Member associations

[frivoal]

The term "member association" is both defined and used in both the Process and the bylaws.

The bylaws have just changed as follows:

"Member Association” means a consortium, user society, or association of two or more individuals, companies, organizations or governments, or in any combination of these entities that has the purpose of participating in a common activity or pooling resources to achieve a common goal other than participation in, or achieving certain goals in, W3C. The Board of Directors or any Board Committee authorized by the Board of Directors has final authority to determine whether a person is a Member Association and shall exercise reasonable discretion in making this determination

The Process has this similar text (which is where the definition in the bylaws was originally taken from):

A “Member Association” means a consortium, user society, or association of two or more individuals, companies, organizations or governments, or any combination of these entities which has the purpose of participating in a common activity or pooling resources to achieve a common goal other than participation in, or achieving certain goals in, W3C. A joint-stock corporation or similar entity is not a Member Association merely because it has shareholders or stockholders. If it is not clear whether a prospective Member qualifies as a Member Association may reasonably make the determination.

Looking at the specific changes and differences:

• Towards the end of the first sentence, the deletion changes the meaning significantly, and I think it is important that Process and Bylaws be identical on this point, otherwise things will be very confusing.
• The second sentence of the Process is not in the bylaws. Maybe we should drop it from the Process? Maybe it's a helpful clarification, and we should keep it in the Process, possibly as a note, and/or possibly propose adding it in a later version of they bylaws?
• The second sentence (in the bylaws, or third in the Process) assigns the determination of what is or isn't a Member association to different entities (Board vs CEO). This discrepancy is not helpful, as it could theoretically lead to entities being considered member associations for bylaw purposes and not for process purposes, or vice versa, even though the criteria is the same, due to the determination being made separately. While it is unlikely that this would happen, even opening up the possibility seem undesirable. We should either replace the current process text with that of the bylaws, or have the process reference the bylaws and say that they decide who gets to make the determination.
• In the first sentence, the bylaws revision has added "in ". I'm actually not sure why, as it looks awkward grammatically to me, without changing the meaning. Maybe I'm wrong, it's a meaningful change, and we should adopt it? Maybe the change in the bylaws is an accident that we don't need to reproduce? Maybe it's an accident but we should align anyway?
• Also in the first sentence, and maybe that's related to the previous point, though I am not sure, the Process uses "any combination of these entities which has the purpose" while the bylaws use "in any combination of these entities that has the purpose". The Process version seems more fluid to me, and I don't think that in this context, the word choice makes a difference of meaning, but probably we should align the Process to the bylaws anyways?

Alternatively, we could just delete the definition of Member associations from the process entirely, and update its uses to point to the bylaws for the definition, but (a) we have tried so far to limit the coupling between the two documents, and that seems generally worth preserving, and (b) the bylaws, at least in their current incarnation, don't lend themselves to hyperlinking to individual terms, so that's not very practical.

cc: @LJWatson @mnot @dwsinger @koichimoriyama

[TallTed]

• In the first sentence, the bylaws revision has added "in ". I'm actually not sure why, as it looks awkward grammatically to me, without changing the meaning. Maybe I'm wrong, it's a meaningful change, and we should adopt it? Maybe the change in the bylaws is an accident that we don't need to reproduce? Maybe it's an accident but we should align anyway?

It's not just "awkward" grammatically. It's grammatically incorrect, and should not have been inserted. The Process should not align; rather, Bylaws should revert this change.

• Also in the first sentence, and maybe that's related to the previous point, though I am not sure, the Process uses "any combination of these entities which has the purpose" while the bylaws use "in any combination of these entities that has the purpose". The Process version seems more fluid to me, and I don't think that in this context, the word choice makes a difference of meaning, but probably we should align the Process to the bylaws anyways?

Technically, either "which" or "that" may be used in this case. I prefer "which" (and I probably suggested this change in the Process document), but would not block aligning, if this is deemed important, and if adding it to a set of such minor changes to the Bylaws is not viable.