Re: Updated task force proposal; comments welcome

Hi all,

I finally had a chance to catch up on email and read the current proposal. 
I like the general direction. Thanks go to Ian for managing to produce 
such a nicely structured document out of the rather free form 
discussions/ramblings we've had.  Here are some comments and answers to 
the open questions:

I suggest the name "Community Innovation Forum".

As for the tool to be used, if people really think mailing lists are out 
of fashion I think we should use a "standard" online forum coupled with an 
rss feed.
Topics/threads could have a rating/voting system which would allow people 
to weigh in on their importance and which would "Allow easy tracking of 
prominent discussions."

Question: Suggest small number of moderators; how are they chosen? Staff?. 
One proposal is a small number of staff, possibly assisted by publicly 
acknowledged volunteers.

The ad hoc groups we want to attract do not have a staff and yet somehow 
they manage. I wouldn't want the W3C staff to commit to any level of hand 
holding on a group basis because unlike Standardization activities that 
are managed and can be kept to a reasonable amount the number of these can 
quickly get out of hands, sucking in staff resources away from member 
supported activities.

Question: How are Community Supporters chosen?

I say: leave it to the community to figure this out. In my experience, in 
every community they are natural leaders and people willing to help and 
take a more active role. Let it happen on its own.

Question: In Apache projects, there are various levels of responsibility 
that you can have based on reputation. In an Apache progress, for 
instance, you get committer privileges. Are there analogous privileges for 
a Community Group (e.g., write access to the spec, or distinct mailing 
lists where one is world readable but only writable by select people)?
Question: Should we have some mechanism for granting write access to 
documents? This might be more stringent than the ability to post to a 
list.

That, I think, is reasonable. I can see how someone would have to be voted 
in before being given editing privileges. However, it raises a question on 
how to bootstrap the process. This is something that isn't the most 
transparent in Apache for that matter.

Keep track of Community Group participants' employers so that we can 
contact them for organizational commitments

I think for the sake of transparency participants should be required to 
disclose their affiliations. When it comes I don't put much faith in the 
idea of chasing people's employers to get licensing commitments from them 
after the fact but OWF seems to believe it's a viable option so I maybe 
wrong. In any case, this is something for PSIG to discuss.

Question: We need experienced editors. How do we bring new editors to the 
community?

Same remark as for the Community Supporters. Let it happen. The community 
can figure this out on its own.

Question: Should we reuse the name "Interest" or "Incubator" instead of 
"Community?" Or is the rebranding useful (and the processes will be 
sufficiently different that it is worth the new name)?

I think rebranding is useful because it will help communicate W3C is 
offering something new. Given that the goal is to attract ad hoc groups 
out there we need to have a good communication plan around this to make it 
successful.

Question: should there be a minimal level of support?

Yes. Although it's not bullet proof by any means and quite arbitrary, I 
think a minimum of three people or so would be good to eliminate the most 
obvious junk.

Question: Should we engage designers to develop a new visual brand for 
these new offerings?

I think that's really up to the staff and the Advisory Board to decide 
whether it's worth the expense and whether the W3C can afford such an 
expense.

Question: For Web Innovation Forum and Community Groups, should 
participants have disclosure obligations over Rec track documents 
according to the W3C Patent Policy. This may affect whether some 
organizations allow their employees to participate in these lightweight 
groups, even if disclosure is limited to personal knowledge.

I think this is best left to PSIG to answer.

Question: Will Members ask that employee accounts be approved by Members?

While it's convenient for large companies to have the W3C force 
participation approval by the AC rep it's merely a convenience and whether 
the W3C does offer such a service or not doesn't prevent companies to vet 
participation from employees.
--
Arnaud  Le Hors - Program Director, Global Open Standards, IBM Open Source 
& Standards Policy