[legal-discuss] OpenStack and its CLA [was Re: Copyright statements in source]

Alan Clark aclark at suse.com
Wed May 21 22:55:05 UTC 2014


Mark,

The "OpenStack and its Contributor License Agreement" paper that you authored shows a lot of thought, time and effort.  I can appreciate the amount of effort you and others have put into investigating this issue.

I recognize the need for the paper to be written as a persuasive argument to propose change but there is more that needs to be written for completeness if this is intended as a proposal to the Board. I will leave it to you to determine if that material belongs in this paper or somewhere in addition.  I simply know that If we don't write it up, the questions and issues will still come up at the meeting and we will simply chew more time and encounter decision delay. Also to give a little timeline, before putting this on a board meeting agenda I want all the info possible input into a Board packet to be distributed to the Directors 1 week prior to a meeting. I also think that it is important that the information be run through the Legal Affairs Committee for their consideration prior to a Board discussion.

Here's some of the info that may need to be added:

1. What is the real world feasibility / effort required to transition from the CLA to a DCO?  I'm familiar with the Linux kernel model, the how, why and impetus for implementing the DCO. Any estimates on the size of effort this would entail? For example, does our current repositories have the data needed to give us a clear chain of trust? How would a transition be handled?  What effort would be needed to setup the attestation? (include CI, documentation, education, adoption) My sense is that a DCO system is simpler to maintain (as you argue in the paper), but we do need to understand the effort that would be needed to get there with some confidence that OpenStack could actually do it and at what cost - people, time, impact to release, etc.

2. In the section, "Relationship to the Apache License" the paper makes the statement, "...structured to privilege one entity (the OpenStack Foundation itself)...".  The paper makes it sound like the Foundation is an evil empire.  (Teasing&Smiling).   There is a reason the CLA was setup that way and that reasoning needs to be spelled out. (Doesn't mean that it can't change, just makes for a better informed decision.)

3. In "The Need For Change" section, the paper describes the "Contributor Friction". I get the need to make the persuasive argument, but the impact also needs to be explained.   There is also a need for a similar section to cover the 'Corporate member / Sponsor Friction'. We have multiple member classes.  The proposal should cover all of them, making the persuasive argument as well as describing the impact. The Corporate member section should not only describe the impact to them as a corporate entity, but also the impact to the Foundation in terms of corporate members and sponsors.

Next I have an ask and I am not implying that it is happening.  I just want you to be sensitive to it, so that it does not inadvertently happen. My ask is that you be the guard against any alienation between any of the governing bodies, advisory boards and members.  It's important to understand that each will look at this issue from differing responsibilities and perspectives, sometimes those perspectives can get minimalized. If we keep the groups focused on providing insight in relation to their areas of responsibility and ensure they respect others responsibilities, we'll arrive to the correct conclusion together and the community will be stronger from it.

Thanks,
AlanClark

>>> On 5/13/2014 at 03:28 PM, Mark McLoughlin <markmc at redhat.com> wrote: 
> Hey
> 
> Along the lines of what I laid out in below email from January, Richard
> and I completed a first draft of such a document last Friday:
> 
>   https://wiki.openstack.org/wiki/OpenStackAndItsCLA
> 
> It's a 5000 word document that attempts to capture as much of the
> nuances of this as we could.
> 
> No doubt there are many conflicting opinions about this and much
> discussion is needed ... just as we anticipated in the below email.
> 
> Please do feel free to react here to any of the points made in the wiki
> page. Any and all feedback is welcome.
> 
> We also had a design summit session today where we gathered some
> feedback from the technical community, particularly about where we're
> seeing the CLA cause contributor friction or an image problem for the
> project. See here:
> 
>   https://etherpad.openstack.org/openstack-and-its-cla
> 
> My interpretation of the session is that there's a good level of
> consensus amongst the technical project leadership that there are issues
> and a change to the DCO should be seriously considered.
> 
> Thanks,
> Mark. 
> 
> On Thu, 2014-01-23 at 10:55 +0000, Mark McLoughlin wrote:
> 
>> I think it's worth having a properly informed discussion involving the
>> Foundation Board and Legal Affairs Committee.
>> 
>> To do so, we'd need to pull together some points into a document:
>> 
>>   - why the CLA process is causing friction
>> 
>>   - a review of practices adopted by some other large, well known and 
>>     comparable projects
>> 
>>   - how OpenStack's process differs from other projects using CLAs, 
>>     like the ASF
>> 
>>   - enumerating the perceived benefits and explaining why they are a 
>>     misconception, not a major benefit or that a similar effect can be 
>>     achieved differently
>> 
>>   - a concrete proposal for a change to DCO, including infra changes, 
>>     education, bylaws amendment, etc.
>> 
>>   - a FAQ section which anticipates additional concerns people may have
>> 
>> I'd take this to the TC first to double-check that there's consensus
>> amongst the contributor community to make a move like this.
>> 
>> Unfortunately, there's no quick way to make this happen, but I think if
>> we can get the process moving we should be able to make it happen.
>> 
>> Mark.
> 
> 
> 
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