Revision as of 13:18, 23 May 2012

The nomination period is CLOSED. The nomination period ended at 23:59:59 UTC on May 15, 2012.

FAmSCo 2012 F18 elections

This is a special transitional election for FAmSCo. All seven seats are open for election. The four candidates receiving the most votes will be seated for two release cycles and the three candidates receiving the fewest votes will be seated for one release cycle. As those terms expire in the future elections will be held each release to fill the open seats.

Candidates must be a member of the Ambassadors group in the Fedora Accounts System. This helps ensure that FAmSCo members have some experience with the processes of Fedora Ambassadors, but still allows relatively new contributors to sit on FAmSCo and bring fresh ideas to the table.

Ambassadors will be following the Fedora election timeline.

You may self-nominate. If you wish to nominate someone else, please consult with that person ahead of time.

Questionnaire

The community has submitted the questions that it wants you to answer. The list of questions is here: F18_elections_questionnaire#Fedora_Ambassador_Steering_Committee_.28FAmSCo.29

Please do not answer them on the wiki. Please email your answers to Ankur Sinha "FranciscoD" at ankursinha AT fedoraproject.org by May 22 2012. All the candidates' answers will be collected and put up together before the town halls.

Name (IRC nickname)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?
What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?
What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?
What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?

Jiri Eischmann (sesivany)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- Although my history with Fedora started just at the beginning of 2011 I've been involved in Linux communities much longer (since ~2004). Because I work as a community manager for Red Hat Czech I spend on Fedora-related stuff most of my time.
- I'm an ambassador for the Czech Republic, and also in the marketing and the Czech L10n team (haven't been very active in this team though).
- I produce Fedora media for EMEA.

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?: I want to influence how Fedora is promoted and I think what FAmSCo needs the most now are active members and I hope I will be able to provide that level of activity.

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?: As the name says it's a steering committee, so I think FAmSCo should steer the whole project, make the global decisions. It should also enable cooperation between the regional ambassadors teams and between ambassadors and other groups in Fedora.

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?:
- Improving communication between ambassadors and other groups so that ambassadors can know what activities are important for the Project and should be promoted in the community because it's ambassadors who should deliver this message. For example Test Days are a unique and great way for the community to easily contribute to Fedora. However, they are still not very well attended, and I think the awareness and promotion in the community is not very good.
- Improving swag production and distribution. We've done some improvement in the EMEA region and I think we can improve it even more, perhaps on the global level.
- Working as a middleman between Red Hat and Fedora. Because I both work for Red Hat and am involved in promoting Fedora (ambassadors, marketing) I'd like to help coordinate efforts between Red Hat and the community.

What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?:I'd focus on ambassadors' activity. There are hundreds of ambassadors, but I meet just a little subset of them at regional meetings (talking about EMEA). Maybe we should start a discussion what steps to take to keep ambassadors active.

What will you be able to accomplish if elected, that you couldn't as an unelected coontributor? Why this post?: I think most of my goals can be achieved even without being a FAmSCo member. The Fedora community is very open at this. On the other hand, being a FAmSCo member can help me spread and execute my ideas.

Do you have any notes on how best the FAmSCo can help support The Fedora Project in regions where there aren't enough Ambassadors?: Well, we should first figure out which regions are covered and which are not. We have ambassadors in many countries, but many of them are inactive which means Fedora is also inactive and invisible there. After we find out what countries are not covered we may take some steps. I think the best way is to look for new ambassadors who will be active and promote Fedora in that country. Either by encouraging current community members to step up and become ambassadors or getting new enthusiasts involved in Fedora. That's what I'm trying to do with Poland and Slovakia. When we have no people there ambassadors from neighboring countries may help identifying the most important event(s) and covering at least that. Cooperation with close open source projects (GNOME, KDE,...) which have strong communities in such regions might be helpful, too.

How do you think you would solve the issue of FAmSCo members being from various time zones and the meetings therefore falling short of quorum?: Well, I think it's pretty much impossible to find time that would work for anyone. Right now, FAmSCo meetings start at midnight in my time zone. It requires a lot of member's commitment. Discussions will always be affected by low attendace at IRC meetings. But maybe voting may be done in a way it won't require attending the IRC meetings (mailing list, special voting tools), so decision making won't be so paralized. It may have a bad impact on meeting attendance, though, so maybe only for important decisions?

Do you think you'll be able to attend a majority of the meetings?: I do. Otherwise, I wouldn't candidate.

Will/Do you participate in the regional meetings that Ambassadors hold? If yes, what regional meetings will/do you cover?: I'm from the Czech Republic, so I participate in the EMEA regional meetings. I've missed only one regional meeting this year and it was just because I was driving from a Fedora-promoting event at the time.

What do you think are the problems and challenges that the Fedora Ambassadors are currently facing? Do you have solutions for these issues?: As any other open source project, Fedora Ambassadors are in need for more people. There are never enough volunteers, but what I see as a problem is that the number of people that do extra work, are able to do changes and lead the community is not as it used to be. How to solve this? I don't have any solution right now and I don't think there is an easy one. In general, we should intesify attracting more contributors and then encourage them to become leaders.

How do you think can budget management be improved?: I've been a FAmSCo member before, so I have very little experience with budgeting in Fedora Project. I've just dealt with expenses on Fedora media and their processing in the RHT financial system. It worked fine.

What do you think can be done to attract more people to sign up as Fedora Ambassadors, and maybe other areas of the project? Do you think Fedora's visibility needs improvement? If yes, do you have any ideas on how?: I think those two problems are connected. The more Fedora is visible the more people we will attract. And I think Fedora's visibility does need improvements. One of the ways to improve Fedora's visibility is to give Ambassadors tasks/ideas how to promote Fedora in their region. We can't push any volunteer to do this or that, but just giving them some kind of to-do list may help them promote Fedora properly because they would know what to do and what works. We've had something like this, but it all pretty much ends with encouraging ambassadors to organize release parties. Ambassadors also share ideas that work, but it might be helpful to formalize it.

Do you think the issues FAmSCo discusses and the decisions FAmSCo makes are effectively and efficiently communicated throughout the Fedora community? If you believe communication between FAmSCo and the Fedora community can be enhanced, what first steps or ideas would you propose?: Who wants to know what's going on in FAmSCo can, all meetings are transparent and posted on our wiki page. The question is if it's enough. I think it can be improved. For example FAmSCo members could blog more about their work in FAmSCo. Improving communication between ambassadors and other groups in Fedora is one of my goals. For example ambassadors should be told what iniciatives and subprojects are currently important, where new contributors are especially needed so that they can communicate and promote it in public.

Christoph Wickert (cwickert)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- Red Hat/Fedora user since Red Hat 6.1
- Fedora contributor since 2005, ambassador since 2007, FeSCo member from 2009-2011
- Currently member of both FAmSCo and the Fedora Board
- I run the weekly FAmSCo meetings and the EMEA ambassadors meetings every other week.
- I organize swag production and media distribution in EMEA (together with Jiri) as well as the Ambassadors Polo shirts.
- I also organize events here in Germany (5 this year).

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?
- I drafted the new FAmSCo election rules that make these elections happen. I hope we get a stronger and and more active committee and of course I want to be part of it.
- I want to fix the budget workflow to make reimbursements easier and quicker. We have started working on this in FAmSCo's trac
- I want to improve controlling. The latest changes in the Community Architecture team have led to a situation where FAmSCo hardly has a clue about it's budget. We need better controlling for our spending and this is why Robyn and I are are working on a new draft budget

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?
- Make sure all ambassadors get what they need to promote Fedora
- Establish policies and procedures to get things done easily
- Delegate as much power as possible to the regional and local communities
- Be the voice of the ambassadors and a point of contact for other groups in the project.

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?
- Emerge new leaders. We have lost a lot of long-term contributors due to various reasons (dayjobs, private reasons) and we need new ones to fill this gap. We have lots of new ambassadors but only a few of them stand up and take over responsibility. We need to educate people how to become leaders.
- Get the events calendar finally in place. If Fedora Insight is not ready soon, we should just use a media wiki calendar plugin.
- Build a swag inventory that collects all kinds of swag, vendors, quotes and the persons who are in charge of each item.

What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?
- More regular meetings, especially of FAmSCo itself
- Get more ambassadors involved in other groups, too. An ambassador represents Fedora and as a member of other projects you get a deeper insight into Fedora as a whole.
- Run more FADs again, where "Fedora Activity Day" and not Fedora presentations. In the past, the leaders of the EMEA community met for an ambassadors FAD once a year and discussed the events of next year. This did not happen and caused a log of chaos, that will last throughout 2012. We should not only bring the EMEA ambassadors FAD but establish one a year in every region.

What will you be able to accomplish if elected, that you couldn't as an unelected contributor? Why this post?: We are trying to enable more ambassadors to do things that traditionally FAmSCo has done. Currently we are working on new budget approval guidelines in order to move a lare part of the budget to the regional communities. We are not quite done and this is why I want to continue working on this in FAmSCo.

Do you have any notes on how best the FAmSCo can help support The Fedora Project in regions where there aren't enough Ambassadors?: I am not sure if Fedora as a project can do something, it's on every individual to do this. ATM I support our only active Turkish ambassador be helping him when he has questions and making sure that he needs everything to run his events. Other than that there is not much we can do in short term, but we should try to get more people join Fedora in these countries. At FUDCon Kuala Lumpur I have just seen what only a small number of ambassadors can achieve, so for me it's not size that matters but having the right people.

How do you think you would solve the issue of FAmSCo members being from various time zones and the meetings therefore falling short of quorum?: Having FAmSCo members from all around the world is a good thing. Frankly speaking I don't think the time zones were a problem but the willingness of some FAmSCo members. Therefor we should vote for members who have proven to be active and attend the meetings.

Do you think you'll be able to attend a majority of the meetings? Yes, I host them. As of April I attended 15 out of 16 meetings.

Will/Do you participate in the regional meetings that Ambassadors hold? If yes, what regional meetings will/do you cover?: Yes, because again I host the EMEA meetings and I therefore have attended most of them.

What do you think are the problems and challenges that the Fedora Ambassadors are currently facing? Do you have solutions for these issues?: The biggest problem I currently see is leadership. Some important, long-term contributors have left or suspended their activities for private reasons (dayjob, studies, family). On the other hand we have a lot of ambassadors and constantly new people joining. But not many of them become real leaders and take over responsibility. They do good work, but with some training they surely could do better. I therefor want to support promising candidates and improve the overall education of the ambassadors.

How do you think can budget management be improved?: By making it more transparent and by giving more power to the regional communities. In order to improve transparency and improve accounting Robyn and me have been working on https://fedorahosted.org/draftbudget/ We hope it will go live soon. As for empowering the regional communities to manage their own budget, I have created a draft for FAmSCo that is currently being discussed. Hopefully we should have this before the elections.

What do you think can be done to attract more people to sign up as Fedora Ambassadors, and maybe other areas of the project? Do you think Fedora's visibility needs improvement? If yes, do you have any ideas on how?: I don't think that we need more ambassadors, at least in most countries. If you have the right people, even a small number can do miracles. But I do think that we need to have more ambassadors involved in other areas of Fedora - this was one of the reasons for me to draft the new election guidelines. And of course I do think Fedora's visibility needs to be improved - that's why I have become an ambassador and go out to events.

Do you think the issues FAmSCo discusses and the decisions FAmSCo makes are effectively and efficiently communicated throughout the Fedora community? If you believe communication between FAmSCo and the Fedora community can be enhanced, what first steps or ideas would you propose?: Yes, I do believe that FAmSCo decisions are effectively and efficiently communicated throughout the Fedora community. I am sending out meeting minutes after every meeting and the summary is in that mail. For really important changes like the new election guidelines I do write announcements to the ambassadors mailing list. Not sure if we can do

much more.

Clint Savage (herlo)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- I started with the Fedora Project in 2007. Shortly thereafter, I attended FUDCon Raleigh in February 2008, where I was introduced to Max Spevack, Paul Frields, Michael DeHaan, Stephen Smoogen and many others. Their excitement about Fedora and its future really got me interested in the project.
- I am currently a Fedora Ambassador mentor and have been since its inception. Most of my mentoring these days is with other mentors, as I believe it is good to step aside after a while and let others find a good way forward.
- Previously, I managed the media production for the North American region, saving a dramatic amount of costs and improving the process to get the media out to contributors quickly with the famnarequests Trac instance.
- I have been on the fudcon planning committee for the past two years. My goal is to help get the t-shirts designed and help with some additional sessions as well.

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?

As I see it, FAmSCo is about making sure that ambassadors can get things done. My plan with FAmSCo is to help break down some barriers to doing just that and I see that there are some really good opportunities we are currently not taking advantage. I'd also like to help the Ambassadors broaden horizons and integrate more with the other teams and other communities where applicable, growing both the concept of what it means to be a Free Software Ambassador as well as a Fedora Ambassador

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?

FAmSCo's job in my view is to serve the greater community. I'm one to believe that the Ambassadors in their regions generally know what is going on better than FAmSCo ever will. I'd like to help provide general guidelines while enabling Ambassadors and the greater community better ways to spread knowledge and information about Fedora and Free Software.

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?

As a candidate it is easier for you if I mention my vision clearly, that shows mainly How I see and What I ll do as a member of the FAmSCo if I am elected.

- Lowering barriers to becoming an Ambassador. I do think that the Join process is good, and I had a large hand in it, but I'd like to make the process easier to complete for both the Mentors and the Candidates.
- Getting out of the way of good things. FAmSCo should provide a good set of guidelines and let the Ambassadors get things done!
- Provide resources for all regions quickly, and as transparent as possible. FAmSCo is about helping the Ambassadors do their job. Each region has its specific challenges and FAmSCo should be meeting regularly to address these issues. Additionally, the meetings should be as transparent as possible, meaning meeting notes, public IRC meetings with Q&A and possibly even a regular 'office hours' for Ambassadors to come and get resolution.

What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?

I believe Ambassadors are doing much more than they used to in the past, which is amazing. I do think there are many more ways FAmSCo can improve and grow the Ambassadors program.

- Lowering the barriers to joining the Ambassadors group. Improving the join process, helping mentors understand "what's next" and how to get a prospective Ambassador going quickly.
- Better response times for requests from Ambassadors and community members. It's hard to judge this and say that there is any problem really, it just seems there could be some process improvement to getting Ambassadors resources they need to put the best food forward.
- Better financial processes -- enough said.

Daniel Bruno (danielbruno)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- Fedora user since Fedora Core 1.
- I began to contribute with fedora in 2008 as ambassador, in 2009 I started to contribute in the administration of LATAM infrastructure helping communities to have the means to spread Fedora more effectively in their regions.
- Mentor for ambassadors.
- I have attended several events in Latin America spreading Fedora. I also have attended the last three FUDCon in Latin America.
- As mentor of ambassadors I have helping new ambassadors to contribute more actively in the project and contribute in other projects.
- I'm a member of the RPMDev project that help new contributors to became packagers.

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?
- I want to collaborate more effectively to improve the level of cooperation of ambassadors understanding how things are done around the communities and propose process improvements.

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?
- Ensure that the contributors are able to do their job.
- Analysing the needs of communities and make to get things without pain in a clear and practical way.

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?
- Clarify how ambassadors may have access to available resources.
- Encourage new ambassadors to become more active contributors.
- Help the community's growth in LATAM and reach areas where there are no representatives of Fedora.

What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?
- Encourage the involvement of ambassadors in other projects.
- Improve reporting of activities and events.

Truong Anh Tuan (tuanta)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- Fedora User since 2006
- Fedora Contributor since 2009
- Initialized and maintained the first Fedora mirror in Vietnam: http://virror.hanoilug.org/#fedora since 2009
- Organized a lot of Fedora Release Parties around the country since Fedora 11 (that's also one of three best Fedora 11 release parties worldwide: http://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-ambassadors-list/2009-August/msg00151.html)
- Founded Fedora Vietnam community with dedicated community website and mailing list since 2010
- Co-chaired/Co-organized Fedora Ambassadors APAC bi-weekly meeting since 2010
- Started maintaining Fedora package with ibus-unikey, a keyboard for Vietnamese (and planning for further more ones) this year
- Present Fedora at a lot of FOSS and Tech events.

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?
- Improve collaboration inside Ambassadors group as well as between Ambassadors and others, following things like these: http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/ambassadors/2011-October/018319.html

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?
- Coordinate ambassadors in regions and countries
- Support ambassadors to run their own events and other activities
- Coordinate with Fedora leadership and CommArch for budget and reimbursement

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?
- Connect ambassadors among countries and regions better; support local ambassadors to make regional meetings more effective (e.g. more people involved, more effective discussions, faster from thoughts to actions, etc.)
- Make budget budget/fund review, approval, usage and reimbursement faster and more effective
- Make sure at least one FAmSCo member got free ice cream at FUDCon (of course! :)

What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?
- Improve quality of community activities and contributions in APAC as discussed at FUDCon KL 2012 APAC Ambassadors discussion at FUDCon KL 2012
- Run more FADs, Fedora release parties, etc. to introduce more about Fedora to people and to share knowledge and experience among Fedora users and contributors as well

Nick Bebout (nb)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.

My FAS account was created 2007-04-05,  I've been involved with quite a few different projects in Fedora, including Ambassadors, Infrastructure, Docs, IRC support, etc.

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?

I think I would bring experience with various aspects of Fedora to FAmSCo since I am not just involved with Ambassadors but am also involved with many other areas. I think this is important for FAmSCo to know how other teams work so they can better help them.

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?

To ensure that resources are available to help make Fedora the leading Linux distribution. I believe FAmSCo should empower the regions to do their job without micro-managing everything.

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?

I think i've pretty much covered this in the other questions.

What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?

Less bureaucracy with FAmSco, reduce the number of trivial tickets that have to be approved by FAmSCo (continuing the work started by the current FAmSCo).

Arif Tri Waluyo (arifiauo)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- I am using Fedora since Fedora 12 and joining Fedora Project since 2010.
- I am currently a member of the Fedora Ambassadors, Fedora Bugzappers, L10N Indonesian Team and Proven Testers.
- I am currently active as a contributor in Fedora Indonesia Community
- I am often be a guest speaker at various local events.

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?
- Because I want to be involved more in the Fedora Project, so I will have an influence in an attempt to realize the mission and goals of FAmSCo.

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?
- Ensure the mission and goals are achieved.

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?
- Create an active communication with the ambassador.
- Provide what is needed an ambassador in promoting Fedora.
- Ensuring regular meeting went well, so all tickets can be processed quickly and accurately.

What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?
- Increase the ease of joining as an ambassador.
- Make rules that make the ambassadors remained active in the project.

Alejandro Perez (aeperezt)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- Fedora user since Fedora 3
- Contributor since 2010
- Founder of Fedora Panama community
- Main organizer of FUDCON Panama
- Fedora Packager, Localization Spanish, Ruby SIG
- Member of RPMDEV project helping others to become contributor as Packagers
- Give talks about Fedora and FOSS.
Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?
- Help Ambassadors and other members of the project to get resources needed to promote Fedora
What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?
- Establish and maintain communication with Ambassadors and other groups within Fedora
- Keep resources flowing to Ambassadors and other groups
What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?
- Improve communication in Ambassador group and Others groups
- Promote new leadership in the Ambassadors
- Bring more transparency to FAMSCO
What would you change about the way Ambassadors is run?
- FAMSCO needs to become a lead group around ambassadors

Buddhika Chandradeepa Kurera (bckurera)

Please briefly describe your history with Fedora.
- I started with Free Media group and then joined with the Ambassador group. Since then I am contributing to Design Team, Marketing Team, News,Summer coding and Localization work as well.
- Locally, I have organized some events including release parties and fedora events. I represent the Fedora project in events and initiated the fedora local communityLK_Community.
- I expanded the Fedora project in University level locally, that makes the local community stronger and also working with APAC ambassadors towards a strong community by assisting them.
- I manage APAC Bi-weekly meetings with David and Tuan.
- I wrangle fedora-apac trac and facilitate fellow FAms in the region.

Why do you want to be a member of FAmSCo?

FAmSCo is playing a major role with in the Ambassador Group, indeed they set the path to proceed.

- First, the main aim is to support the Ambassador Group.
- I need to provide a dedicated, effective support which Ambassadors need.
- I would like to be a part of the team and be an active part of decision making process which lead shaping the project.
- Further I want to make the FAmSCo, a place which is more attentive, sensitive, responsive and assisted to ambassadors and their needs.

What is the proper role for FAmSCo in a global project like Ambassadors?

The main role of the FAmSCo is to provide the support that Ambassadors seek. The support should be fast and it should be effective. Such a support keeps the global ambassador effect active and useful. Therefore FAmSCo as the hub, should provide assistant and resources and ensure the ambassadors are getting what they need, when they need. Being align with the team is another very important role that FAmSCo should play. FAmSCo should be very sensitive with the ambassadors. Should identify their needs, ideas, thoughts and try to facilitate, encourage and even try to get novel ideas to shape the team and as well as the project. FAmSCo govern the ambassador team and as well as act as the central hub which connects other entities as well.

What are your particular goals related to FAmSCo?