I believe that the current situation is the result of a history of years of miscommunication (probably, the worst example of communication I have witnessed in the past 50 years as a communicator) and its consequences. Today, it is difficult to trace back what we can define as original sin, because the problems have superimposed themselves on the problems, to the point that there are opposing but equally legitimate interpretations for each of them, obviously depending on the point of view.
I do not believe that anyone has ever deliberately acted against the law, but that bad communication has crystallised the respective opposing positions, and this has meant that those who had a majority in the BoD have tried to use legal advice in an instrumental way, to support their point of view.
If the first legal opinion that raised the issue of trademark licences had been immediately followed up, today - years later - we would not still be discussing how to solve the problem, which is now crossed with tenders and other issues.
And here we come to the two examples cited by Michael.
Personally, I believe that the decision to use the term LibreOffice Enterprise was an egregious error, the result of the BoD’s misinformation of the law firm ( the BoD completely ignoring the decisions made by the BoD itself in approving the marketing plan). An egregious error, which today - in light of other definitions - should in my personal opinion be categorised as a partial misuse of TDF funds.
Moreover, since - unlike others - I am perfectly aware that it is possible to make mistakes even in good faith, I protested against the decision at the time but was completely ignored by the BoD, despite the fact that I was the one who had written the rules (and therefore knew them perfectly well), but I did not accuse anyone of criminal behaviour, as others have done several times for even much less serious things. Let us also say that the fact that my protest was ignored is perfectly in line with the incredible number of mistakes made by the BoD in 2020/2022 and 2022/2024.
As far as the Procurement Policy is concerned, I have already made it clear that the errors contained in the first version that was published have been corrected in a version 1.1 that I hope will be published as soon as possible, and that in any case even version 1.1 cannot be considered final because it only addresses a partial case of tenders, i.e. those for which the skills are widely distributed within the community and not concentrated within the companies of the ecosystem. A fact that is quite obvious to those who have even a minimal knowledge of LibreOffice developers, such as myself, but evidently not obvious to those who have an obviously inferior knowledge to mine but think instead that they have a good grasp of the project.
Once all this has been clarified, I repeat my point of view for the umpteenth time.
At this time, I believe it is appropriate for everyone to avoid going back over points that have already been clarified, as if the clarifications had never happened, or to continue in accusations that are almost always the result - to a large extent - of communication crimes committed in the past by the majority of BoD members (this is a professional judgement, for which I can provide all the supporting evidence).
I believe that it would be much better for everyone to do a good examination of conscience, with a cool head, trying to understand how and where we may have gone wrong by creating in others the perceptions that - in the long run - turned into the current frictions. Assuming that we have all done something wrong, and nothing we have done is perfect. Not even in all those cases where we are adamantly convinced that we have done the right thing, even from a legal point of view.