Work in Progress Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) List

[anajsana]

We are excited to share with you an initial and work in progress Frequently asked questions (FAQ) list based on the questions raised during our past community calls. This FAQ serves as a foundation to address some of the key inquiries and to guide our ongoing discussions.

While there are a few answers provided -for example, why a foundation and why LF - the aim for most of these questions - and others that may raise- to be answered collaboratively to ensure that all voices in our community are heard and considered. We invite the community to collaborate and define the remaining questions together.

All feedback is welcome, and there will be space for discussion in the upcoming community calls about the proposed FAQ to improve this list together.

Below as comments is the initial content for this WIP FAQ list 👇

[anajsana]

1️⃣ Why a Foundation?

The major benefit of a foundation is that it promotes participatory governance, preventing any single company from monopolizing a collaborative project. Specifically, a foundation ensures:

• Community-driven Governance: Projects are managed by the community for the community, with contributions reviewed and accepted based on merit.
• Open Source: Contributors can use the project's resources without fearing sudden changes in licensing or direction.
• Impartiality: contributions to the content and direction are accepted based on their community value, regardless of their impact on any particular vendor

This initiative stems from a shared passion for DevRel and the recognition that the profession faces persistent challenges, such as a lack of clarity and difficulty in measuring impact. Despite significant growth in resources and organizations addressing these issues, these resources are fragmented. Our goal is to create an inclusive, community-driven entity that formally defines DevRel practices, addresses common challenges with best-in-practice resources, and attracts both individuals and organizations’ decision-makers. A foundation aims to be a trusted, credible, and expert resource, similar to professional bodies in other fields, providing training, certification, continuing education, and advocacy.

[anajsana]

2️⃣ Why Linux Foundation

The major benefit of hosting with the LF is that it offers recognized global credibility. Specifically, the Linux Foundation ensures:

• DevRel value outside DevRel: Being part of a renowned and large open source foundation like the Linux Foundation enhances the project's credibility not only within the DevRel community but also among external stakeholders and decision-makers. This recognition elevates the visibility and perceived value of DevRel as a profession, demonstrating its importance and impact beyond industry peers.
• Level Playing Field: Ensuring that no single company in the ecosystem can exert undue control over the project by owning the trademark.
• Licensing Integrity: Protecting the licensing integrity of the collaborative project, as detailed in this LF blog post.

The Linux Foundation allows individual contributors to retain copyright ownership of their contributions while providing an open source license, reflected through the Developer Certificate of Origin sign-off process.

This collaborative project has been hosted as a community project, with no funding involved. This means taking advantage of the governance structure, project management staff, and back-end resources that the LF provides to all hosted projects, to ensure long-term sustainability. Examples of these projects include SPDX (SBOM Standard), FOSSology or CHAOSS. We also chose the LF to avoid reinventing the wheel. Creating something new requires tools, infrastructure, and ideally, a lightweight process to get started and make the initiative resilient.

[anajsana]

3️⃣ Who is the current SC?

This first, non-official Interim SC, composed of tenured Developer Relations professionals, has initiated this “intent to form foundation” built through the LF’s guidance and principles. Once the charter and mission are in place, a new Leadership council will be established. This process will be via elections at a future date to be determined.

While our profession is relatively small, it is big enough that there are many really good people who can do this work. And we hope they want to! We had the initiative and time to do this, and so feel it’s reasonable for us, just like anyone else, to take the first steps forward on building something

Our aim has always been to thread the needle on process and progress - we wanted to get enough done that we as a professional collective had a base and some scaffolding from which to build, but not too much progress that folks felt we had prematurely made decisions.

[anajsana]

4️⃣ What have you accomplished to date?

To date we have accomplished the following:

Formed an initial, no-official interim steering committee of tenured DevRel professionals with the shared goal of solving critical DevRel problems through the formation of a Foundation
Secured support from the Linux Foundation to have the DevRel Foundation hosted by them
Drafted a lightweight charter and took a first pass at organizational structure to provide the broader DevRel community with a starting point from which to work
Identified tools and lightweight process get work done: Discord, GitHub, gitvote and groups. io
Scheduled and facilitated open bi-weekly sessions to listen and learn (alternating APAC/EMEA and AMER)

[anajsana]

List of identified open-ended questions to be answered by the community:

• What are the plans for official and future leadership?
• What's next?
• How do I get involved?

And more to come as this intent to form initiative evolves