charter: revised membership rules #142
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| # Technical Steering Committee (TSC) Charter | ||
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| ## Section 1. Guiding Principle. | ||
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| The Node.js Foundation will operate transparently, openly, | ||
| collaboratively, and ethically. Project proposals, timelines, and status | ||
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@@ -34,20 +34,21 @@ individual project scope and direction while they remain within the scope | |
| and direction of the policies as described in the TSC Policy document and | ||
| approved by the Board. | ||
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| ## Section 4. Establishment of the TSC. | ||
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| TSC memberships are not time-limited. There is no maximum size of the TSC. | ||
| The size is expected to vary in order to ensure adequate coverage of important | ||
| areas of expertise, balanced with the ability to make decisions efficiently. | ||
| The TSC must have at least three members. | ||
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There was a problem hiding this comment. Perhaps add: "Members are expected to speak and act in the best interests of the Node.js Foundation and open source projects." There was a problem hiding this comment. That's something that I think is better left to a separate PR. |
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| There is no specific set of requirements or qualifications for TSC | ||
| membership beyond these rules. The TSC may add additional members to the | ||
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There was a problem hiding this comment. Should Foundation membership be a requirement? There was a problem hiding this comment. That would contradict the By-Laws:
There was a problem hiding this comment. Thanks @williamkapke, clearer now that I read your comment above :) |
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| TSC by a standard TSC motion and vote. A TSC member may be removed from the | ||
| TSC by voluntary resignation, by a standard TSC motion, or in accordance to the | ||
| participation rules described below. | ||
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| Changes to TSC membership should be posted in the agenda, and may be suggested | ||
| as any other agenda item. | ||
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There was a problem hiding this comment. Perhaps: Nominations for TSC membership should be... as any other agenda item by any member of the community (i.e. not just current TSC members). There was a problem hiding this comment. I think this is saying that any collaborator can suggest adding someone to the TSC by adding the There was a problem hiding this comment. That's what I understand too, but was suggesting perhaps we might state it more clearly. Note that only repo admins can label issues. Or at least I can't label issues in the TSC repo at the moment 😄 . |
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| No more than one-fourth of the TSC members may be affiliated with the | ||
| same employer. If removal or resignation of a TSC member, or a change of | ||
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@@ -56,14 +57,32 @@ one-fourth of the TSC membership shares an employer, then the situation | |
| must be immediately remedied by the resignation or removal of one or more | ||
| TSC members affiliated with the over-represented employer(s). | ||
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| The TSC may, at its discretion, invite any number of non-voting observers to | ||
| participate in the public portion of TSC discussions and meetings. | ||
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| The TSC shall meet regularly using tools that enable participation by the | ||
| community (e.g. weekly on a Google Hangout On Air, or through any other | ||
| appropriate means selected by the TSC). The meeting shall be directed by | ||
| the TSC Chairperson. Responsibility for directing individual meetings may be | ||
| delegated by the TSC Chairperson to any other TSC member. Minutes or an | ||
| appropriate recording shall be taken and made available to the community | ||
| through accessible public postings. | ||
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| TSC members are expected to regularly participate in all TSC activities | ||
| including: | ||
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| * Regular attendance in TSC meetings; | ||
| * Actively participating in TSC related discussions on GitHub; and | ||
| * Voting | ||
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| In the case where an individual TSC member: (a) attends fewer than 25% of the | ||
| regularly scheduled meetings held within a six month period, (b) does not attend | ||
| at least one meeting every three months, (c) does not regularly participate in | ||
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There was a problem hiding this comment. (b) is superfluous, it's a weaker version of (a). There was a problem hiding this comment. @bnoordhuis But it's not. E.g., per month: There was a problem hiding this comment. In a six month period we have 13 meetings. If you attend 25% of those, that's 3 meetings. If you only attend one meeting every three months, that's 2 meetings in that same period. Ergo, if you meet requirement (a), you by definition also meet (b). Unless (b) covers the hypothetical scenario of attending 25% of the meetings in the first 3 months, then zero in the second 3 months. That seems needlessly confusing though, just say "25% attendance per 3 months" and leave it at that. There was a problem hiding this comment. As well, this section could be clearer if the TSC member needs to meet any or all of the requirements. There is an "and" buried in there but it's rather subtle and it could be interpreted as combining only (c) and (d). There was a problem hiding this comment. I'm good with simplifying this. +1 to 25% every three months. There was a problem hiding this comment. Food(s) for thought: |
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| TSC discussions, and (d) does not regularly participate in TSC votes, the member | ||
| shall be asked to voluntarily resign their TSC position. Should a member fail to | ||
| participate in *any* TSC activity within a six month period, the member shall be | ||
| automatically removed from the TSC. In such cases, the member may request to | ||
| continue as an invited observer to TSC meetings. | ||
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There was a problem hiding this comment. If we do this I think it technically needs to have a clause that it cannot drop below 3 people. Also, I feel 6 months could be a bit short? Unsure. |
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| ## Section 5. Responsibilities of the TSC. | ||
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| If an agenda item cannot reach a consensus a TSC member can call for | ||
| either a closing vote or a vote to table the issue to the next meeting. | ||
| The call for a vote must be seconded by a majority of the TSC or else the | ||
| discussion will continue. Simple majority wins with exception given only to | ||
| removal of a member from the TSC, which shall require a two-thirds majority | ||
| vote to approve. | ||
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There was a problem hiding this comment. I think it's weird and hard to defend that you can get in on a hypothetical 51% majority but expulsion requires 66%. It should either stay the way it is or it should be 51% for both. There was a problem hiding this comment. The idea is to intentionally make the bar higher for removing and for adding. I highly doubt there will ever actually be a need to officially vote someone off the island, but should it happen, the bar should be high. There was a problem hiding this comment. I agree, but vice versa, how likely is it that someone is nominated that gets 51% but not 66% approval? And if that ever did that happen, does that person really belong on the TSC? Votes have always been unanimous so far. I'd stick with the current 2/3rds majority for both just because it's more congruent. There was a problem hiding this comment. The motivation for lowering to 51% is that it's proven hard to get 66%. It's not that there are >33% "no" votes, but that there is usually >33% "didn't vote." It's currently really hard to get enough people to vote so that we have >66% "yes" votes, even when everyone who voted did vote "yes" There was a problem hiding this comment. I see your point, but by that logic removal should be 51% too. There was a problem hiding this comment. If anything it makes less sense for removal to have a higher bar because most removals happen when it becomes difficult to make quorum, which would mean 66% is near impossible if you're having regular quorum issues. I've said this many times but we should 1) try to never resort to votes and when we do have to vote 2) stick to simple majorities. Raising the bar above a simple majority favors a lack of change and progress, makes it more difficult to get things done, and puts an undue burden on those who must convince their peers to enact changes compared to those who do not. There was a problem hiding this comment. Good points, upon further reflection, I can get behind making everything a simple majority, including member removal. |
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| Note that, in addition to requiring a simple majority vote of the TSC, all | ||
| changes to this charter are also subject to approval from the Node.js | ||
| Foundation board. | ||
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| ## Section 9. Project Roles | ||
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Maybe a good thing to have... but it begs the question of what happens if this minimum isn't met?
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A good question indeed. I would guess board intervention of some sort, perhaps dissolution of the remaining TSC?
Thinking out loud here, I don't think this is likely to happen, but if it were, I suspect that would mean something has gone really wrong and the project would be without leadership. I'm not saying that the TSC is itself project leadership, but that many people leaving the TSC would probably be because of some sort of exodus on a larger scale. In other words, I think it's really unlikely for this event to occur in a vacuum.
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Indeed, it's exceedingly unlikely. If the membership were to even get close to falling below that number, I would suspect that the separate CTC and TSC bodies would remerge into one. If that were to fall below 3 members, then we'd really be in trouble.