Election 2015 Candidate Manifestos

A space for the candidates for election to the Board to share some information about themselves, their aspirations for OSGeo, what they would like to change, improve or introduce and what role they would like to play on the board.

Dirk Frigne

Alias D.

About me

founder and spiritual father of the OSGeo geomajas project Father of 3 daughters founder of technology companies wants to help improving the world, and believes strongly this is possible and realistic when everybody is just changing a small little bit
OSGeo advocate. [read more]
I am not native English speaking, please feel free to improve my tekst </co-creation :-)>

My vision

Climate change, migration, IOT, robotica, public privacy, ...
The world is changing. The world is changing very fast. It is happening during our lifetime.
The current politicians don't have an answer yet on these new challenges. Knowledge is generated and exchanged in such a fast way, even universities have difficulties to transfer this know how to the brains of the new generations.
From Entrepreneurs it is expected to build businesses to maximise profits, but I am not motivated in this respect. I do believe that Entrepreneurs take initiative, which can result into a success, or which can fail. Profit should be re-invented into a broader scope.
In the changing world of today, with all our challenges, a new balance should be found between protection and proprietary between sharing and openness. Both are important values, but balance points a little to far to the protection/proprietary side.
I believe communities are a great mechanism for individuals, to act as self steering organisms which interact with other communities and organisms and as such are able to focus on the real needs to adapt our society to make a better world.

What you have done within the community in the past

I am an OSGeo member since 2007 and became a charter member in 2013.
I am a member of the steering committee of geomajas and am a regular speaker on FOSS4G conferences since 2007.
I try to keep contact with the Dutch and German chapters.
In 2015 I took the initiative, together with a team of enthusiastic open source adepts to found The Belgium OSGeo local chapter, and I am actively involved in the organisation of the first FOSS4G.be in Belgium.
I am evangelising the foundation of the European chapter, which is right now under construction, discussing the goals and principles (http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Europe).
Looking for members to become involved.

What your interests are in terms of the board

OSGeo is a community of communities.
It is a global organisation which is growing year after year. OSGeo is reflecting on her own organisation, if it should become more professional, or stay a group of friends. I see a lot of opportunities when observing everything which is happening in this community, where I am proud to be a member of. I became a member, not because I registered my name on a website (of course this was the first step), but because I felt me accepted as a person by the other members. People encouraged me to speak up and try to express my thoughts, share them with others in the community. And by doing that I encountered even more great people. And doing that, I was nominated to become a candidate for board member. I am of course very honoured to be nominated, this is important to me, as a person, but not for the community. If the community thinks I could be an added value to the board, I will be more than happy to help.

Any things that you would like to change or introduce

If I would be a member of the board, I would like to work on a more professional OSGeo. Which is a global organisation, working through local chapters that are not only language oriented, but also regional and even cultural. I think the CoC discussions prove that not for all issues there is only one answer or solution. Europe has for certain circumstances other values than the US or the Asian countries. I think a great value we all share is respect. One of the things I want to work on is the branding of OSGeo as an organisation, strengthen the role OSGeo has to play into the world of Geo-ICT. Promoting the diversity of all the work of the different communities, but at the same time bring communities closer together, working together, so we can bring the message of openness and respect to those in the industry who didn't see the light, to the politicians who have dare to take long term decisions, and to the schools where students can experience the great applications we already have.

What role you would wish to fulfil on the board (if any)

If I should have a role, I would want to be the public relations evangilist. I would help the president in bringing the different communities more together, bridge OSGeo to other initiatives such as Geo4All, Locationtech, OGC, INSPIRE, other open initiatives (OSM, Open Knowledge, Open Data, ...) but also other open source communities: Apache, Drupal, Gnu foundation, ....

Anita Graser

About me

I studied geographic information sciences and am now working with the Mobility department at the Austrian Institute of Technology, Vienna. I am a member of the QGIS PSC, OSGeo Charter member and member of the Young Scholars Committee of the Laboratory for Geocomputation at Ryerson University, Toronto.

My vision

Openness, data literacy, creativity

It's increasingly important for all of us to understand both the data we produce ourselves as well as the data available around us. I think GIS has a very important role to play here on both private and professional level. In my opinion, open source GIS and a strong community are an essential part of the puzzle since it provides tools and skills for the data revolution.

What you have done within the community in the past

I was elected OSGeo charter member in 2012 and started serving on the QGIS PSC in 2013. The focus of my work within the community is supporting users and spreading the word about open source GIS. I'm also community moderator on gis.stackexchange.com, a Q&A platform for all things GIS where the open source and proprietary world meet. I'm also writing books and teaching current and future GIS professionals.

What your interests are in terms of the board

What I can bring to the board, I think, is a very user-centered perspective (based on years of user support) as well as experience from the PSC of a big community-driven project (QGIS). If the community decides that these skill would be valuable on the board, I'd be happy to serve.

Any things that you would like to change or introduce

One potential issue that would be worth addressing is the communication and collaboration between OSGeo and the projects. I think there is still considerable untapped potential to improve the relationship between the communities. Especially bigger projects can be so busy with their own community that they can lose sight of what's going on in the other communities.

What role you would wish to fulfil on the board (if any)

If I had a specific role to pick, I'd suggest that I would like to provide a connection between QGIS and OSGeo.

Helena Mitasova

About me

I am a Professor at the Center for Geospatial Analytics and Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA, and lead the OSGeo Research and Education Lab at NCSU

What you have done within the community in the past

I have been involved with open source geospatial community for many years, starting in the GRASS GIS development team in 1991 co-writing the code for spatial interpolation and I am still involved in the GRASS community as a member of the GRASS GIS steering committee. I have co-authored the first book on GRASS GIS and I have been teaching courses with FOSS4G since 2008. I am charter member of OSGeo since its founding in 2006 and I am in OSGeo conference committee and education committee. Our OSGeo RE lab at NCSU is one of the founding members of the global OSGeo research and education labs network and I am one of the coordinators for the geo4all initiative, one of the regional chairs for North America You can find more here http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/OSGeo_Advocate#Helena_Mitasova

What your interests are in terms of the board

I am interested in improving the coordination with geo4all initiative and renewing and establishing MOUs with academic and professional organizations. I would also like to make sure OSGeo provides continuing support for the activities initiated by the projects such as community sprints. I would also work to ensure continuing growth and visibility of FOSS4G conferences

Any things that you would like to change or introduce

I believe that OSGeo has done a great job building open source geospatial community and I would like to streghten the connections between the projects and academia through geo4all. Especially encourage educational institutions not only to use FOSS4G but also increase the contributions back on several levels - from educational material to the code. And I would like to make the FOSS4G conferences more open to presentations by everybody who wishes to present their work

What role you would wish to fulfil on the board (if any)

Coordination with geo4all initiative

Venkatesh Raghavan

About me

I am a Professor in Geoinformatics at Osaka City University (OCU), Japan, and lead the OSGeo Research and Education Lab at OCU

What you have done within the community in the past

I have been involved with open source geospatial community for many years, starting in the GRASS GIS development team in 1994. I was one of the organizers of the first FOSS4G (http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/FOSS4G) conference in Bangkok in 2004 (http://gisws.media.osaka-cu.ac.jp/grass04/).

I have been with OSGeo Foundation since its inception and was on the board in 2006 and have been engaged in building OSGeo Local chapters in Asia. Recently, I was also the conference chair for FOSS4G-Asia 2014 (http://www.foss4g-asia.org/) and Academic Track Chair at FOSS4G-2015(http://2015.foss4g.org/) I am charter member of OSGeo since its founding in 2006 and I am in OSGeo conference committee and education committee. I am one of the coordinators for the geo4all initiative, one of the regional chairs for Asia. You can find more here http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Venkatesh_Raghavan

What your interests are in terms of the board

Interested fostering the Open Geospatial Ecosystem in Education and Research and Business

My recent lightning talk at FOSS4G-2015 should provide some more info. http://www.slideshare.net/VenkateshRaghavan1/g4-a-newver2

Any things that you would like to change or introduce

I would like to bring in the Asian perspective to the board and provide inputs based on my multi-cultural background.

What role you would wish to fulfill on the board (if any)

Serve the OSGeo Foundation to the best of my ability and help it grow in regions that are still not well represented in our community

Nimalika Fernando

About me

I am an academic attached to Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology, Sri Lanka. I travel a lot, enjoy working with people and acting as a psychological counsellor also apart from my usual job role.

My vision

Empower my community and developing nations via OSGeo initiatives while respecting local value systems.

What you have done within the community in the past

I have moved to open source GIS in 2006 with a project related to 2004 Tsunami, a disaster which deeply affected my community. I had no option than adopting FOSS GIS (which was very new at local level then) and thereafter continue the spreading them among my community. I introduced GIS related modules to local universities with FOSS GIS tools, which lead to merging of new generation of GIS professional s in the local community . I talked at local events about OSGeo and open standards for GIS and provide support to integrate FOSS GIS in activities of local organizations. I initiated the OSGeo lab of SLIIT in 2014 with the guidance of Prof. Yann Chamin and then lead the first Sri Lankan FOSS4G gathering in the same year. I was a member of the organizing committee of FOSS4G Asia 2014 and the Academic Track committee of FOSS4G 2015.

What your interests are in terms of the board

I wish to add the developing nation’s perspective to the board.

Any things that you would like to change or introduce

While supporting the already proven community spirit, I wish to link more communities from Asian and African countries with the OSGeo. We, developing nations, may be with our long lasting political and social struggles, still to embrace the idea of ‘”openness” . The barriers which limit the involvement need to be identified from the local community’s point of view, I guess, and I wish to assist in overcoming them.

What role you would wish to fulfil on the board (if any)

Linking local communities and promote collaboration among different regions via Geo4All, projects and collaborative R & D activities