[MEI-L] MEI organization

[Axel Teich Geertinger]

Hi Johannes

One of the things I like about the current council is its relative openness to new members, but of course this is possible only within certain limits as long as the council is also the body responsible for the formal part of the organization. So I think it would be the logical consequence to have this entirely open general assembly to substitute the ever-growing council, which quickly will become too large to work efficiently as the executive board while on the other hand being too limited to accommodate everyone who wants to contribute somehow or participate in the discussions. So yes, as long as the meetings of the general assembly are actively facilitated by the board, I see no need for another organizational body in between the board and the community. 
I am aware that a dedicated conference every year is not realistic, so of course the annual gathering could be connected to other events. Workshops etc. are also terrific opportunities. Surely we have to be pragmatic in that respect; also, limiting the travels involved by combining events wouldn't hurt. This way, perhaps it would even be possible to have more than one annual MEI-community-related event, some of which may very well have a more local focus. And of course they wouldn't even have to be "official" MEI events organized by the board. I am thinking of events such as your excellent Edirom Summer School :-)

Best,
Axel

-----Oprindelig meddelelse-----
Fra: mei-l [mailto:mei-l-bounces at lists.uni-paderborn.de] På vegne af Johannes Kepper
Sendt: 9. maj 2014 10:37
Til: Music Encoding Initiative
Emne: Re: [MEI-L] MEI organization

Dear Axel,

thanks for answering. Just to make sure I get it right: All you would like to see is one official meeting of the community per year, but not a separate organizational body with defined ways to enter or leave. This means we would remove the special status from all current council members[1], and just make them members of the General Assembly, which would be nothing more than the group of community members assembling at some venue. There would be no elections, no terms, no organizational requirements. 

Is this correct? If so, would it be ok for you to have a dedicated Music Encoding Conference only every other year, and a general assembly meeting at some other related venue in the years between? Personally, I'm not sure if we have sufficient oomph to run a full-blown conference every year[2], but it should be fairly easy to organize sessions at MLA, DH, TEI, IMS or other conferences. But of course, if there is sufficient interest in having (and hosting) annual conferences on our own, we can do that as well ;-)

Best,
Johannes



[1] Of course they will always remain honored founding members of the Music Encoding Initiative :-) [2] What I would like to see, though, are more informal developer workshops every year. Do you think this would rule out parts of the community, even if these workshops would be open to anyone? 



Am 09.05.2014 um 10:03 schrieb Axel Teich Geertinger <atge at kb.dk>:

> Dear Johannes and others
>  
> Thank you for bringing up the question about the current MEI council. I was one of those concerned about its future when we started this discussion last year, because I believe that it is the one of the most valuable resources we have both in terms of development and spreading the word.
> From my perspective, all of the proposals imply splitting up the council in a smaller, elected group (the board) while making the rest simply members of the community or general assembly. In order not to lose the engagement and enthusiasm of the current council I think it is crucial to ensure in any future organizational model that the general assembly, which is open to all members, convenes regularly (say, once a year; most conveniently in combination with a conference). This may not have been sufficiently described in the proposals, but I actually think this should be formalized too to make sure the active members of the community get the chance to meet regularly. In my view, the general assembly substitutes the informal work of the current council, while the board takes over the council's formal and administrative functions.
>  
> Best, Axel
>  
> Fra: mei-l [mailto:mei-l-bounces at lists.uni-paderborn.de] På vegne af 
> Giuliano Di Bacco
> Sendt: 8. maj 2014 21:27
> Til: Music Encoding Initiative
> Emne: Re: [MEI-L] MEI organization
>  
> 
> Also from my personal perspective:
> 1- I always assumed that the current Council would remain in place 
> until the future Board is installed;
> 2- the conference is approaching, and I see this as a precious opportunity for both informal and formal discussion. So (at this point) I would wait until the end of it to draw any conclusion. Then the proposals could be fine-tuned and re-submitted for final discussion and approval to the list. As for Benjamin's excellent idea, we could attach a resumé of all pros/cons that people will have expressed so far (I am sure that those members of the Strat-group who will be in Charlottesville would be happy to collect more opinions--certainly I would). 
> Best,
> Giuliano
> 
> 
> Benjamin Wolff Bohl wrote on 08/05/2014 11:01:
> Dear Johannes,
> thanks for your questions, tah I'll answer below from my personal perspective:
> 
> Am 06.05.2014 21:18, schrieb Johannes Kepper:
> Dear all,
>  
> thanks to those that did respond to the strategy group's proposals. 
> For those who didn't - it's not too late, please give some feedback 
> and help us to shape the future MEI. You can find the document with 
> the proposals at
>  
> https://docs.google.com/document/d/1IBvbKFM1fo4lwyFnIYnneUhfwTj4DLrAmt
> CSUfqzeQs/edit?usp=sharing
>  
> Since we're approaching the conference, I'd like to ask some questions. 
>  
> - All proposals don't make a statement about the current MEI Council. 
> Was this an intentional decision? If I remember correctly, there was 
> some concern about this group last year. I know that it won't be easy 
> to find a solution for this one, but I think we should address it in 
> one way or the other.
> 
> This is a great hint, I guess we just missed to articulate anything about this. From my part I always was assuming, that any new Board would replace the "current Council" but others might have another opinion?! 
> 
> 
> - At first glance, it seems that the first proposal triggered most feedback. Would it be a correct observation that most in the community prefer this over the other two _in principle_, but still would like to clarify some details about it? Please don't get me wrong - I don't want to get rid of the other two proposals, I just want to get a sense of where we are drifting. If you think my impression is wrong (which is perfectly possible), please disagree - either here on MEI-L or in the document linked above. If you like the other proposals (or aspects of them), please speak up - the sooner the better. Please remember that the google document gives the possibility of anonymous feedback, if you prefer. 
> 
> Getting a feeling if general tendencies towards one of the proposals would be indeed very interesting! Nevertheless the comment frequency is not to be taken as general tendency towards one or the other... for example Raffaele shared a quite good argument for Model B over this list:
> 
> 
> In general, I prefer Model B: it's lean and reflects well the size of the community. It also keeps the focus on the Guidelines and releases, which I agree with Sigfrid are the most important product of this community. I feel model B will allows us to move forward without having to jump through too many administrative hoops, while tasking people with essential admin responsibilities.
> 
> Maybe we should try come up with a general pros-and-cons list for each Model?
> 
> 
> Thanks,
> Benjamin
> 
> 
>  
>  
> Thanks again for your interest and participation. 
> Best,
> Johannes
>  
>  
>  
>  
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