LegalXML TC and Member Section Membership

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Subject: LegalXML TC and Member Section Membership




From: "Winters, Roger" <>
To: 
Date: Wed, 12 Apr 2006 08:11:58 -0700














STEERING COMMITTEE: The following is an exchange I had with Scott McGrath
of OASIS, where each presented his ideas on how TC and Member Section membership
should/could be related to one another. We have not reached a conclusion -
I am hoping Scott will be on today's call so he can tell us what does and
doesn't work for OASIS. 





Roger





From: 
[mailto:]

Sent: Friday, April 07, 2006 1:58
PM

To: 

Cc: 'Dee Schur'

Subject: LegalXML Membership in
Member Section



Hi, Scott,



The Steering Committee for the LegalXML
Member Section has a conference call meeting on Tuesday at 10 Pacific time One of the agenda items is likely to
be to ask what we've concluded about what makes people members of the Member
Section Can you advise me where you think we
are on that issue? (I was on vacation the last two weeks and I haven't
remembered yet that we reached a final determination, so I'm assuming we
haven't) 



Thanks for any help you can give on this I'm probably going to be called on to
report on the subject



Roger



Roger Winters

Program and Project Manager

and 

Continuing Legal Education (CLE)
Coordinator

King County Department of Judicial
Administration

516 -609 MS:
KCC-JA-0609



V: (206) 296-7838 F: (206) 296-0906









From: Scott McGrath [mailto:]

Sent: Friday, April 07, 2006 2:49
PM

To:

Cc: 'Dee Schur'

Subject: RE: LegalXML Membership
in Member Section



Roger,



 is out, so I don't know what you folks have dialogued on,  I believe she has looked at the
TC rosters and the MS to see how divergent we are now  Failing that input, until
Monday, here is my brain dump  Some  of this may seem
like stating the obvious, but I'll try to cover it all, while not being
too verbose  First the policies and
guidelines, then the implementation (Yup, taking on the easy stuff first)



To be a Voting Member of the MS, one must
be a representative of an organization  (or perhaps also an Individual
member, depending on your RoP) who is contributing funds



There is no reason why any OASIS member
can't be an Observer in the MS



The OASIS norm is all mail lists are
opt-in, except our Member list which is opt-out-as we use this as a
one-way (low traffic) list to make formal announcements that all members need
be aware of 



BUT, I also see where having all
participants in the various LegalXML TCs in the MS would benefit the MS and
probably the participants



Therefore, I'd like to float the
following straw man (knowing that this should be vetted with LegalXML SC and
OASIS staff before we consider implementing)  you'll see the central
theme of these ideas to be that members ought to be self-determinant in these
areas



Option A

LegalXML MS SC votes to approve the action
of TC Chairs to encourage all TC participants to join the MS, via the
"Join Group" link on http://www.oasis-open.org/apps/org/workgroup/legalxml-ms/
  



Option B

LegalXML MS SC votes to approve the action
of adding all participants in LegalXML TCs to the MS list as Observers, unless
they are already there in another capacity  This could/should? be followed
by  a vote of endorsement at each TC so added 



Implementation considerations:

Option A is easy and may get you real
close to where you want to be



Option A wins on the scale of Members are
Self-Determinant



We, staff, could sit in on each TC concall
where Option A is discussed and do a walk-through demo of "how to use the
new TC sign-up tools" thus encouraging real-time participation and
sign-ups



I have no way to support automation of
Option B  Following the vote, we could do
the manual additions, but that will quickly go out of date  We will be resigned to manual
updates at a time and frequency determined by attention, time, resources etc



With either option, I recommend we modify
the TC members homepage with either advice to join the MS or advice that they
will be added at some time, without their tacit consent



How does this fit with your thinking?



Scott...











From: 
[mailto:]

Sent: Friday, April 07, 2006 3:28
PM

To: 

Cc: 'Dee Schur'

Subject: LegalXML Membership in
Member Section



Thanks, Scott, for your explanation and
ideas. What follows are my views, but I don't pretend to know whether the
ROP or anything presently supports or contradicts what I'm suggesting. I
think once we have an acceptable concept we would follow up by proposing the
appropriate amendments to ROPs to make it happen.



My view all along has been that if one is a
member of a TC that is affiliated as one of the LegalXML Member Section TCs,
one should automatically be enrolled as a member in the Member Section.
(Observer status, because it does not imply active commitment, should not
result in voting power in the Member Section.) There's no intention that
the Member Section would be an active e-mail list. One would still do the work
and have the most dialogue in the TCs one works with. However, by forming or
joining a Member Section, our TCs, in effect, delegate their power to the
Member Section (which is directed by the Steering Committee) to recommend use of
OASIS resources generated by the whole Member Section. On the principle of
"no taxation without representation," our Member Section is
composed of one representative elected by each TC PLUS three representatives
at-large elected by the whole Member Section. How can one be
"represented" by the at-large people unless you are able to vote in
Member Section at-large representative elections? By leaving joining the Member
Section optional and requiring that one take steps to make it happen (and most
of our people are, like everyone, very busy people for whom such a little thing
might seem "easy" from our point of view, but it's a detail
one has to stop and deal with, read about, and perform), we would in effect
disenfranchise those who won't or can't find time to sign
themselves up. 



I agree with your desire that people should
be self-determining - that's an important principle. However, the
key thing about self-determination is to know what you're getting into.
So long as TC membership (not observership) is defined in our rules as
constituting one's relationship to and rights within the TC PLUS being a
member of the Member Section in which the TC is a part, members of the TCs will
know what they are doing when joining a TC. Perhaps they could "opt
out" by requesting that their listing on the Member Section be switched
to "no-contact" or something, or by just not paying attention to
messages from that level, refusing to vote, etc. However, enrolling them in a
list that gives them an enhanced say in deciding how resources are used in the
OASIS group within which their work is being done does not harm them or enslave
them or impress them into service against their will - it gives them
power they are at risk not to have if left to their own devices. Unless it's
an automatic enrollment (a member of a TC automatically becomes a member of the
Member Section), the busy people or the ones who have trouble following
directions will be excluded, in effect.



To implement my proposal, we could perhaps
have something automatic happening or, if need be, we could have the Secretary
of the Member Section (me) or someone (an officer of each TC) check the TC
membership list monthly and reconcile any discrepancies. A check could also be
made prior to a vote, to ensure all will be able to participate.



(My graduate degree was in political
philosophy - one thing I learned is that concepts like
"consent" and "freedom" are not clear-cut and
unambiguous. In practice, there can be the APPEARANCE of freedom when in fact
there is none. Remember the 100% turnout for elections in the ? How much more democratic were they than the ,
where participation in voting is perhaps closer to 50% of those eligible?)



So, unless it would create a problem for
OASIS of which I'm unaware, I hope that we will find a way to make TC
membership something that includes the additional influence that comes from
being part of the Member Section.



Roger



Roger Winters

Program and Project Manager

and 

Continuing Legal Education (CLE)
Coordinator

King County Department of Judicial
Administration

516 -609 MS:
KCC-JA-0609



V: (206) 296-7838 F: (206) 296-0906






























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