About Me

Hi, all.  I am interested in serving as a member of OSI's Board of Directors.  I currently serve as General Counsel for Software Freedom Conservancy, a public charity dedicated to promoting, improving, developing, and defending free, libre, and open source software.  Conservancy acts as the fiscal sponsor and corporate home of over 30 FLOSS projects.  As Conservancy's attorney, I'm responsible for addressing all of the legal issues facing our organization and our member projects; as such, I deal with nonprofit governance issues, trademark and copyright enforcement (including open source license compliance), employment law issues, and more.  I contribute to Conservancy's new ContractPatch initiative -- a series of blog posts that we plan to grow into a full-fledged resource for developers to better understand how to negotiate and manage their employment agreements.  I enjoy working with and supporting the efforts of the 1,000+ developers that comprise Conservancy's member projects.  

I also proudly serve as a coordinator for Outreachy, a member project that helps people from groups underrepresented in free and open source software get involved by providing a supportive community for newcomers to contribute to throughout the year, and by offering focused internship opportunities twice a year with many FLOSS organizations.

Prior to joining Conservancy, I worked in private practice, and in IBM's Technology & Intellectual Property group as a licensing and business development  executive.

When I'm not working for Conservancy, I enjoy life as a (fairly) new parent.  I dabble in songwriting and music production (although I recently converted my home music studio into a nursery).  I root for Washington, DC-area sports teams (including the surprisingly good Wizards).  I live in Harlem, New York, NY with my amazing wife, Beth, and our son.

Why I'm running

I appreciate and support OSI's mission, and would like to provide my skills and expertise in volunteer capacity.  I think my background in both nonprofit law and technology law (particularly as it relates to open source license interpretation and enforcement) would enable me to bring a unique dimension to OSI's board. 

I'm excited about OSI's potential to bring value to the public in new and exciting ways.  For starters, I'd like to help OSI recruit more foundations and public charities outside of the open source/technology space for affiliate membership.  The free and open source community is close-knit, but increasingly, organizations outside of our community are developing and/or using open source software to advance their charitable missions.  We have an opportunity to mentor these organizations, and encourage others to join their ranks.  OSI can serve as a connector between NPOs pursuing a range of charitable missions who may not otherwise interact, and provide a platform for sharing best practices about the use and development of FLOSS.  Together, we can help charities reallocate the millions of dollars currently spent on unwieldy proprietary software solutions towards program activities that better our world.

I also would like to help OSI to coordinate with existing diversity initiatives to broaden the pool of participants and contributors to FLOSS.  OSI can take a leadership role in promoting inclusivity in FLOSS, which will result in healthier, more robust communities.

Contact Info

If you have any questions, feel free to ping me on IRC (keynote2k on freenode).  Or, find me on Twitter (@keynote2k).  

I hope that OSI's membership gives me the privilege of serving them and the public in this capacity.  Thanks for your consideration!