I am seeking election to my first term as an OSI Board member. I have been actively involved in the free software community as both an attorney and as a sometimes individual contributor. 

About me

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I am a lawyer with substantive experience and a passionate interest in free software legal and policy issues. I have been a user of free software since buying my first Walnut Creek CD of Slackware Linux in the mid-nineties. I have over 6 years of experience as a legal counselor almost exclusively focused on representing open source project developers, open source/free software nonprofits, and commercial entities involved in free software use and development. 

For the past two years I have been in house legal counsel for CivicActions, a professional services company that works with governments and nonprofits to provide solutions based on free software licensing. All of CivicActions work is delivered under a free software license or under a license that enables our customers to release it as free software. In addition to advising CivicActions as inhouse counsel I also provide consulting services to government legal offices on how to use and develop free software projects. I continue to regularly act as pro bono counsel for several prominent free software and open data nonprofits.

Before joining CivicActions I was counsel at the Software Freedom Law Center, where I principally advised free and open source software nonprofit projects and individual free software developers. The projects I advised ranged from projects with with a small team of core contributions to some of the largest and most prominent free software nonprofits. 

Prior to becoming an attorney I spent 17 years as systems administrator and architect at a public research university. I regularly developed software and deployed open source solutions in that role. I also contributed back to free software projects I have used. My experience developing software and working as a technologist has allowed me to be particularly effective serving legal clients developing free software. While not the best software developer I am knowledgeable about the software development process and I believe that same perspective will be a benefit to my service on the Board. I am a regular speaker on topics at the intersection of open source, law and policy, to diverse technical, legal and government audiences. 

Why I'm running for election

I am naturally drawn to the licensing mission of the OSI. I believe it is important to have an attorney well versed in open source licensing on the board of OSI. However, I do not believe the board should be dominated by attorneys. An attorney's  professional voice is only one voice that should help guide the future of OSI and the Open Source Definition. I look forward to participate along with experienced software developers and community leaders in guiding the OSI.

One of the most important functions of the OSI is to continue its leading role in interpreting and applying the Open Source Definition. Now more than ever this role is critical. OSI's approval of licenses and the OSD is highly regarded and frequently referenced explicitly or implicitly in government policies and commercial transactions. OSI should use its position of authority to protect the OSD, advocate for the greater adoption of open source licensing, and advance software freedom for users. To do that I believe it is critical that OSI continued to be a trusted voice in guarding the spirit of software freedom that lead to the OSD achieving such prominence uncompromised by the short term interests of commercial actors. OSI must vigorously defending the OSD against a new wave of commercial actors who while recognizing that open source has "won" are now intentionally or unintentionally seek to undermine the spirit of the open source definition to fit their business models. I believe my experience qualifies me to make significant contributions to the Board's work of protecting the spirit of the open source definition. This doesn't mean that there is no space for new licenses or innovation; to the contrary, I believe OSI should take a leading role in recognizing new licenses that are created to address new issues arise as technology advances. OSI should ensure that new licenses approved as open source conform to the open source spirit and preserve the trust that both free software communities and commercial actors have in using software licensed under a OSI approved Open Source License.

OSI's license gatekeeping function is critical for establishing and strengthening the legal framework that allows open source development to prosper. OSI should take a more active role in explaining the spirit of the open source definition including updating the annotations to the Open Source Definition and the approval process to ensure that the approval process is responsive to the current social and technology environment. This should be done by building on the current board's efforts to make clear that the primary mission of OSI and the purpose of the OSD is to advance software freedom. While I believe commercial actors should be welcomed and encouraged to participate in the free and open source community they should be expected to participate in a manner consistent with the community values. To that end OSI should be active in combating "open washing" efforts that deceive users into relinquishing their software freedom. OSI must continue to nurture relationships with other free software and open source community organizations who share similar values including the Software Freedom Conservancy and the Free Software Foundation.

I also believe now is the time to actively engaged with governments around the world who are increasingly adopting "open source" as part of their procurement and transparency strategy. OSI should be actively engaged in making that more than a buzzword, so that governments and its citizens can benefit from the use of open source software. The free and open source software community ethos is a natural ally of good government, personal privacy and transparency efforts. Open source is a non-partisan issue that is being embraced by governments around the world as the chance for governments to regain its computational and data sovereignty as users of open source and to do so in a fiscally responsible manner. OSI should also encourage governments to look at the benefits of using open source to promote citizen involvement in government and to allow citizens to create modern digital businesses in their local communities.

Feel free to ask me any questions by emailing me marc_at_joneslaw.io. Thank you!