The AB’s Task Force on the W3C Vision

Unofficial Draft Charter, 27 February 2023

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Status

This is an unofficial draft for discussion. It has no standing of any kind.

Parts highlighted in yellow in indicate pieces of text that are known to need to change, or hyperlinks where the target is not yet determined.

1. Introduction

The mission of the Advisory Board’s Task Force on the W3C Vision is to provide a venue the W3C Community to develop the W3C Vision document.

Join the Vision Task Force.

Parent group	Advisory Board
Start date	[dd monthname yyyy], when the charter is approved)
End date	open ended
Chairs	[chair name] (affiliation) (to be appointed by the AB)
Team Contacts	[team contact name] should there be a Team Contact other than the AB's team contact?
Teleconferences	1-hour calls will be held monthly prior to publication of the W3C Vision as a W3C Statement, and quarterly thereafter; additional teleconferences may be scheduled by the Chairs provided sufficient notice is given, but are generally not expected.
Meetings	Face-to-face meetings may be held once a year during the W3C's annual Technical Plenary week; additional meetings may be scheduled by consent of the participants, but are generally not expected.

2. Motivation and Background

W3C was originally founded and driven by the vision of the founder of the Web, Tim Berners-Lee, who used his own personal principles to guide the organization and its activities. As W3C transitions to a community-led organization, we need to articulate our shared values and mission in writing so that our community has a shared vision leading W3C into the future.

This work was initially started as a public activity by the AB, but in order to develop consensus in the W3C community, the AB is chartering this Task Force to improve its visibility and facilitate broad participation.

3. Scope

The scope of this Task Force is articulation of the W3C’s mission, values, purpose, and principles; in other words, our vision for W3C as an organization in the context of our vision for the Web itself. The goal of this vision is not to predict the future, but to have shared principles to guide our decisions as we go.

3.1. Out of Scope

The following topics are out of scope, and will not be addressed by this Task Force:

Other deliverables of the Advisory Board, such as the Process, the CEPC, the Patent Policy, etc.
Any technical specification.
An operational strategy for W3C Inc. as an organization: such a strategy should take the Vision into account, but it isn’t the Vision itself.
Recommendations for or against specific technologies: technologies are not value neutral, and preference for or against a particular technologies should be influenced by values as articulated in the Vision, but the Vision should support thinking about such things, rather than contain specific answers.

4. Deliverables

The main deliverable of the Task Force will be the following document:

W3C Vision

This document aims to articulate the W3C’s mission, values, purpose, and principles.

It is to be developed on the Note Track, with the intent of eventually being published as a W3C Statement once it attains sufficient maturity.

Other documents may be produced by this Task Force, such as:

documents providing background information for the W3C Vision
documents discussing how to apply the principles described in the W3C Vision to various contexts

5. Success Criteria

This Task Force will have succeeded if it develops a document that:

Helps the world understand who we are, what we do, and why it matters.
Is opinionated enough to provide a helpful framework when making decisions, particularly on controversial issues.
Is grounded enough in the shared values of the W3C community that it represents the emergent consensus of most of our participants.
Is timeless enough that it doesn't need frequent revision.

Examples of such documents would be the original Mozilla Manifesto, the Debian Foundation Documents, and the Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) Charter and Chantilly Principles.

6. Participation

As this is a Task Force of the Advisory Board, members of the AB are generally expected to participate. However, participation is not limited to the Advisory Board; indeed, this effort is structured as a Task Force to encourage and facilitate broader participation.

Individuals affiliated with W3C Members (not limited to AC Representatives, though their participation is most welcome), as well as Invited Experts in a Working Group or in an Interest Groups, and members of the Team, are encouraged to join.

Members of the public and other individuals who have not explicitely joined this Task Force are welcome to open issues and comment existing ones (see Communication), but are not part of the Task Force for the sake of determining consensus (see Decision Policy).

Participants in the group are required to follow the W3C Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct.

7. Communication

Material discussions for this Task Force are conducted in public: the meeting minutes from teleconference and face-to-face meetings will be archived for public review, and material discussions and issue tracking will be conducted in a manner that can be both read and written to by the general public. Deliverables and their drafts will be developed in public repositories and permit direct public contribution requests. The meetings themselves are only open to eligible participants or by invitation of the Chair.

Information about the group (including details about deliverables, issues, actions, status, participants, and meetings) will be available from the Vision Task Force’s home page.

This Task Force primarily conducts its technical work on GitHub issues. The W3C community as well as the public is invited to review, discuss and contribute to this work.

The Task Force will use a Member-confidential mailing list for administrative purposes and, at the discretion of the Chairs and members of the group, for member-only discussions in special cases when a participant requests such a discussion.

8. Coordination

As required by the Process for advancement towards a W3C Statement, this Task Force will seek wide review for its deliverables, including horizontal review for accessibility, internationalization, privacy, and security with the relevant Working and Interest Groups, as well as with the specific groups listed below:

Advisory Board: This Task Force operates under delegation from the AB (see Decision Policy). Participation from AB members is generally expected.
Advisory Committee: This Task Force seeks to produce a document that will get the Consensus of the AC; extensive engagement with the AC is therefore desirable, and the AC is expected to be a key source of participants other than members of the AB.
Technical Architecture Group: The TAG's Ethical Web Principles is distinct but complementary to this group's Vision document. Coordination with the TAG to ensure a coherent set of documents is desirable.
W3C Board of Directors: The W3C Directors do no have inherently any more or less say in setting the Vision than other members of the community. However, the Board is likely to be a key user of the Vision document, applying it to various parts of the W3C's operations. Coordination with the Board to confirm that the Vision document is adequately actionable is desirable.
W3C Team: The Team are key participants in the W3C community, have a deep historical connection to its mission, and will play an active role in applying the Vision to W3C activities going forward. In addition, they will likely be responsible for incorporating it into key documentation such as the W3C website and participation guidebook.

9. Decision Policy

This Task Force operates under delegation from the AB. Specifically, this means:

Explicit decisions of the AB are binding onto this group.
The AB empowers this Task Force to publish updated Draft Notes or Notes on its behalf, based on the consensus of the Task Force, without needing to request an explicit decision of the AB for each such publication. However, the AB may restrict the types of changes that can be made or published without its explicit permission.
In cases where this Task Force is unable to come to consensus on any particular question despite careful consideration of the range of views presented, the Chairs should refer this question to the AB for a decision.
This Task Force is not empowered to request advancement of the Vision on the Note Track; only the AB itself may do so. This Task Force should, however, propose advancement when it believes it has reached sufficient maturity.
After successful publication of the Vision as a W3C Statement, this Task Force is empowered to maintain errata and candidate amendments for the W3C Vision, but not to incorporate such amendments; this action is reserved for the AB itself.

This Task Force will seek to make decisions through consensus and due process, per the W3C Process Document (section 5.2.1, Consensus). Typically, an editor or other participant makes an initial proposal, which is then refined in discussion with members of the group and other reviewers, and consensus emerges with little formal voting being required.

Decisions are made by consensus of the Task Force, typically by a Chair observing consensus in a synchronous teleconference or face-to-face meeting, and declaring a resolution. In addition, decisions may also be made by an asynchronous Call for Consensus issued by a Chair:

The chair applies a recognizable label on the relevant GitHub issue.
The chair leaves a comment in the GitHub issue indicating the duration of the review period, and making the question under review explicit. The review period must not be less than 7 days.
The chair sends a mail to the task-force’s mailing list to highlight the Call for Consensus to all participants, and references the Call for Consensus in the agendas of any meetings during its response period.
If no objections are raised by the end of the response period, the resolution shall be considered to have consensus as a resolution of the Task Force; the Editor may take any corresponding action, and the Chair should explicitly record conclusion of the Call for Consensus.

Participants in the Task Force may suggest that the Chair issue a Call for Consensus, but cannot do so themselves.

All decisions made by the Task Force should be considered resolved unless and until new information becomes available or unless reopened at the discretion of the Chairs or the AB.

10. Miscellaneous

10.1. Licensing

This Task Force will use the W3C Software and Document license for all its deliverables.

Do we need some kind of inbound license or copyright grant from participants to W3C, or is that already covered by general membership and being an IE?

10.2. Patent Policy

This Task Force is not a Working Group and does not produce technical reports under the W3C Recommendation Track. It is therefore not subject to the Licensing Obligations of Working Group Participants of the W3C Patent Policy.

10.3. Conflicts

In the event of a conflict between this document and the W3C Process, the W3C Process shall take precedence.

10.4. Evolution

This charter may be revised at any time by a decision of the Advisory Board; this includes changes in chairing.

Any change to this charter after its adoption by the AB must be documented in the Changes section and announced to the Task Force’s mailing lists.

10.5. Changes

Changes to this document are documented in this section.

None yet