Open Governance

Have a look at this blog post, which gives some of the background and motivation for running the course: http://sharing-nicely.net/2010/08/open-governance

Logistics

• Participants will post answer to the weekly tasks on their individual blogs (set up a blog prior to the course at wordpress.com if you don't have one)
• All discussion, including discussion of blog posts will take place in the discussion forum in this course
• We will set up synchronous seminars as appropriate and needed, taking into account different time zones -- choosing a time that works for most people -- and connectivity

Week 1 - Introduction - Shaping the course together

Goals:

• Getting to know the other participants.
• Review the course syllabus and extend / update as a group.
   

Week 2 - "Learning to act like baboons!" Cultural norms transfer

Open innovation communities are characterized by cultural norms that vary greatly from the hierarchical structures common to firm-based employment (and sometimes university study). Governance processes rest on a foundation of norms and behaviors, some explicit and others implicit. As open communities grow, the transfer of these norms and behaviors to new community members is important to preserve stable governance mechanisms. Readings will look at community norms in baboons to highlight the mechanisms of norm transfer. The task will be to find examples for norm transfer in open communities and discuss them in the group.

• WNYX Radiolab, The New Normal, Part 1 "New Baboon", http://www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/episodes/2009/10/02
• RM Sapolsky, A Natural History of Peace, http://opim.wharton.upenn.edu/~sok/papers/s/sapolsky-foreignaffairs-2006.pdf
• Short summary of Sapolsky's thesis and work, http://www.sharpbrains.com/blog/2008/04/05/peace-among-primates-by-robert-sapolsky/

Mini Case

• Opening up the gang discussion list at P2PU

Week 3 - Groups and Networks

Guest facilitator: Leigh Blackall

In 2006 I recorded a video of Stephen Downes explaining his position on Groups vs Networks, and wrote a blog post around it. Please consider that video and blog post and join us in a 1 week forum conversation about it. Questions we might mull over could be:

1. Is governance an appropriate framework for thinking about online projects?
2. Will the desire to organise, centralise and ultimately govern, always be a need for people in an online future?
3. Is the individualism implicit in networks too problematic for people with cultural, family or political backgrounds that value collective identities?

After, before or during the discussion event, please consider adopting a question stemming from this topic, and cover it in your blog with links and references to support perspectives. Multi media welcome of course. Share your work in the discussion forum and I'll aggregate it in a post of my own after the week.

Regards
Leigh

Case study - Debian, Ubuntu (with Mako Hill)

Conversation with Benjamin Mako Hill about governance in various open source software projects he has been instrumentally involved in. Mako wrote much of the Code of Conduct that forms the foundation of the Ubuntu Community model. 

Discussion topics as outlined by Greg Grossmeier (who is a participant in this course);

1. What did you see as the problems in other communities that you were trying to avoid with the newly formed Ubuntu project? And how did you attempt to address/avoid those problems?
2. In my first blog post assignment for this course I mentioned how I see much of the transmission of the social norms in the Ubuntu community is done through process (Membership approval, which I am on the America's board for, QA Team, MOTU, etc) but I failed to contrast that with the Ubuntu CoC. How do you see the relation of the CoC to the creation and transmission of social norms within the community?
3. One of the initial articles[0] we read for this class was about a troop of baboons that lost most of their alpha-male figures due to a freak accident. The resulting culture of that baboon troop was much more welcoming and gentle. This persisted even after new males joined the group due to, it is believe, the fact that the females greeted the new males more openly and sooner than they normally would have. Even though most FLOSS projects have a SABDFL or similar role, what mechanism do you envision could be used to mitigate some of the negative effects of that figure? This should not preclude simply saying "have a nicer alpha-male."
4. What were the lessons you learned from the creation of the founding documents/processes of the Ubuntu community and the subsequent real world testing of those materials? Anything specific you would suggest to individuals working to create a culture of Open Governance in their community, FLOSS project or not?

Ideas for Additional Weeks (we didn't get to)

Moving from informal to formal (governance structures and processes) Review charter documents, articles of incorporation, by laws, and other formal definition

• Joomla
• Wikimedia Foundation
• WikiEducator

Possible guests:

• Charles Armstron, One Click Orgs (TBD) - Questions that arise when moving from informal to formal / challenges / tensions .... 

Task:

If you are involved in a project that has some aspects of open governance, please review and analyse the organisation's governance structures in the following dimensions (alternatively, choose an existing open community and analyse it following the same criteria):

• Formal documents that set out decision making processes, roles and responsibilities [provide links to these documents]
• Describe the organizational structure (often defined in the formal documents above) and how the organization makes decisions
• Outline the informal practices of working together and decision-making, especially where they contrast with or go beyond the formal structures
• Describe community norms around responsibility and decision-making (provide links to guidelines or values if available)

Case Study - Free Software / Ubuntu

Guest facilitator(s): Joshua Gay, Mako (TBD)

Optional - Transparency - Can you have too much of a good thing?

Task:

• Give an example from your own experience where transparency has been used effectively, insufficiently or used to the detriment of a good outcome.

Other options:

• TBD - Case Study - Free Software or One Laptop Per Child project
  Possible case study week where we look at free software or OLPC. See comment below.
• TBD - Leadership in open communities (Ronald A. Heifetz)
• TBD - Decision making in groups (Cass Sunstein, Infotopia)

Notes

Ideas for seminars

• Maha Shaik (LSE)
• Charles Armstrong (One Click Org) to speak about the relationship between incorporation and community norms / processes
• Joseph Hardin (University Michigan, Sakai) to speak about Sakai
• Mark Surman (Mozilla Foundation) or someone in Mozilla to speak about Module Ownership in Mozilla
• Achal Prabhala / Tomas Buckup to speak about Wikipedia Chapters
• Wayne Mackintosh to speak about WikiEducator (also invite Leigh Blackall to speak about challenges during the start-up process?)
• Eugene to speak about Wikipedia in general?
• Tonya Surman to speak about Constellation Model (or other ideas)

Readings

• Review: Managing without managers - pdf
• Google talk on dealing with problems in your community (search own blog)

Example Tasks / Problems

• Inviting attendants to the P2PU community meeting. How to make the decision.
• How much transparency is appropriate? Relationship between board responsibilities and community involvement when open communities incorporate.
• There are legal requirements that specify board activities, which are not always appropriate for governance of fluid, open, volunteer communities.