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It's important for me that the Council represents the wishes of
Thunderbird end users, both current and potential ones. In order to
do that, I think transparency is an important aspect.<br>
<p>For your information, following are some motions / votes that I
had proposed to the Thunderbird Council in the last year. I do not
include the results or responses, because I speak for myself only.</p>
<p><br>
</p>
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<p><b>Transparency of Council motions</b><br>
2018-01-24<br>
</p>
<p>Motion: </p>
<p>In order for the public to follow the decisions and the work of
the council, the motions, votes and decisions should be made
public in a public log.<br>
</p>
<p>Each vote log should include:<br>
</p>
<ul>
<li>Date and time when the vote was started and closed<br>
</li>
<li>For each Council member:</li>
<ul>
<li>How they voted: YES, NO, ABSTAIN, or ABSENT (no vote in
time)</li>
<li>Any additional comments they made in the same email when
they voted, e.g. for justification, or conditions for their
vote, or anything else they would like to add.</li>
</ul>
</ul>
Rarely, sensitive matters might be discussed. Examples are mostly
monetary numbers (salaries, business numbers etc.). These sensitive
matters may be removed from the public notes. In this case, they
should be replaced by black bars, to inform the public that there
were parts removed and how much was removed. The bar for removal
from the public vote log should be very high (meaning as little as
possible should be removed), mostly just monetary numbers).<br>
<p>Why important:<br>
</p>
<p>It allows accountability, followup in the implementation, and
allows new Council member candidates to prepare for the coming
job.</p>
<p><br>
</p>
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<p><b>Transparency of Council meetings</b><br>
2018-01-24<br>
</p>
<p> </p>
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<p>Motion:</p>
<p>In order for the public to follow the decisions and the work of
the council, the agenda and meeting notes of the weekly Council
meetings shall be made public. For example, on a blog dedicated to
it. The blog may be syndicated to the main Thunderbird blog, or
not, that's TBD.</p>
<p>The notes should include:</p>
<ul>
<li>Date of the meeting</li>
<li>Attendants</li>
<li>Agenda, which is set before the meeting</li>
<li>Topics, which were actually discussed during the meeting<br>
For each topic:</li>
<li>Notes of what was discussed. At the very least, which options
were proposed.</li>
<li>Decisions made, and (if discussed) rationale why.</li>
<li>Who voted how / for which option</li>
<li>Action items, and who will take care of it.</li>
</ul>
Occasionally, sensitive matters might be discussed. Examples are
business who asked for confidentiality, matters concerning specific
employees, and any monetary numbers (salaries, business proposal
etc.). These sensitive matters may be removed from the public notes.
In this case, they should be replaced by black bars, to inform the
public that there were parts removed and how much was removed.
<p>Why important:<br>
</p>
<p>I think this is an easy action that will greatly increase the
transparency of the Council work to contributors, donors and the
public. I think it will greatly improve the public view of the TB
Council and its work, and also help in collaboration with the
community. It allows outside feedback to matters we currently
discuss.</p>
<p> </p>
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<br>
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<p><b>Transparency of Council mailing list</b><br>
2018-01-24<br>
</p>
<p>Rationale:</p>
<p>There is a lot of discussion happening on the TB Council mailing
list. It is intended only for TB Council members, and rightly so,
as this is our way to discuss and meet. However, the vast majority
of TB Council mailing list discussions are *not* inherently
confidential or sensitive. I think it would do the community a lot
of good for these discussions to be public.<br>
</p>
<p>Motion:</p>
<p>The Thunderbird council mailing list is a moderated mailing list,
whereby TB Council members have no posting restrictions and others
can post only moderated, for exceptional circumstances when they
need to talk to the entire council, for example business proposals
or interaction with Mozilla. Public discussion with the community
should happen on tb-planning.</p>
<p>However, for the community to be able to follow and have
pertinent input to discussions *before* decisions are made, the
Thunderbird mailing list has a <b>publicly readable archive</b>.</p>
<p>It may also allow read-only subscriptions, that's TBD. The idea
is not that the community directly engages in TB Council
discussions, but can read and follow them.</p>
<p>Importance:</p>
<ul>
<li>Allows community to follow TB Council work, if interested</li>
<li>Allows community to give feedback (in other channels, not on
tb-council mailing list) to discussions before decisions are
made and final</li>
<li>Gives a public record, which prevents foul play</li>
<li>Increases trust and transparency</li>
<li>Shows activity</li>
</ul>
<p><br>
</p>
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