Hey Sudoers,

I'd like to submit a proposal in advance of a meeting next Wednesday, January 11th at 8 PM:

The proposal: I propose we organize working groups for membership, facilities, finances, promotion, and general administration.

The goals: I think we should focus in 2023 on bringing in new people. Hosting more events. Finding new sources of revenue like grants. Organizing the tools, repairing the roof, and installing a mezzanine. I think all of these would be more attainable if we had a bit of structure that makes it easier for new people -- and old! -- to find similarly minded collaborators and organize and communicate to do these things collaboratively.

The details: I see three elements to this proposal, which I'm listing to make it easier to offer suggestions or alterations:

1) I think we should define a set of core functions which require coordination: membership, facilities, finances, promotion, and administration (miscellaneous general operation).

2) I think we should promote coordination by establishing working groups, primarily consisting of an email list and a wiki page, but with broad leeway in how each group wants to organize and communicate. The facilities working group could decide to set up a Discord channel. The building group could choose to have regular in person meetings. The admin group could operate mostly on Signal. These don't have to be dictated in this proposal, as long as everyone knows how to get in touch with these working groups. 

3) I propose that participation and role assignment be presumed open, but managed by the groups themselves. I am actively choosing not to propose that they groups have a leader or a minimum number of participants, or a qualification to join. As proposed, I imagine anyone who likes fixing 3D printers when they clog can sign up for the facilities working group and now they're an equal member to everyone else. But if the membership working group is just one person answering new member questions, that's fine. The finance group and promotion group will presumably set guidelines on who has login credentials for accounts. Under this proposal, anyone can join any group and no member of a group has elevated privileges unless they establish them by consensus separate from this proposal.

What do you all think? Would you like to join any of these groups? I'd like to get lots of feedback and then discuss this next Wednesday to incorporate the feedback received over email.

Cheers,

Andy