[odf-discuss] Problems at the OASIS TC.

[Daniel]

Oh, and I forgot to add a comment about how OASIS rules keep out small 
players who can't afford their significant membership fees. I understand 
that you don't want a single non-profit to swamp each TC with 
representatives, but on the other hand, two representatives doesn't seem 
fair because companies can have as many employees as they want (which 
also benefits large companies over smaller companies). So yeah, I do 
have some issues with OASIS membership rules. I wonder if Ecma rules are 
worse than OASIS.

Cheers,
Daniel.

Daniel wrote:
> Hello all,
> 
> Yesterday I received an email from OASIS explaining that my membership 
> at the OASIS OpenDocument committee will be revoked. David Wheeler, head 
> of the formula sub-committee (spreadsheet formulae) got a similar email. 
> Bruce D'Arcus, head of the metadata sub-committee got a similar email. 
> Marbux got a similar email.
> 
> What happened?
> 
> Well, we, along with another 12 people, are all in OASIS as non-employee 
> representatives of the OpenDocument Foundation, a US-based non-profit 
> run by Gary Edwards. It turns out that non-profits are only allowed to 
> have two non-employee representatives (and that's two more than any 
> company). I learnt yesterday that OASIS has been discussing this issue 
> with Gary for some time.
> 
> I'm not too bothered about my removal, I'm not important. But I'm 
> concerned about the removal of Bruce D'Arcus and David Wheeler. Those 
> are two people who do invaluable ODF work at the OASIS TC and now are 
> being removed.
> 
> Can the Fellowship do anything? Does anyone have any ideas? The 
> membership fees for OASIS are high:
> 
> http://www.oasis-open.org/join/categories.php
> 
> The cheapest way to get Bruce and David back on the TC would be 
> individual membership which costs 300 USD each. That's well outside what 
> the Fellowship has at hand, but maybe there's a way to raise that money? 
> Maybe find a sponsor or do some sort of fund raiser?
> 
> I don't know what we can do.
> 
> Oh, I just got another email from OASIS... I (and apparently others) 
> explained that this whole discussion was news to us. Among other things, 
> they pointed us to fee-waved memberships:
> 
> http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/liaison_policy.php#fee-wavedgrants
> 
> It says here that the TC chair can ask for a fee waved membership for 
> people who are very important. So I guess that Bruce and David might get 
> that. I hope they do.
> 
> Cheers,
> Daniel.
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