Hello Pydotorg:
Could you please post the following "PSF board meeting minutes" online,
http://www.python.org/psf/records/board/minutes/ at the usual web
locations:
please see the attachment for the approved board meeting minutes for
April 2012.
If you have any questions, please let me know.
Thanks,
Pat
--
Pat Campbell
PSF Administrator/Secretary
pat...@python.org
Title: 2012-04-30 PSF Board Meeting Minutes
Encoding: utf-8
Author: p...@python.org
Content-Type: text/x-rst
.. declare custom role for action items:
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| The Python Software Foundation
| Minutes of a Regular Meeting of the Board of Directors
|
| April 30, 2012
|
|
A regular meeting of the Python Software Foundation ("PSF") Board of
Directors was held over Internet Relay Chat beginning at 16:00 UTC, 30
April 2012. Steve Holden presided at the meeting. Pat Campbell
prepared the minutes.
All votes are reported in the form "*Y-N-A*" (*in favor ââ¬â opposed
ââ¬â
abstentions*; e.g. "5-1-2" means "5 in favor, 1 opposed, and 2
abstentions").
.. sectnum::
.. contents::
Attendance
==========
The following members of the new Board of Directors (11 of ll) were present at
the meeting: Brian Curtin, Steve Holden, Andrew Kuchling, Marc-Andre Lemburg,
Van Lindberg, Martin von Löwis, Jessica McKellar, David Mertz, Doug Napoleone
[arrived at 12:12], Jesse Noller, and Tim Peters. Also in attendance were
Kurt Kaiser (Treasurer) and Pat Campbell (Secretary/Administrator).
Minutes of Past Meetings
========================
The 26 March 2012 Board meeting minutes were voted on and approved.
**RESOLVED**, that the minutes at http://mail.python.org/mailman/private
/psf-board/2012-April/016746.html be accepted as a true and accurate record
of the March meeting.
Approved, 8-0-1.
Votes Taken Between Meetings
=============================
There were no votes taken between meetings.
Treasurer Report
================
The monthly Treasurer's Report was provided to Board members by K.
Kaiser prior to the Board meeting and produced from Quickbooks Online.
Here is an exerpt from the treasurer's report on a few of the activities
the treasurer has been focused on:
For the month of April 2012, the treasurer provided a sumation of the financial
activities by saying:
Our assets were up by 25K in March, reflecting the payments for PyCon
registration and sponsorship. This was matched by a similar increase in
liability.
March was, of course, extremely busy financially, but the P&L won't show
much change until we recognize the results of PyCon 2012. At that point
(triggered by settling accounts with the convention center and the
hotels, including room commissions) the accrued expense and revenue will
move to the P&L and our assets and liabilities will return to normal
levels.
He reported on the revenue and expense below:
Revenue:
In the month of March, YTD income was down by 14K, primarily due to
payroll and Python Brochure expense. Total equity declined to 462K.
Donations for the month were $5026.
Expense:
Outside Services:
Wendroff 1,150
Evenios: Python Brochure 5,396
The treasurer goes on to say:
At the end of March, AR was down to 245K due to PyCon 2012 Sponsor and
PSF Sponsor collection activity. As of 16 April, AR was 168K.
I was involved in the purchase of a Dell server to host python.org, and
in modifying the domain's nameserver pointers to access a new dns host.
I'm also being asked to procure some additional server certificates.
Concerning the Honorary Associate Member Program (HAM), he said:
Associate Member program:
The website is available to accept Associate Member registrations.
I expect to get back to working on the comments received at PyCon.
This process will continue over the next few months.
We still need to link psfmember.org to python.org, improve the
attractiveness of the offering by adding content on python.org
relating to the Associate Membership, and make the community aware of
the opportunity.
Kurt concluded his report with a list of item the treasurer's office will
be focused on, he said:
My focus is on PyCon wrapup, AR/AP reduction, the Associate program, and
the increased activity and the strong interest in fiscal sponsorship
shown at PyCon.
Progress Reports
================
The following board reports were submitted to the board mailing list
one week prior to this month's meeting. Please see a summary of each
board report listed below and a possible board discussion at the end
of the report(s):
Communication Status
--------------------
B. Curtin, (new) Communications Officer, reported on continued activities
from last month. He said:
1. Send announcement email about the blog to various mailing lists
(c.l.py, c.l.py.announce, etc.).
Brian is planning an email campaign with the Outreach & Education
committee, and the PSF blog may be included in the resources
discussed there.
Brian also reported on the new activities for the month. He said:
I (Brian) had a busier month than normal with other projects, so I was unable
to produce any new work outside of a post about the Indianapolis Python
Workshop. Tetsuya Morimoto completed a translation of the PyCon Language
Summit Report to Japanese, which was great to have such a large post
translated for that community.
I was contacted by a staffer from PHP Solutions magazine about contributing
some coverage of Python to be published, but no one on the team (or the ones
outside the team who I've contacted) has shown interest.
He reported the following information on the planned activities for next month:
1. Via Steve Holden, we have some information to put together a story
about Python's use in schools from David Coopersmith along with a
student of his named Isaac. The same story involves some
praise for the trademark committee, which may or may not go into the
same post.
2. Community service award posts for Audrey Roy and Carl Trachte.
3. Post information about this summer's PyGames contest for students
(http://www.summerpygames.org/).
As far as the ongoing projects for the month are concerned, he reported:
1. Brian Curtin is working on a post about the video equipment
purchased by the PSF and how it has been used to record conference
talks and other events.
2. Recruiting other people to help write for the blog.
For tabled activities, B. Curtin said:
1. PyCon video equipment loan/rental program post
There was some discussion of offering the PyCon video equipment to
PUGs for their meetings, but the mechanism to do it isn't in place,
yet.
Honorary Associate Membership Program
-------------------------------------
P. Campbell, Honorary Associate Membership (HAM) WebPages & New Membership
Subscription Start-up Project (with K. Kaiser as the primary technical guru),
reported on the current issues or blockages the project may be faced with by
saying:
"We are closer to the end of the technical phase of the Honorary Associate
Membership (HAM) Project. However, attention is now being geared more
toward working on the HAM content cosmetics and beautification on the
python.org website.
Many technical hurdles have been jumped in order to setup the HAM program
and we are now beginning to see the finish line."
As far as the continued activities from last month are concerned, she reported:
Please see the message from Kurt Kaiserâs March 2012 treasurerâs report
regarding the activities involving the technical phase of the HAM program
implementation, website setup and membership signup:
âThe website is available to accept Associate Member registrations.
I expect to get back to working on the comments received at PyCon.
This process will continue over the next few months.
We still need to link psfmember.org to python.org, improve the
attractiveness of the offering by adding content on python.org
relating to the Associate Membership, and make the community aware
of the opportunity.â
Marketing Material
------------------
M.A. Lemburg, Marketing Material Project Manager, provided a summary
of his work. He said:
The project is lead by Marc-André Lemburg who is in contact with
the people behind the Plone brochure created by the German Zope
User Group (DZUG): Jan Ulrich Hasecke and Armin StroÃ-Radschinski.
We started working on the concept a few weeks after World Plone Day
in April 2010 and had several meetings and conference calls to take
the idea forward.
For more details, please see the brochure support site at:
http://brochure.getpython.info/learn-more
Marc-André also reported on the progress of his project when he said:
The PyCon US teaser version of the brochure has so far not resulted
in much feedback from the PyCon US attendees. We've had a few
signups to the newsletter, a couple of visits to the site, but
that's about it.
Here's the link to the PDF of the teaser, in case you missed it:
http://brochure.getpython.info/media/flyer/python-brochure-pycon-us-2012-teaser-booklet/view
It looks like finding sponsors will be just as much work as
getting the content lined up. We'll probably have to contact
potential sponsors directly and do one-on-one marketing.
We plan to do a call for sponsors via the usual channels
to help change the situation.
The online payment solution has been up since the start of
PyCon US in March. We do have a few ad and reference sponsor
signups, but no where near enough to start going to print.
Most of the signups are from Germany. If the US folks don't
hurry up, the reference list will be filled with German IT
shops :-)
As a result of the slow progress with sponsors, we won't
be able to produce the brochure in time for EuroPython 2012,
which is sad, since it would have been nice to show off the
new brochure on the new PSF booth we'll likely have there.
Sponsor Options
---------------
There are 8 half-page ads available in the brochure and
we want to have 30-40 reference sponsor entries as well.
All options are listed on our sponsorship page, and you
can also order them online:
http://brochure.getpython.info/sponsorship
The reference sponsor entries are meant for companies
providing Python services, have a fixed layout and provide
a great value for money: the companies will not only be
listed in 10.000+ copies of the brochure, but they will
also each get a box of around 120 copies of the brochure.
Educational Sponsorship
-----------------------
In case you missed it in the last report: we have also added
a new sponsor option: the educational sponsorship.
This works much like the subscription sponsorship where a company
can order extra brochure copies at very reasonable prices. The
difference is that companies can order extra copies for educational
institutions of their choice or of the PSF's choice. The bill will
be paid by the company and the boxes will go straight to the
institution.
Please Help find Sponsors
-------------------------
If you know possible sponsors or are interested in sponsoring
the brochure yourself, please check the available sponsorship plans
we have available:
http://brochure.getpython.info/sponsorship
If you have questions, please ping me directly or write to
brochure at getpython.info.
M.A Lemberg reported on the current issues the project is faced with.
He said:
If you know of interesting projects or companies using Python
to great things, please contact us and consider signing up as
contact scout to provide on-site help at conferences or other
events:
http://brochure.getpython.info/signup/contact-scout-signup
and, if you're interested in the project, please consider signing
up to our newsletter:
http://brochure.getpython.info/
Thanks !
As far as the future plans for this project are concerned, he reported:
If the project goes well, we'll follow up with a second edition
of the brochure, Python flyers using material extracted from the
brochure, translated versions of the brochure and also consider
creating marketing material more targeted at specific user groups or
application fields.
In the long run, we'd also like to take the idea of producing
marketing material beyond printed material and develop booth
setups, giveaways, CDs, etc. to support conference organizers and
local user groups wishing to promote Python at their events.
Moving PyPI to Amazon CloudFront
--------------------------------
The project leader, M.A. Lemburg, Moving PyPI to Amazon CloudFront,
reported on progress for the month:
"The project is currently on hold, since the team members don't have
time to put into this."
According to M. A. Lemburg, there is nothing new to report for this
month. He said:
"I'm beginning to believe that doing a sprint of sorts would likely
be the best way to move this forward, but I currently don't have more
cycles to spare (the brochure project has turned out to be very
work intense), so can't lead such an effort at the moment."
In terms of having any issues surrounding his project, M. A.
Lemburg reported no issues except one: he said, he just does not have
enough time to devote to his Moving PyPI to Amazon CloudFront project.
M. A. Lemburg also reported on the future plans for this project:
"Check to see whether a trigger based approach to S3 syncing
wouldn't be easier to implement right from the start."
PyCon Chair
-----------
J. Noller, PyCon Chair, provided us with information surrounding
the current status of the PyCon US affairs. He reported on the interim
period at the closing of PyCon US 2012 and the gearing up of PyCon US
2013:
"Not much to report this month: We are in the process of closing out the
2012 budget/books so the foundation can recognize the revenue from the
conference.
We are in the discussion phase of 2013 based on what we learned from 2012,
and I am
ramping up sponsorship discussions for 2013 behind the scenes.
Until the books are closed for 2012 I am not comfortable with moving forward
on 2013.
I have a larger blog post planned to discuss the conference overall - with
over 2300
attendees, the conference was a wild success by any measure and feedback has
been
positive modulo complaints about the food."
Sprint Committee (SC)
---------------------
J. Noller &/or B. Curtin, Sprint Committee Chair, reported that there
were no issues or blockages surrounding any sprint activities for the
month.
As far as the continued activities from last month, he reported:
None
On his report of the new activities for the month, He reported:
We received and accepted a reimbursement request for a sprint at
Rochester Institute of Technology. The sprint occurred Friday April 13
-- we are awaiting their request for reimbursement as well as details
of the event.
In terms of the new activities planned for next month. He wrote:
The email and blog campaign to raise awareness of the group. I need to
coordinate this with another email campaign I'll be doing for O&E so I
don't spam user groups.
As far as the ongoing projects for this committee, He said:
Wrapping up of the ledger project. This is mostly complete as the
previous sprint data has been loaded in.
Infrastructure Committee (IC)
-----------------------------
S. Reifschneider, Infrastructure Committee Chair, reported on continued
activities
from last month. He wrote:
- Hosting Project: Discussions are still ongoing with regards to OSU/OSL
and other hosting provider (whos name I can never remember). This
project has been picked up again and is expected to make further
progress.
- Arc Riley is planning to transfer these domains:
jython.com
jython.net
psfb.org
psfmember.com
psfmember.net
psfmember.org
python3.org
Sean also reported on the activities planned for next month. He said:
- Continue on migration of services to their new homes.
Outreach and Education Committee (OEC)
--------------------------------------
D. Mertz, Outreach and Education Committee Chair, reported on the issues
& blockages this committee was faced with for the month.
- Some active discussion with PyLadies organizers about likely
reorganization
of the group/brand, with PSF possibly playing a large(r) role in the future
direction. Most of this needs to remain confidential for a little while
longer,
but will probably result in some motions for PSF Board to consider.
However, he also reported that there was no new planned activities. He wrote:
- Nothing new to report for the month.
Trademarks Committee (TMC)
--------------------------
D. Mertz, Trademarks Committee Chair, reported on issues & blockages for
the month. He reported:
- Never really received a formal answer from PSF counsel about whether
assignment of derived logos to the PSF might allow us to grant broader
permission (for what would then, hypothetically) be PSF trademarks.
- The "PyLadies" is considering granting the name to the PSF for
stewardship. There are a number of inter-related issue with changes to
the group that I have been discussing with them, so no motion about this
is quite ready yet, but this is likely to be something the board will need
to decide on.
- Need to locate someone to create a better unified record of all the
trademarks authorizations and refusals made by the committee. Perhaps this
can be a responsibility of the PSF Secretary/Administrator in the near
future? The information on actions is all there in mailing list archives,
but not in any nicely digestible form (such as on a Wiki or a Google Docs
spreadsheet).
- Seemed to have missed Marc-Andre's motion to adopt the PSF logo from last
month's meeting. Added to agenda.
As far as reporting on new activities, however, he provided the following
list of items:
- Apparently John Morrissey <jwm at horde.net> displayed his authorized
stained-glass versions of the Python logo at PyCon. I did not personally
have an opportunity to see them though.
- A bunch of discussion with Fernando Perez and other IPython folks at PyCon
about possible filing of an "IPYTHON" trademark by the PSF. Since the mark
would be derived from the PYTHON word mark, and yet the PSF itself has never
used the derived mark, assuming the trademark by the PSF will presumably
require fiscal sponsorship or some other arrangement between IPython and the
PSF. Mostly TBD.
- Beginning of March: Permission for Steve Holden <steve at holdenweb.com>
to
use the name "Open Python" and the Python logo embedded in a US map for
several
Open Bastion conferences.
- Beginning of March: Discussion with Donald Stufft <donald at crate.io>
about
derived version of Python logo for site https://crate.io. An initial
version of
a derived logo was too much of a modification of the design, but some
discussion
led to a version that preserved the full shape of the Python logo (with some
permitted perspective added, as if logo was stamped on side of a crate).
- The kind Jonathan Hosmer <jon at pythonforios.com> with whom we worked out
the
name "Python for iOS" for his Python distribution (modified from the
confusing
iPython, which is similar to the older IPython shell) decided to offer to
PSF
members complimentary licenses to his distribution which I distributed to
some
PSF members (including Guido). FWIW, Jonathan offered more free copies than
were
claimed, but the recipients all seemed to like the distro.
- Late March: Authorized use of logo on stickers made by Teemu Otala <info
at
nixstickers.com>.
- Late March: phillip torrone <pt at adafruit.com> of
http://www.adafruit.com
provided some complimentary iron-on Python logo patches (that we authorized
previously) to the PSF Secretary; and some more to the TC Chair.
- Early April: Clarified for Amit Saha <amitsaha.in at gmail.com> that use
of
screenshots of the Python shell in a Prentice-Hall book were not restrict by
our
trademarks or copyright policies.
- Early April: Was notified by Lucius <lucius.bentley.kina at gmail.com>
that a
second free-of-cost Python distribution for iOS is being sole on the iTunes
store.
The name is nominative, and no special action is needed by the PSF. FWIW,
the
distribution seems to be of lower quality than Hosmer's "Python for iOS" but
that
is for buyers/users to decide. Out of curtesy, I discussed this
distribution with
Mr. Hosmer, just so he would be aware of it.
- Jonathan Hosmer requested, and I authorized, use of the somewhat more
specific
distribution names "Python 2.7.2 for iOS" and "Python 3.2.3 for iOS". My
permission
covered creation of any similar names that follow the numbering of
underlying Python
versions (he may create other versions than these--presumably at least later
Python
versions when they are created).
- Late April: The PSF Secretary was able to send some complimentary "Python
3"
stickers to Timothy Farrell <explorigin at gmail.com> who requested them.
- Late April: Authorized request from Ricardo Bánffy <rbanffy at gmail.com>
to use
the Python logo with the words "GruPy-SP" for the São Paulo Python user
group. The
modified logo preserves the icon, and uses a similar font to that used in
our word
mark version of the "Python" logo.
As far as his "ongoing projects", he said:
- See "Issues"
Google Summer of Code (GSoC)
----------------------------
A. Riley, Google Summer of Code (GSoC), reported on the issues and/or
blockages this program is currently faced with. He said:
1. Several applications for projects under our umbrella
came in after the deadline, I was still processing
new project applications during student applications
which caused delays.
2. Lower number of applications (80) compared to previous
years resulting in 25 slots allocated (we ended up with
30 last year). The projects which got involved by the
deadline got the highest number of applications.
Arc also reported on the continued activities from last month when he wrote:
1. Still signing up new mentors, many are in queue from the
last week. We should have a mostly finalized group of
mentors by the end of tomorrow (4/17).
A. Riley reported on new activities for the month. He said:
1. Student selections; receiving choices from mentors today
(4/16) and I will have until 4/18 to compile a semi-final
list for Google. That list may be modified due to extra
slots being made available or losing students due to
inability to provide credentials or de-duplication.
As far as the planned activities for next month, he reported: the ongoing
projects,
1. After student selections and the official announcement by
Google, we'll enter the "community bonding" period. I'll
be working with mentors to ensure students stay involved
during this time and are ready to begin at program start.
Additionally, Arc reported on "ongoing projects" with the GSoC project and on
"tabled activities", respectively:
Ongoing Projects
----------------
Summer of Code 2012 will be ongoing until August.
Tabled Activities
-----------------
1. Discussion with rejected mentors regarding why they were
not accepted this year.
Executive Session Held by Board of Directors
=============================================
Board members held a brief Executive Session to discuss the efforts
expended by and compensation for the Administrator and the Treasurer.
2012 EuroPython Conference Funding
===================================
**RESOLVED**, that the PSF provide EUR 3,500 to the 2012 EuroPython
Conference to be held in Florence, Italy.
Approved, 10-0-1.
2012 PyArgentina Conference Funding
====================================
**RESOLVED**, that the PSF provide funding of USD 3,000 to sponsor
the PyArgentina Conference to be held in Buenos Aires.
Approved, 11-0-0.
Rasberry Pi Model B Kits
========================
**RESOLVED**, that the PSF purchases 50 Rasberry Pi model B kits
(USD 35 each) to donate to interested Python projects, community members
and to use as raffle for conferences, in order to help increase the number
of available Python applications for the platform. Steve Holden will provide
a publicity and distribution plan by the next board meeting.
Approved, 9-2-0.
Board Discussion:
M. vLowis: "I think this is a too specific, too toy, too irrelevant a project
to
support."
M. A. Lemburg: "It's mostly marketing for the PSF and it's a pretty cheap
marketing
gadget."
D. Napoleone: "I viewed this as a [Public Relations] PR campaign, and any
actual work
we get out of it as a bonus."
S. Holden: "User groups can use them as prizes too."
D. Mertz: "Even though a bit of a toy, I think the publicity from giving them
out
potentially helps donations and interest in the foundation."
V. Linberg: "Is this a time-limited offer?"
S. Holden: "Yes."
PyPy STM Project Funding
=========================
**RESOLVED**, that the PSF provides seed funding for the PyPy STM project
(http://pypy.org/tmdonate.html) with an initial amount of USD 5,000.
Additional
funding will be made available depending on project progress in 6 month
intervals,
subject to approval by the Board of Directors.
Approved, 9-1-1.
PyPy Py3k Project Funding
==========================
**RESOLVED**, that the PSF provides seed funding for the PyPy Py3k project
(http://pypy.org/py3donate.html) with an initial amount of USD 7,500.
Additional
funding will be made available depening on project progress in 6 month
intervals,
subject to approval by the Board of Directors.
Denied, 1-9-1.
2012 Frank Willison Award Nomination
====================================
Board members discussed and recommended the 2012 recipient of the Frank Willison
Award to O'Reilly Media.
*[Details temporarily omitted from the public minutes, to be restored after the
announcement.]*
Conference Kits for Python Conference Booths
=============================================
**RESOLVED**, that PSF funds an effort to create PSF conference kits for
running booths at conferences, lead by Marc-Andre Lemburg with up to EUR
1,200 (about USD 1,600) per kit. Initially, three kits will be produced,
one for Europe (to be used at EuroPython 2012), one for South America (to
be used at PyCon AR 2012 and Python Brazil 2012) and one for the US.
Approved, 10-0-1.
Board Discussion:
V. Lindberg: "I would like to know what will be in the kits."
M.A. Lemburg: "The kits will have a foldable display with 9 fields and two slip
covers for bistro tables. The display will have the Python logo and the PSF
logo
on it -- same for the slip covers.
Appointment of Board Officers for 2012/2013
===========================================
**RESOLVED**, that the following people be appointed as officers until the
next Board election (or their resignation).
* President: Guido van Rossum
* Chairman: Steve Holden
* Vice Chair/Chair-Elect: Van Lindberg
* Secretary: Pat Campbell
* Treasurer: Kurt Kaiser
* Communications: Brian Curtin
* PyCon US Chair: Jesse Noller
* Events Coordinator: Eva Jodlowska
Approved, 10-0-0.
Reappointment of Project Management Committee Chairs for 2012/2013
===================================================================
**RESOLVED**, that the respective current chairmen of the following active
project management committees be reappointed as chairman of the committee
for the 2012/2013 term and that each chairman shall appoint the members of
the their committee for the term:
* Outreach & Education Committee (OREC)
* Sprint Committee (SC)
* Trademarks Committee (TMC)
Approved, 10-0-1.
Other Business
===============
None
Adjournment
===========
S. Holden adjourned the meeting at 17:29 UTC.
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