User:Sethwoodworth/MembershipDraft

OLPC Community Membership

There is a large number of volunteers who contribute or would like to contribute to OLPC's goals. Some of these people are developers, some are educators and many of these people fall into any number of other groups. There is a matter of pride in being a developer or a support-gangster at OLPC. And participation in these venues is somewhat formalized and well understood. Expectations are defined and there is a framework to volunteer within. Currently there isn't a framework or structure for other types of volunteers to get involved.

I see several methods to foster this structure, among them a Human Participation Interface or an official community liaison. My proposal is much along the lines of systems in place at Ubuntu, Gnome, Wikipedia and much like Mel's SG Restructuring proposal. I propose to create an OLPC Volunteer-Membership structure.

FOSS Membership

Ubuntu and Gnome already have very similar membership systems in place. "Substantial contributors" in development, Grassroots org, documentation, or graphic design are all eligible for Membership in their structures. The requirements basically involve over three months of involvement, community support, and documented contributions. Although Wikipedia doesn't involve the same sort of community structure (far more ad-hoc), they seem to treat admin-ship as a reward/acknowledgment for dedicated contributions and commitment over time.

OLPC Membership

Membership at OLPC would provide several benefits to the OLPC organization as a whole, as well as benefits to volunteer members. While users who drop in for short amounts of time to contribute small amounts to OLPC are very useful, the greatest utility is from volunteers who have been around OLPC's community to have been trained in the basics of Git, our Wiki, IRC, various mailing lists, and of course the XO hardware and software. Becoming a member of OLPC would likely involve active projects that a volunteer is working on. Also, as evident in the OLPC-health project, there aren't enough people at OLPC to oversee and coordinate (but not administer) on going projects that the community is interested in. Having access to @laptop email addresses, able to set up phone conferences and discuss OLPC events as a more official contributor to OLPC would provide a lot of support and framework to languishing projects. But OLPC isn't the only party to benefit from Membership.

Volunteers would also have a strong incentive to become full members. As members they would have access to an email redirect like @ubuntu.com and @gnome.org provide their members (although this may end up being @member.laptop.org). Members would also have better access to phone conference lines and other OLPC resources. Also there have been several attempts to set up a community panel for vetting and distributing XO's through the developer's program. Who better to decide on laptop contributors getting laptops than trained and committed volunteers.

The most important factor in maintaining volunteers, especially in an online project, is a feeling of ownership on the part of volunteer. Membership can provide this sense of ownership as well providing ownership and responsibility in a real sense within OLPC.

It should also be noted that an 'insider's track already exists to some degree in our volunteer community. The volunteer Support Gang is privy to sensitive materials, and is often given access to additional information and resources. Also Wiki adminship is given on the basis of the testimonials of fellow volunteers. So parts of this membership proposal already exist within our community.

Moving forward

A membership system isn't something that simply agreed upon by a group of volunteers, nor can the project be handed down fully-formed from OLPC. A consensus must be found among current volunteers and OLPC. Please add any questions/comments/concerns below.

Proposed Structure

Please tear this apart and comment in-line if you wish.

Criteria for Membership

• Require Sustained Contribution to OLPC
  • At least two months of visible, significant activity
  • Activity can be any documented contributions

• Sufficient knowledge of OLPC's systems: hardware, software, processes
  • Must complete (or show previous knowledge) a basic training course

• A fleshed-out Userpage on the wiki
  • Documented contributions to OLPC
  • Your personal goals/interest/involvement at OLPC

Deciding Membership

• A Membership board would oversee qualifying for Membership
  • Four volunteers
  • One OLPC employee (Sj? Adam?)

Discussion

Please sign your comments with four ~'s

IMHO, wiki adminship should be about need/willingness to do admin tasks on wiki and nothing else, although it is true that the expression of trust implied by adminship gives warm-fuzzies. If you have a good telco vendor (I can recommend one), teleconferencing numbers are easy to generate, track usage and cancel (when needed) from a central location, again, it's a tool, not really a priv/reward thing. The e-mail address is a pretty good idea, it's also used by many alumni associations. You don't want go too far with the inside/outside distinction and risk discouraging newcomers by making it clear they are not part of the "in-crowd", that is a turn-off.

I think much could be done in far simpler terms to promote on-wiki outreach to newcomers. Simply "being noticed" by someone with a laptop.org address can be quite rewarding all by itself. Walter's Community News used to do a good deal of that, I've noticed that Kim's last few posts there unfortunately read more like a supervisor's report on OLPC staffers and much less like a community newletter, that is not hard to fix and should be corrected ASAP. SJ's canned welcome message is a start, but too impersonal to be truly effective at making someone feel noticed, a bot could handle it (and probably should, to not miss newcomers). Far better would be some enhancement of the level of personalized outreach to new users, on wiki or on lists. Cjl 18:56, 26 May 2008 (EDT)

So... yes, I think we do need a community recognition/membership structure. I am still confused as to what the structure you are proposing here is - how do people earn the right to apply for membership? What criteria are they evaluated on? By whom? How does the evaluation process work? How long does your membership "last" and what privs do you get during it? (You mentioned an email account and better access to resources - can you be more specific)? Can you write us a walkthrough of how several imaginary but specific and diverse people would become members? Mchua 01:56, 28 May 2008 (EDT)

I was hoping that the privs would be decided on by the community, but I agree that this should be straw-manned at and fully proposed. I will do so now. Seth 05:35, 28 May 2008 (EDT)

Good stuff, let's discuss this in more detail over the weekend and early next week when we're all at 1CC. ChristophD 15:55, 4 June 2008 (EDT)