Re: Publishing BG becoming a CG?

Hi all,

Thank you for the conversation today, and especially for several people’s candid perspectives on this topic. I think having honest conversations about where we are at is the only way to proceed.

In the interest of being honest, I want to provide my insights as the chair of the “technical” side of the activity and as someone who has attended many BG, CG, and other meetings in our activity.

Cristina is right, we’re spread out, and the differentiation between groups is in name, not participation. For us to succeed, we do need to consider the fact that we are spread too thin across arms of the activity to actually be effective in running any of it.

When Liisa described what happened in IDPF, the presentation of a business problem that is passed to the tech side to solve, I wished that was happening here. From my perspective on the technical side, we have not received anything from the business side in terms of guidance or requests for exploration. All of the developments in EPUB/Audiobooks/Accessibility in the last 5+ years have come from the community and the working group. We have asked many times for business insight, for what to do next, and we have received nothing.

I don’t want this to descend into an argument over who did what and when, I want us to focus on how we resolve this going forwards. I think the best way forward is to integrate the business group with the working group or the community group, and end it as its own separate entity.

Pros:

  *   Reduction of number of meetings
  *   Reduction on demands on our attention, more time for participation
  *   Brings a diversity of perspectives to the group it folds into: business problems can be addressed directly to technical people, technical people can have business insight into proposed solutions
  *   Reduction in fragmentation of communication
Cons: (derived from what people shared in the meeting)

  *   Financial challenge for members potentially needing to upgrade to W3C “full” membership if we fold into WG
  *   Publishing executives that participate want a venue for their concerns separate from the rest of the activity
  *   Loss of status separate from CG membership (publishers may still want a “stake” but not in the full technical activity)

I think there are ways to handle the cons that would satisfy many, though maybe not everyone. I particularly want to see us improve our communications.

Liisa’s AOB item today illustrated exactly the concern I have with the fragmentation as it currently is. TDM Rep has been in “final note” status since May, if there was a need to change EPUBCheck or any of our tooling, it should have been reported then. There was no communication regarding publisher uptake of TDM Rep, and EPUBCheck is likely only the beginning of issues as it’s implemented since the technical side of the community was never informed about its adoption and use. We’ve had this with other issues in the past as well, but they never get communicated. If you don’t tell us, we don’t know. I can’t communicate effectively with my WG if I don’t have the information, I can’t effectively prioritize or build agendas if I don’t know what the business side wants us to attend to, so we’re left to our own devices.

I apologise if this is too blunt or hard to hear, but for us to succeed as I know we all do, we need to be candid about the challenges and what needs to change.

Thanks,
Wendy

From: Daihei Shiohama <shiohama@mediado.jp>
Date: Thursday, September 12, 2024 at 5:46 PM
To: Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org>
Cc: Ralph Swick <swick@w3.org>, McCloy-Kelley, Liisa (she/her) <lmccloy-kelley@penguinrandomhouse.com>, W3C Publishing Steering Committee <public-publishing-sc@w3.org>
Subject: Re: Publishing BG becoming a CG?

[EXTERNAL] This message comes from an external organization.
Ivan,

I've been talking to several publishers as well as publishing industry related members in Japan who have been actively participating in PBG after your email sent last weekend. In addition to their desire to keep the PBG with the current status, they mention that they are not clear about what caused the idea of changing BG to CG. Though CG could be more open or open to any W3C members, the reason they have been retaining the W3C membership is for privileged discussion and information available to the members.  Some say if only interested in business related discussion, would it mean that keeping the membership may not be necessary?

As a W3C Evangelist, I address the importance and value of the W3C membership to all the people I talk to and keep them informed on the value of participating in other W3C groups even outside of publishing. I face a quandary of this BG and CG discussion.

Best,

Daihei





On Wed, Sep 11, 2024 at 9:18 PM Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org<mailto:ivan@w3.org>> wrote:
Dahei,

thanks. What this means in practice is that, even if the group becomes, officially, a CG, it should be kept separate from the current Publishing CG. Personally, I am perfectly fine with this.

Ivan


On 10 Sep 2024, at 00:52, Daihei Shiohama <shiohama@mediado.jp<mailto:shiohama@mediado.jp>> wrote:

Ralphe, Ivan and SC,

In addition to Liisa's comment sent earlier, I would like to point out there shall be a place to give focus to business aspects in the publishing industry and the ecosystem, while tech centric discussion is held at other groups. It is clear that the Japanese major publishers have been participating in the PBG meetings but they may become weary of participating in CG if the technical aspects become stronger. They may even lose justification of their maintaining the W3C membership. As PBG co-chairs, we need to remain responsible for the digital publishing works effectively to each territory and global markets.

Best,

Daihei

On Mon, Sep 9, 2024 at 1:27 PM Ralph Swick <swick@w3.org<mailto:swick@w3.org>> wrote:
I raised this in the July meeting and solicited feedback:

  https://www.w3.org/2024/07/12-pbgsc-minutes.html


We certainly want to hear the thoughts of those W3C Members who feel that a Business Group serves them better than a “Publishing Business Community Group”.  I can list pros and cons but I would not care to speculate on what those W3C Members feel.

Regards,
-Ralph


On Sep 9, 2024, at 3:37 PM, McCloy-Kelley, Liisa (she/her) <lmccloy-kelley@penguinrandomhouse.com<mailto:lmccloy-kelley@penguinrandomhouse.com>> wrote:

Ivan and SC-

So this email is indicative of perhaps a bigger problem that the SC should address.

I don’t know what meeting Ivan is referring to. From my notes (and our minutes) I don’t think the SC as a group ever discussed this beyond a passing mention perhaps in our Aug meeting. We definitely as a group did not decide anything or have a conversation directly with the PBG Co-Chairs about the pros/cons of moving from a BG to a CG. So when this email went out, the PBG co-chairs were all a bit taken aback.

The PBG co-chairs have concerns about what this means for our business group folks who have full memberships, particularly our Japanese members, and whether that has been considered—it is not just a matter of losing a few business group memberships, but a large contingent of full memberships that folks may not want to renew. And though we want more participation, we don’t necessarily think that participation from just anyone is the answer. It warrants further discussion.

But the real thing that this points to is that there are several places where our communication across our work here is not adequate.  In our July meeting, we talked about Rick and Graham being asked to co-chair the SC, but it was never confirmed. Graham sent out an agenda for August, so I could infer that perhaps he had accepted. But Ivan’s note makes it clear that even he isn’t sure who is running this group now. This is not the first time something has been referred to and assumptions made that we are all on the same page without being in the same conversations.

If there has been a discussion about the BG, could someone please tell us where? When? What the proposal and reasoning is? And where are we with finding new leadership for the technical work within the CG?

And can we add improving communication to our agenda for Friday?

Thanks.

Liisa McCloy-Kelley on behalf of the PBG co-chairs


From: Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org<mailto:ivan@w3.org>>
Date: Saturday, September 7, 2024 at 5:44 AM
To: W3C Publishing Steering Committee <public-publishing-sc@w3.org<mailto:public-publishing-sc@w3.org>>
Subject: Publishing BG becoming a CG?
CAUTION: This email originated from outside of Penguin Random House. Please be extra cautious when opening file attachments or clicking on links.

Dear all,

at one of our recent meetings we discussed (and decided on?) the possibility to convert the current Publishing Business Group into a Community Group. The argument was that by declaring it, officially, as a Community Group, the membership fee obstacle would disappear, making it easier for anyone to join the group. The only downside is that W3C might lose some modest income, which was deemed to be acceptable. It would be good to put this issue on the agenda of the Steering Committee meeting of the 13th of September and make a final decision. (I am not sure who controls the agenda these days.)

The mechanics of converting the BG into the CG is something the W3C staff members will have to do. Hopefully, the change will be such that member of the current BG will be automatically be the member of the new CG (although that may not be possible, something Ralph and I will have to clarify).

However, there are some questions that we would have to discuss first, such as:

- Are we considering a merge of the current BG and CG into a new "Publishing CG", or do we keep the two groups separate with two distinct profiles?
- If we keep them separate, what will be the name of the new group? (Say, "Publishing Business Community Group"?) Do we want to also rename the current CG to make the profile clearer? (Say, "Publishing Technology Community Group"?)
- If we merge them, who will chair the new group?
- How do we explain the change to the current BG members? Do we want to use this announcement to make some extra CG recruiting, or, on the contrary, do we downplay the change as a purely administrative step?
- What other communication steps should we make, if any?

Would it be possible to get these discussed, and decide upon, next Friday, so that we can move on with the practicalities?

Thanks

Ivan

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Ivan Herman, W3C
Home: http://www.w3.org/People/Ivan/

mobile: +33 6 52 46 00 43
ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0782-2704




----
Ivan Herman, W3C
Home: http://www.w3.org/People/Ivan/

mobile: +33 6 52 46 00 43