[DECISION] Approve letter to Berlin authorities, authorize Florian to send

Hello,

the following decision, which has been taken in private on 2024-08-12, is now made public in accordance with our statutes.

The text of the letter is not published yet, as it is an ongoing legal matter.

Florian

with the change of the board composition, I now propose the following VOTE again:

  1. The board approves the following (German) text as reply to the Berlin authorities.

  2. The board authorizes Florian to send it on behalf of TDF.

The vote runs 72h from now.

The Board of Directors at the time of voting consists of 7 seat holders (not including deputies). In order to be quorate, the vote needs to have 1/2 or more of the Board of Directors members, which gives 4.

A total of 5 Board of Directors members have participated in the vote.

The vote is quorate.

Result of vote:
5 approvals: Paolo, Italo, Sophie, Osvaldo, Eliane; deputy Mike supports the motion as well
0 abstain
0 disapprovals

Decision: The proposal has been accepted.

Where is the archive of outgoing TDF correspondence, in which we can find a copy of that letter?

We don’t publish in- and outgoing correspondence, at least yet. As you see from all the recent publications, I am a big fan of transparency. However, in general publishing all documents is maybe not what’s feasible, that’s why the statutes also limit what needs to be published.

It at least requires quite some time to make proper redactions and review all the documents, to not expose personal details, which in light of the current situation at TDF is something hard to afford.

The document refered here was about an ongoing legal situation where TDF is in touch with the authorities. That alone makes publishing documents harder, even more because TDF community members are involved in this situation.

If you have any references how other organizations publish their documents I‘d be interested in a pointer.

  1. You must publish them, the statutes say so.
  2. You don’t even disclose them to the trustees, which is just a slap in our faces. We’re supposed to be in charge - collectively - of an organization which keeps us blind on matters it discusses with outside entities.
  3. Yes, it does “require quite some time to make proper redactions” - which part of why the foundations’ affrairs are required to conducted publicly. Confidentiality is reserved for extra-ordinary matters. But somehow, almost anything of any significance is kept secret and there are endless redactions.

The statutes say what needs to be made public is „the processes, discussions and decisions of the foundation, its committees, the Board of Directors and any Executive Directors, including minutes of meetings“. It does not mention related documents or contracts. We can now discuss the statute interpretation for ages, but things will run in circles.

You can see if from a practical PoV. Imagine TDF enters into a contract with you. The documents contain your address, your phone number and other personal details. Alongside, we have a little chat. Would you feel comfortable in having all of that published?

I am happy to discuss a feasible, sensitive way to ensure more transparency. „You must do it“, however, is not a helpful start.

  • A letter is something that has already been disclosed to an outside entity. The presumption to then prevent trustees from reading it preposterous to the extent that nobody would bother forbiddin this specifically in a set of statutes.
  • Correspondence with state parties are definitely a process of the foundation. And if you were to say “but that clause regards internal processes”, then there’s also the fact that:
  • The clause regarding publication requirements is only intended to extend further obligation to publish - beyond what is naturally outwardly-facing into documents/content created internally.

Now for the practical example: The TDF is a foundation dedicated to a public cause. Naturally, formal correspondence with it needs to be a matter of public record; and any contracts must be easily accessible and discoverable by public search. Yes, that would include the amount of money a contractor would be paid for services rendered. As for an informal chat - it’s informal, and thus does not require record-keeping or disclosure. But if that chat is to have any formal consequence, be the basis of a meaningful decision of the TDF (and is outside the scope of a personal private matter), then it should be repeated on-record and made public. Yes, there are exceptions to this - but we have turned that on its head, and made secrecy the default and disclosure the exception. Exceptions should be reserved for exceptional situation and be very limited even then - in the amount kept confidential and in the length of the period of confidentiality.

Finally, about the discussion you suggest - it cannot be divorced from its context. I’m just a trustee, and an oppositionary one at that, shouting into the wind. If an agreement is not reached, I would be left to just sulk; and you - i.e. the BoD and yourself - can go on doing whatever you like, with no oversight and probably no consequences. In this state of affairs, my audience for these forum replies are my peer trustees. When and if the power relations change - and the default on disagreement is not just status quo ante - then a discussion might be meaningful.

I explained why what you ask for is not mandated by the statutes. You keep on telling me, the statutes author, what they say.

I asked how other organizations handle this to be inspired by that.

I also made a real-life example.

Yet, I see no constructive discussion, but accusations I could do whatever I want with no consequences.

I do now „what I want“: I‘ll not engage in this discussion further until it gets constructive. I have other critical items to focus on.