[Koha] First things first for a Koha foundation

[Kyle Hall]

I agree completely. I will also be happy to donate kohademos.org to
the Koha non-profit, when it is formed.

Kyle

http://www.kylehall.info
Information Technology
Crawford County Federated Library System ( http://www.ccfls.org )




On Fri, Oct 9, 2009 at 12:51 PM, Thomas Dukleth <kohalist at agogme.com> wrote:
> Reply inline:
>
> 1.  MINUTES TO RESOLVE BUT FIRST THINGS FIRST.
>
> Original Subject: Re: [Koha] Koha demo links on koha.org
>
> On Fri, October 9, 2009 14:12, Kyle Hall wrote:
>> What we really need is fr.demo.koha.org, en.demo.koha.org, and so on.
>> This would require Liblimes assistance, and we can ask, but I don't
>> know how long it would take to set up.
>
> It would take only a few minutes to direct domains or subdomains to
> something under community control.  We should move on with the business of
> setting up a legal entity for the Koha project which can manage that and
> receive funding.
>
>
> 2.  FASTEST WAY TO ORGANISE OURSELVES.
>
> The fastest way to set up such an entity which can receive donations to
> support what may be needed at least for an interim period is through
> having a foundation held by HLT or SPI for a temporary period.  Setting up
> an independent Koha project entity should also be done but would take
> perhaps some months of discussions about bylaws which we could be
> discussing while already having legal status via another organisation such
> as HLT or SPI.
>
> An independent foundation now choice for which the majority voted in the
> first poll perhaps without understanding the question or implication well
> would delay matters because of all the discussion about bylaws and other
> matters needed and which ought to occur before registering.  [There were
> some problems with the design of the first poll which we should fix in
> future by having wide community discussion of the drafting of any poll.]
> Registering an independent entity with the government is easy and may take
> little more than a couple of weeks.  More weeks may be required to obtain
> certification of non-profit status.  Yet before all that one has to know
> all the particulars of the registration and decide in what jurisdiction it
> should be registered primarily which may take months to agree.
>
> I believe that I understand correctly that both HLT and SPI either already
> have in SPI's case or within a few days can have in HLT's case a bank
> account in the US and in Europe to receive monetary donations in the local
> currency.  Receiving donations in the local currency would allow the
> project to direct their use in that currency without any loss of value in
> currency conversion.  HLT certainly already has a bank account to receive
> donations in another local currency where there is significant interest in
> the project.  HLT is certainly the most flexible.
>
> I favour HLT because of their greater flexibility and commitment to the
> Koha project from its very inception.  SPI has much better governance
> rules which we could discuss adopting or adapting for ourselves as an
> organisation held by another organisation and later as an independent
> organisation.  HLT's charter grants them perhaps a little too much
> flexibility and the Koha community should expect a legal guarantee from
> them to take on the full trust of the community.  They have demonstrated
> over the years their complete willingness to not try to exert any undue
> influence on the project for any private interests of their library.
> Combining that implicit trust with a guarantee for the Koha community
> gives me great confidence.
>
> I might be persuaded that SPI is a better choice but I merely guess that
> the very size of SPI would make it more difficult to obtain rapid
> attention when it may be needed.  Perhaps some reports from other projects
> they host would persuade me otherwise.
>
> The Software Freedom Conservancy could also be a good choice but their
> worst problem is that they have become so popular that to preserve the
> degree and quality of attention given to each accepted project there is
> now a three to six month waiting list for application consideration.  I
> think that the application waiting period is now too much time for the
> level of impatience I perceive from those most active in the Koha
> community.
>
> In the final ballot, please vote for a project organisation which we can
> actually implement now.  Of the possibilities currently nominated that is
> only a foundation held by HLT and SPI for an interim period.  The project
> can have all assets held on its behalf transferred to own independent
> foundation soon afterwords but everything needs to be agreed and in place
> first.
>
>
> 2.  MANY PROBLEMS WITH THE COMMUNITY WEBSITE.
>
>>
>> Somewhat of an annoyance, the 'Demos' link on koha.org takes me to the
>> showcase, not to demos.
>
> I had identified a large number of such problems including that one
> specifically when the new website went up.  I reported them to the mailing
> list but I have not yet taken the time to report them formally as bugs.
>
> The worst problem is that the navigation links are not displayed in a
> visible manner on the world's most commonly used web browser, Internet
> Explorer with the default IE configuration.  I have had to fix CSS
> problems with Internet Explorer and it can be tricky because some things
> are interpreted backwards to the standard.  The default Plone stylesheets
> would have worked but they were not modified or replaced for the Koha
> website with cross-browser compatibility in mind.
>
>
> 3.  NEW WEBSITES.
>
>> As an alternative, I just registered kohademos.org. I could make
>> en.kohademos.org point to http://demo.koha-fr.org/, and
>> fr.kohademos.org point to
>> http://demo.koha-fr.org/cgi-bin/koha/changelanguage.pl?language=fr-FR.
>> It seems like a reasonable way to handle it would be to have one
>> company host a demo in their native language, for each language. This
>> would spread out the amount of work and bandwidth required.
>
> We should coordinate such efforts through an entity in which we can place
> our collective trust for holding the domains and other key aspects of the
> project.
>
> When we have ourselves properly organised, then we can make requests of
> LibLime from a position of strength as a community prepared to offer an
> alternative if LibLime is disinclined to cooperate.  Presently, with
> LibLime in control of the community domain and no official community
> alternative to offer any request is made from a position of weakness.
>
> [...]
>
>
> Thomas Dukleth
> Agogme
> 109 E 9th Street, 3D
> New York, NY  10003
> USA
> http://www.agogme.com
> +1 212-674-3783
>
> [...]
>
>