PF Member Meeting, Sep 2005

Minutes from the annual member meeting at the Plone Conference in Vienna, September 2005.

Introductory Remarks Joel called the meeting to order and asked for procedural motions. Joel discussed the mission of of the PF: "protect and promote Plone". One goal last year was the "Plone Group". The conservancy initiative addressed this. The other was the work on the trademark. These two handled "protect". On promote, things like conferences, attractive information. This is "promote Plone". Another item: funded by CA seed money. CA was very good supporters of Plone and the PF mission. CA streamlined their product line and one of those was the Plone product. Thus the two CA board seats (and the bylaws for that) are no longer there. Question from Peter: the board will shrink by 2? Correct. Treasurer Report Mark gave report. 100k started. Since then, some revenue, for example Packt Publishing. Current financial statement and reports are available by email. Cash balance is 50k. Liability of 4k. Promotion expenses. Travel expenses, Joel, Paul, Alex. Possibly more trademark expenses, coming to the end of the cycle. Question: budget process for next year? Mark: starts with next board. ChrisW: what was the royalty revenue? Packt Publishing's book by Cameron Cooper. Recurring. Round of applause. Joel: gifts in kind from companies that offset expenses. CIGNEX and ZeOmega for signage. Porter Novelli for PR. Why are we paying for trademark help in light of SFLC? Trademark work is cross-country. Commitee Reports 1) Trademark report by Xavier. Why protect the mark? People starting to register. Had to give an address. Used ZEA w/ agreement to transfer to the foundation when the PF existed. Work with an expert. In some countries, still in an opposition phase. Some people might wake up and say they have an opposition. Probability very low. After conference, finalize paperwork. AndrewHatton: Is the trademark the word Plone or other? The mark was previously registered in different places. We have registered name and logo as "figurative registration". Protects the brand. philiKON: How many countries are in the pending phase? Registration is based on different protocols and different countries. sree: He can help get legally free assistance in India. Xavier: Already in progress, in opposition phase. Russ: We probably shouldn't advertise problem countries. Alan: US trademark, registered long ago, should finish at the end of the year. Paul: Mention about companies that pooled money to get registrations started before PF got its funding. Limi: Trademark committee. Trademark policy published this year, big accomplishment. Need a trademark committee chairman. 2) IP/Conservancy. Vote for conservancy overwhelmingly approved. Worked w/ Eben and SFLC on contrib agreement. Progress on getting signatures. Another topic: licenses. No decision made by the board because no decision by members. Session today to find out more about what people want, collect raw data. Start asking people more formally. Kapil: Is there a process for transfering code to the PF, and should there be? Joel: yes, contributions from CA when they left the market. Other products: Quills and LinguaPlone. ChrisW: Stuff from CA, even if we don't like the code, we should accept it, just to continue chain of ownership. Joel: PloneCollab, from Ben/Kapil/CA, nee PloneForge. sree: In ChrisW's presentation, Plone's download has multiple licenses. Joel: The download contains code w/ multiple licenses. CMFPlone is GPL. Alan: discussion of collective work. 3) Marketing. New Orleans conference created marketing work. Jonah B. is the right person to talk to re: Plone Marketing. We gave presentations at LW, but Mambo got "Best In Show". "Plone.net" helped out by Pilot Systems. Plone.net will include on case studies, company information. Plone.net will be profit-making for the foundation. New Business 1) Things we need. plone.net. membership committee. DavidConvent: Are there strict rules for membership commitee, or is it subjective? Joel: Subject, though broad rules. Need to be conservative, as members become co-owners. plone.org. Lurking problem. Things are getting difficult. Need help for plone.org to become fantastic site. Need help. Designers, sysadmins, content librarians. Jonah: Subdomains. Need to decentralize. 2) New board members announced.