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Re: GR: Disambiguation of Section 4.1.5 of the constitution



On Thu, Sep 18, 2003 at 02:33:08PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
> ======================================================================
>  4. The Developers by way of General Resolution or election
> 
>    4.1. Powers
> 
>     Together, the Developers may:
>      1. Appoint or recall the Project Leader.
>      2. Amend this constitution, provided they agree with a 3:1 majority.
>      3. Override any decision by the Project Leader or a Delegate.
>      4. Override any decision by the Technical Committee, provided they
>         agree with a 2:1 majority.
> -    5. Issue nontechnical policy documents and statements.
> -       These include documents describing the goals of the project, its
> -       relationship with other free software entities, and nontechnical
> -       policies such as the free software licence terms that Debian
> -       software must meet.
> -       They may also include position statements about issues of the day.
> +    5. Issue, modify and withdraw nontechnical policy documents and statements.
> +       These include documents describing the goals of the project, its
> +       relationship with other free software entities, and nontechnical
> +       policies such as the free software licence terms that Debian
> +       software must meet.
> +       They may also include position statements about issues of the day.
> +   5.1 A special clause applies to the documents labelled as
> +       "Foundation Documents". These documents are those 
> +       that are deemed to be critical to the core of the project,
> +       they tend to define what the project is, and lay the
> +       foundations of its structure. The developers may
> +       modify a foundation document provided they agree with a 3:1
> +       majority. 
> 
> +   5.2 Initially, the list of foundation Documents consists
> +       of this document, The Debian Constitution, as well as the
> +       documents known as the Debian Social Contract and the 
> +       Debian Free Software Guidelines. The list of the documents
> +       that are deemed to be "Foundation Documents" may be changed
> +       by the developers provided they agree with a 3:1 majority. 
>      6. Together with the Project Leader and SPI, make decisions about
>         property held in trust for purposes related to Debian. (See
>         s.9.1.)
> 
> ======================================================================       
>  Rationale: The clause being modified has been seen to be quite
>  ambiguous. Since the original wording appeared to be amenable to two
>  wildly different interpretations, this change adds clarifying the
>  language in the constitution about _changing_ non technical
>  documents. Additionally, this also provides for the core documents of
>  the project the same protection against hasty changes that the
>  constitution itself enjoys.
> ======================================================================
> 
> ######################################################################
> ######################################################################
> ######################################################################
> 
> > +   5.2 Initially, the list of foundation Documents consists
> > +       of this document, The Debian Constitution, as well as the
> > +       documents known as the Debian Social Contract and the 
> > +       Debian Free Software Guidelines. The list of the documents
> > +       that are deemed to be "Foundation Documents" may be changed
> > +       by the developers provided they agree with a 3:1 majority. 
> +   5.2 The list of foundation Documents consists
> +       of this document, The Debian Constitution, as well as the
> +       documents known as the Debian Social Contract and the 
> +       Debian Free Software Guidelines. The list of the documents
> +       that are deemed to be "Foundation Documents" may be changed
> +       by the developers only by changing this clause, which needs
> +       according to 5.1 a 3:1 majority. 
> 
> Advantage: This makes the list in 5.2 the authoritative list, which
> makes it easier later to see which documents are in fact foundation
> Documents. (Or to speak in computer slang: normalization of data.)

Seconded.

-- 
  .''`.  ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield
 : :' :  http://www.debian.org/ |
 `. `'                          |
   `-             -><-          |

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