Re: TAG productivity, elections, and httpRange-14

On 24 April 2012 16:20, Jeni Tennison <jeni@jenitennison.com> wrote:

> Larry,
>
> On 24 Apr 2012, at 14:01, Larry Masinter wrote:
> > During the last TAG election, I did try to solicit nominations for TAG
> membership with those skills. I didn’t ask individual candidates – I asked
> W3C AC reps (who are authorized to nominate members) who also participate
> in IETF, pointing out the need.  I think it would be also useful to have
> more TAG members familiar with IETF protocols, documents, and architecture,
> as many of the security and identity protocols are developed in IETF.
>
> It would. I think we should be actively trying to persuade such people to
> stand, and we should be asking the AC to vote for them if they think
> similarly.
>
> > I didn’t come up with anyone willing to nominate anyone, or willing to
> run.
>
> If you asked people, did they say why they weren't willing to run?
>
> > It sounds nice to say that you want to offer more “open” discussion
> during TAG elections. But as with most things, every perceived benefit also
> has a cost.
> >
> >       • Making TAG elections more like the political election circus,
> full of innuendo and character assassination, doesn’t seem like it would
> increase the attractiveness.    To be honest, I don’t know for certain
> whether asking candidates to post a public statement or participate in
> pre-election discussions would be somehow put off, but I think so. The TAG
> deep-ending on other issues might also be part of the issue.
> >
> >       • Statements made during the election period should carry less
> weight, not more, than someone’s record as a participant in open standards
> deliberations.  Those who want to know about candidate Carvalho for the TAG
> can look at the public mail archive:
> >
> >
> http://www.w3.org/Search/Mail/Public/search?keywords=&hdr-1-name=from&hdr-1-query=Carvalho&index-grp=Public_FULL&index-type=g&type-index=
> >
> > and can see contributions over the years, at least in W3C.
>
> Extrapolating from myself (as I normally do), putting aside all the
> logistic downsides in being a member of the TAG, the one thing that would
> stop me running is the feeling that I wouldn't be able to make any
> difference to the group, in terms of its output or its direction, because
> it is too stagnant. I think that asking candidates to post a public
> statement about their goals sends a clear message that the TAG is open to
> active participants who want to shape the group and make a difference, and
> that this is attractive for the kind of people from whom the TAG would
> benefit.
>

While individual creativity should be encouraged, teamwork should be
stressed in all areas of the W3C.  I strongly believe that all the members
of the TAG work extremely hard and, from that effort, make a huge
difference (to the group, to the web, and to the world).  Perhaps that is
not acknowledged enough.  However, imho, both in business and open source,
a team effort often produces the best results.


>
> I think that the AC will naturally vote for people based on their full
> range of contributions and not just those statements. But statements of
> intent are still useful, not least in helping candidates to think about
> what they are committing to.
>
> There plainly are people out there who want to work on web architecture
> [1]. The changes that Robin's suggested around the election process are
> small changes that could have an impact in attracting them to do so within
> the TAG. Or they might not be enough. Personally, I think they are worth a
> shot.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Jeni
>
> [1] http://www.w3.org/community/opentag/
> --
> Jeni Tennison
> http://www.jenitennison.com
>
>
>