Board elections: questions to the candidate Caolán McNamara

[deneb_alpha]

Dear candidate,

Now that the nomination phase is ended and we still have some more days before the start of the voting phase, as previously announced[0], we would like to ask you some questions about your views and intentions regarding The Document Foundation and your plans as potential director of the entity. While replying to this email, please ensure to keep all the recipients in copy.

1. Do you commit yourself to have enough time and the necessary technological tools in order to participate to the regularly scheduled board calls?

2. Do you commit yourself to follow up and work on (at least) the main items and actions you will volunteer to oversee or that will be assigned to you by the board?

3. What is your willingness to delegate decisions, especially in lack of time?

4. What are your views on the foundation's budget? How should the money be spent, besides our fixed costs?

5. Should we work towards broadening our pool of contributors, both technical and non-technical?

6. What actions do you suggest to increase the engagement and participation of volunteers from local communities around the world in project's activities?

7. Should the Foundation -as an entity distinct from the LibreOffice project or the Document Liberation project- engage into growing its influence and promoting and defending Free Software and Digital Freedom? It is, after all, an integral part of its mission per its very Statutes. If yes, do you have ideas on what should be done about this?

8. What's your idea to let TDF membership become more appealing? Currently, the only difference from being Community member and TDF member is the possibility to vote and be voted for TDF's governance, and it's fine, but can you imagine anything to encourage more Community members to become also part of TDF?

9. How do you view your (potential) role as a member of the board of directors, given that this position does not give you any specific functional role inside the LibreOffice or Document Liberation projects?

10. What is the biggest problem of the foundation in your opinion? What is its biggest opportunity?

11. If they will occur, how do you think to handle conflicts within the board?

On behalf of the Membership Committee,
Marina Latini

[0] https://listarchives.tdf.io/i/tFJzSYUUGcSjf0c0NtNiEOou

[caolan]

1. Do you commit yourself to have enough time and the necessary
technological tools in order to participate to the regularly scheduled
board calls?

Sure.

2. Do you commit yourself to follow up and work on (at least) the main
items and actions you will volunteer to oversee or that will be
assigned to you by the board?

Sure.

3. What is your willingness to delegate decisions, especially in lack
of time?

I'm happy to delegate.

4. What are your views on the foundation's budget? How should the money
be spent, besides our fixed costs?

I'm particularly keen on funding for elements on the ESC suggested
tenders: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Development/Budget2021 and
similar where there isn't currently sufficient existing activity.

5. Should we work towards broadening our pool of contributors, both
technical and non-technical?

Sure, though we should be sure we also retain what we have.

6. What actions do you suggest to increase the engagement and
participation of volunteers from local communities around the world
in project's activities?

I think obviously covid has seriously hindered the ability to host in-
person conferences and regional meetups so it's difficult to maintain
energy without that regular face to face boost. Hopefully in the coming
year circumstances improve to allow those to return.

7. Should the Foundation -as an entity distinct from the LibreOffice
project or the Document Liberation project- engage into growing its
influence and promoting and defending Free Software and Digital
Freedom?

wrt to promotion and defense, I'd like The foundation to also consider
risks to the other projects that LibreOffice depends on; spell checking
and hyphenation engines, spellchecking and hyphenation dictionaries,
document liberation project filters, specialized spreadsheet external
dependencies, cmis libraries and existence of fonts that are metrically
equivalent to important competitors.

If yes, do you have ideas on what should be done about this?

I'd like to see our dependencies recognized and categorized into what
risks they pose if they were to go dark. Perhaps there is potential to
more effectively cooperate with Mozilla Foundation where there is some
overlap on some of these technologies.

8. What's your idea to let TDF membership become more appealing?
Currently, the only difference from being Community member and TDF
member is the possibility to vote and be voted for TDF's governance,
and it's fine, but can you imagine anything to encourage more
Community members to become also part of TDF?

I was unaware there was a gulf between the numbers of community members
and actual TDF members. I'd be interesting in knowing the numbers and
if there are identifiable subgroups of community members that feel it's
undesirable, unnecessary or pointless to be TDF members.

9. How do you view your (potential) role as a member of the board of
directors, given that this position does not give you any specific
functional role inside the LibreOffice or Document Liberation
projects?

I'd hope to act as a bridge to the development community, not just on
LibreOffice itself, but as a sometimes contributor to a wider set of
related projects.

10. What is the biggest problem of the foundation in your opinion?

Vulnerability to the loss of one or more of the larger employers of
developers that contribute to LibreOffice.

What is its biggest opportunity?

LibreOffice is an established project and there is considerable good
will held towards it and the foundation.

11. If they will occur, how do you think to handle conflicts within
the board?

I'm reasonably confident I can remain even handed if a problem arises.