On 6/17/2010 5:35 PM, phoebe ayers wrote:
OK, so I guess my question is (and we talked about
this on IRC too) --
who has the power or the ability -- or who *should*, in a perfect
world -- create such a committee? We don't have much precedent for
this. There were concerns over who or what body can create
governance/oversight structures, particularly if this isn't really
just a Foundation issue.
I suppose the board could create the committee, if it's not clear who
else might have the authority. Or perhaps better, the board could
authorize its creation. I think the board is a bit reluctant to jump in,
partly for the reason Sue mentioned that overseeing Wikimania is not
really a board-level issue (it's primarily operational rather than
strategic), but also because the board is not well placed to fill and
maintain committees like this. When it becomes a situation of appointing
people none of us really knows, or feeling that there are probably
people we're not aware who ought to be recruited to a committee like
this, it's pretty uncomfortable to have that responsibility. But if we
authorized the committee and then let the staff and experienced
Wikimania volunteers review applications or expressions of interest to
join the committee, that might work out. That's kind of the direction
things have moved in any case. Some of the early committees that still
function have evolved to a place outside the board's immediate activity,
and the current work of the governance committee is focused more on
structures needed to organize the board's own functions.
--Michael Snow