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id="docs-internal-guid-c0a332a8-3355-e63f-717b-e17409b23de5"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">Dear
Community,</span></p>
<br>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">on
Thursday we had our second meeting with the new council. Aside
from checking in on progress from last week’s action items we
talked about the technical implementation of Thunderbird based
on Ben's proposal also to be found on tb-planning. We then
delved into thoughts on how we should handle partnerships and
briefly discussed progress on the build and release position we
plan to hire for.</span></p>
<br>
<p dir="ltr"
style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">On
the topic of technical implementation there was general
agreement that by starting from scratch like Ben proposed would
allow an implementation to move faster than gradually adapting
the codebase, since there would be no legacy code to worry
about. We also agree that we need to make sure that users still
feel it is Thunderbird, which also includes the general look.
But there are also other important factors that would justify
doing a gradual migration instead of a rewrite, and due to
differing opinions we did not come to an agreement on this topic
for the moment.</span></p>
<br>
<p dir="ltr"
style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">Regardless
of which approach is chosen, the financial aspect must not be
forgotten. In order to support our community we will have to
hire multiple developers and with the amount of technical work
that these tasks encompass, we need a solid financial plan to
make sure we can cover the costs. We believe that donations are
only part of the picture and are looking for further
opportunities.</span></p>
<br>
<p dir="ltr"
style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">We
then moved on to a discussion on how we would achieve
partnerships and what kind of partnerships make sense. To some,
partnerships are considered advertising, an area that needs to
be treated very carefully. We also need to make sure that any
partnerships we enter do not hurt our credibility and bring a
benefit to our community. In the end we decided to table the
discussion, as it will be easier to make partnership agreements
when we have a financial home.</span></p>
<br>
<p dir="ltr"
style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">Finally
we discussed some open questions on the build and release
engineering position. Ideally we'd like to have someone capable
of both fixing issues in the build system and release
automation, but also equipped to help us move to a new
continuous integration system (which may or may not be Mozilla's
TaskCluster system).</span></p>
<br>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">We
will meet again this week to continue the hiring discussion,
also for other roles. We will keep you updated when the
positions are finally open.</span></p>
<br>
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style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">I
hope you enjoyed today's update. As always, we are open to your
feedback. Note also there is an open thread on the technical
implementation, related feedback may be better placed in the
existing thread.</span></p>
<br>
<span
style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Arial;color:#000000;background-color:transparent;font-weight:400;font-style:normal;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;">--
Philipp, on behalf of the Thunderbird Council</span>
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