Video: The Art of Community Source Within Sakai
I have been doing some thinking about the right way to govern Community Source recently. Sakai has been “experimenting” with what it means to be Community Source since 2004. We wonder if Community Source is different than Open Source and if so, how it it different.
Several things have triggered me to think more deeply about this in the last few weeks:
o Approaching first six months of being on the Sakai Board of Directors
o The Review of the Sakai Product Council after one year of its existence
o Seeing the Jono Bacon talk about the “Art of Community”
o Thinking about the upcoming Sakai Conference in Denver and thinking about the kinds of conversations that will happen there
So I decided to make and record a presentation that I titled, “The Art of Community Source” – with full homage to Jono Bacon’s book and talk title :).
Abstract
I start out by reviewing Jono Bacon’s (Ubuntu Community Manager) book and presentation titled “The Art of Community” and describe some of the concepts that come from Jono’s work. I then apply Jono’s terminology to the Moodle, Blackboard, Python, Apache, and Kuali projects to develop a way to categorize open and community source efforts. I then look at Sakai’s changing view of ‘Community Source’ as we transitioned from one executive director (me) to another (Michael Korkuska). I review what I see as the strengths and weaknesses of community structure under both leaders and then suggest how we can improve our current structure – in particular – how we need to adjust our definition of the Sakai Product Council to remove some of the tension in our current structure.
My Slides: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~csev/talks/2010/2010-05-08-art-of-community-source.pdf
Jono Bacon’s Talk: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKOrWubmzAY
Jono Bacon’s Web Site: http://www.artofcommunityonline.org/
I continue down the path I lay out in this talk in more detail in my review and comments of the Sakai Product Council. I have some recommendations as to how to adjust the remit of the Product Council going forward at:
http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/display/MGT/Chuck+Product+Council+Review+Comments
As always – comments are welcome.
An interesting presentation, Chuck. I agree that adding the Jono’s terminology clarifies the discussion. As to your conclusions, balancing the Read and Write communities in Sakai does need some work, IMO. Your specific suggestion of changing the Product Council to a Community Council is a bit vague. The devil is in the details and we need to explore those details to really understand the costs and benefits of such a change. In general, I agree that the Sakai Write community needs more autonomy. I like bringing the Kuali project model into Sakai and I think it would help quite a bit, but making that shift will require strong ED leadership.
- Mark
Mark, the devil is in the details – but there is no way to know all of the details in advance so you need to start somewhere. The PC was chartered as a one-year experiment with an evaluation at the end so that the PC could “work out the details”. My conclusion after that experiment year is that the PC as currently chartered is the *wrong answer*. So I am proposing to make 2.5 simple changes and then again experiment for a year and see if the details work out better next year. My changes are very simple: (a) remove all hints of dejure authority the PC, (b) vest the entire authority in 2.x direction in a single group – effectively combining the MT and RT, and (c) let Sakai 3.x/Nakumura come up with its own structure and let that structure guide Sakai / Nakumura. And then try that arrangement for a year and re-evaluate. I am sure we will find ways to improve the structure after another year – but I am quite convinced that a structure with my proposed changes will not be worse than the current arrangement.
This seems like a reasonable approach to me, but doing it while we are between Executive Director’s seems like begging for trouble when the new one appears. If these changes are made now, isn’t the Sakai BOD doing the kind of thing you want them to get out of? OTOH, maybe on or two moves at that level are required to actually get out of that business. You might try to get an opinion out of Lois, as the acting ED.
I did not come up with the timing of the PC review. Lois initiated the review because it was when we agreed to do the review. So this is the time to make comments or we just rubber-stamp the PC. Of course the new ED may have a significantly different view regarding community structure. Perhaps after the review is done we hold off until we have a new ED before we truly make the changes. But at the same time if the comity wants to organize itself In a particular manner then wouldn’t it make sense for the ED to support community directions?
Chuck
I haven’t looked at your material yet, but I have a simple perspective on your initial question, the distinction between Open Source and Community Source. In my view, the difference lies in the role of the institution/employer. We largely use open source practices, but since most contributors are employees of a host institution and the host institution is the adopter of the software, there is a different dynamic when it comes to what gets done. I don’t think I care to try and pin down exactly how its different, but it is apparent to me that it is different.
OK watched your presentation. Interestingly (to me) I think the role the Product Council members see themselves fulfilling (at least me) matches very well your definition of the Community Council. The issue perhaps is the perception that they are what you suggest or act in the way you suggest. I don’t see it that way, but the impression is strong among those outside the product council who look for power structures, either to use them or to resist them. :-) In my view, all we would need to do to fit your new vision is change the name. Another way of looking at this is to say, even if we did the work to promote the idea of Community Council, it might end up being perceived as having the same flaws as the product council by those looking for power structures…
John – if what you say were even close to being true, it would be lovely and frankly none of this would have been necessary. But the only tangible things the PC has done in the past year was (a) acted as the single and final authority regarding tool promotion for 2.7 and (b) debated about just how much power it really had. Oh yeah and there was that thankfully short discussion about the PC’s view on the end-of-life for Sakai 2.x. All I am asking for is clarity on the “the PC is not structure for those seeking power” – the name change is only trying to make the “elevator speech” about the role of the CC/PC simpler and more quickly understood. A good experiment would be to make all Sakai 2.8 technical decisions in a Sakai 2.x structure made up of the Sakai 2.x participants – so 2.8 tool promotion decisions would be done by a 2.8 PMC – do you think that the PC would tolerate this – or send in the PC lawyers and gendarmes to shut down the upstart 2.8 PMC?