<div dir="ltr">Regarding time.  I have only a comment that is in the debian side of things, for example if one is a debian developer,  this ''title'' goes for live. And also (afaik) you remain with your @<a href="http://debian.org">debian.org</a> mail even though you don't maintain packages or you have cease to do contributions to the project..anyway this is still in discussion. (pls if someone knows this process in detail you can correct me). <div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Sep 9, 2008 at 1:09 PM, David Farning <<a href="mailto:dfarning@sugarlabs.org">dfarning@sugarlabs.org</a>> wrote: <blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"> I have been hand waving around this issue for the last couple of posts in the hope that we could reach consensus on the structural issues before facing this potentially emotional issue. The membership question has three axis: depth, breadth, and time. How extensive should a persons contributions be to earn membership? How broadly do we define contributing to the project? How long does it take to earn membership? How long are membership terms. At the end of the day, the question distills down to, "What is the cost/benefit ratio in terms of governance, recognition, fund raising, and defense of being inclusionary or exclusionary with regard to membership across the three axis of depth, breadth and time.     1. Depth. There examples of successful projects at both ends of the        depth of membership criteria. At one end , Fedora[1] has settled        on a very inclusive mechanism where everyone who applies becomes        a member. On the other end, the apache foundation[2] has a more        exclusive membership policy.  New members must be nominated and        voted on by the current membership.     2. Breadth. Successful projects exist at both ends of the breadth        continuum. At Debian membership is earn through the 'Debian        Developer Process[3]' as a result, the membership is very        developer centric. At Ubuntu[4] , a member is 'someone who's        made a substantial contribution to the Ubuntu community -- of        any type --'. This results in a very broad community.     3. Time. I was unable to find any large FOSS projects which set        term limits on membership. Many project's periodically request        that members in good standing renew their membership or are        dropped from the rolls. As always, questions, comments, and discussion is welcome. I will try to have rough draft membership guidelines ready to submit to SLOB by Friday. thanks dfarning 1 <a href="http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Board" target="_blank">http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Board</a> 2 <a href="http://www.apache.org/foundation/how-it-works.html" target="_blank">http://www.apache.org/foundation/how-it-works.html</a> 3 <a href="http://www.debian.org/devel/" target="_blank">http://www.debian.org/devel/</a> 4 <a href="http://www.ubuntu.com/community/processes/newmember" target="_blank">http://www.ubuntu.com/community/processes/newmember</a> _______________________________________________ IAEP -- It's An Education Project (not a laptop project!) <a href="mailto:IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org">IAEP@lists.sugarlabs.org</a> <a href="http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep" target="_blank">http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/iaep</a></blockquote></div> -- Rafael Ortiz </div>