Open Stack

OpenStack is a global open source community. The OpenStack Foundation serves members in 180 countries focused on advancing the capabilities and accessibility of open infrastructure everywhere. We fundamentally believe diversity and collaboration are a powerful force for innovation, and it has been amazing to see the product of tens of thousands of people around the world over the last 6+ years.

Lauren, Mark and I disagree with the executive order issued by President Trump that targets individuals from 7 countries. The order restricts the travel and movement of people in a discriminatory way that  results in a restriction on access to talent and ideas. It is still unclear how the policies will play out and be enforced, but we will be watching, advocating for and supporting our community members to the best of our ability. 

This executive order will not impact the governance of the Foundation or the way the community operates globally. We will continue to support user groups and community members that are active in the seven countries named by the executive order, alongside our 120+ user groups around the world. However, we have two scheduled events in the United States within the next six months that will attract a global audience: the PTG (Project Teams Gathering) in Atlanta, Feb 20-24, a smaller event that will bring together hundreds of upstream contributors, and the OpenStack Summit in Boston, May 8-11, our larger event that happens every six months. 

This executive order could impact some community members' ability to travel to Atlanta and Boston, but unfortunately it is too late at this point to change the location of these events. The following three OpenStack Summits, however, are now scheduled to occur outside of the United States. The next Summit will be in November 2017 in Sydney, Australia and we are working to finalize the details so we can announce the following two Summit locations soon.

We’ve already heard from one community member, Mohammed Naser, who is concerned that his plans to travel from Canada to Atlanta to attend the PTG may be restricted, simply because he a dual citizen of Canada and Iraq.  Mohammed has been contributing code to OpenStack since 2011 and is the CEO and Founder of Vexxhost. Blocking his travel would serve no purpose and rob the community of a valuable contributor during an important event. If you are concerned about the impact or have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out to me at jonathan at openstack.org.

Political actions like this highlight the importance of our collective values. The Four Opens, the founding principles of our community, exist to ensure the free flow of talent and ideas, across geographic, national, organizational or other lines that might divide us. We believe in humanity. We believe in opportunity. We believe in the power of collaboration across borders, and we will continue to carry forward our mission.

We also posted this online: https://www.openstack.org/blog/2017/01/supporting-our-global-community/

Jonathan Bryce
Mark Collier
Lauren Sell