       this is quite unfair to companies -- like STEP -- which
> > >       were involved in many TM discussions before but did
> > >       not know that participation in Washington and San Jose are
> > >       preconditions becoming a Participating Member (I just assume
> > >       that all Wash./S.Jose participants could become a Participant
> > >       Member without applying these rules. Am I right or wrong?).
> >
> > You are correct about the fact that the founders automatically become
> > Participating Members.  However, and speaking only for myself, I
> > reject the idea that "this is quite unfair to companies -- like STEP
> > -- which were involved in many TM discussions before but did not know
> > that participation in Washington and San Jose are preconditions
> > becoming a Participating Member."  On what other basis did STEP think
> > that the formation of a consensus-seeking group and the adoption of
> > its charter could be legitimized?
>
> Sam and Didier replied already that nobody knew before the charter
> was out how to get a Participating Member and the status/power
> of such a membership. And that was what I wanted to express.
>
> > > I would appreciate it very much, if someone would answer my question
> > > in a way that I do not have to worry about STEP's Participating
> > > Membership any longer.
> >
> > I don't think you need to worry about it at all.  The way for STEP to
> > become a Participating Member is already clear.
>
> I was not clear for me and that was the reason for my email.
> I just read the charter and took it *very* seriously (because
> I am paranoid :-).
>
> > I must tell you that, in my own personal view, it is unbecoming for
> > STEP to take the position that it should be exempted from
> > responsibility to participate in meetings, just as the founders
> > already have, before becoming a Participating Member.  That would not
> > be fair, and the position you're expressing is corrosive of the kind
> > of atmosphere that we need in order to make progress toward consensus.
> > Consensus is impossible without mutual respect.  Consensus never comes
> > from pushing for a position which has not been earned in the same way
> > that everyone else's position was earned.  Consensus is achieved
> > because everyone wants a standard -- the achievement of a public
> > agenda -- *more* than they want to achieve their own private agenda.
> > The creation of a standard involves much more giving than controlling.
> > Your note makes STEP sound like it's totally focused on controlling.
>
> It might be a language problem (you know that I am not a native English
> speaker/writer) which gave you this kind of impression. We do not want
> to control, we want to participate and bring our input into the
> further development.
>
> > As far as I can see, STEP's behavior so far has not demonstrated
> > STEP's willingness to contribute to the achievement of consensus.
>
> Please, remember our SC34 meeting in Granada and the template
> discussion. You convinced us (Norway) not to come up with
> further concerns about ISO/IEC 13250 at that point in time.
> We agreed to find another way to introduce our ideas (which
> are on the agenda for TopicMaps.Org right now).
>
> STEP is willing to achieve a consensus -- it will not work
> without a consensus because that's standards business and we
> know that!
>
> > It's not a good sign, and, quite frankly, it worries me.  But please
> > stick around; I think we'll all get there, and we'll all make some
> > interesting discoveries together.
>
> You do not have to worry! We want to have a stable XML TMs definition
> with some semantics around which allow us to implement and sell
> a great piece of software -- a solution for everybody who needs
> large scale TMs. That's it.
>
> > > Have you fixed the days for Paris already
> > > (we are booking hotels and flights at the moment) and made a decision
> > > about a meeting in Sweden (pro or cons)?
>
> So nothing decided for Paris so far. I just want to remind that some
> of us will -- still -- participate in the SC34 meeting on Sunday,
> 2000/06/11. I would be happy to meet Friday 2000/06/16 afternoon
> and evening, right after the closing session ... ooops I am again
> acting like I am already a member of this group; sorry for that.
>
> Regards and have a nice weekend,
> --Holger
>
> --
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