Change of treasurer for Manjaro community funds
forum.manjaro.org
Hi everyone. The Manjaro community donations are currently held by OpenCollective and CommunityBridge with me acting as treasurer since the switch away from Phil's personal bank account as the target for donations (and that in turn due to the company announcement). There is a written expense policyPlease note the Collective name on invoices. If the vendor requires a billing address, you can put your address or the address of any core contributor of the collective. Expenses will be covered ...

TL;DR jonathon (treasurer) was removed from the OpenCollective after they had a big argument with philm (project lead) over whether or not to authorize the purchase of a $2,000 laptop. After that jonathon posted his grievances on the Manjaro forum, to which philm responded by delisting the thread and removing jonathan as moderator of the forum.

  • abbenm
    4·
    4 years ago

    Spending a small amount of money is not what makes something transparent. I’ve never heard that one before. Transparency is when you openly disclose information.

    From my experience $2,000 counts as quite a lot. Professional institutions that I’m aware of require explicit approval for that kind of expense, and if spent inappropriately it’s something that can get you in a lot of trouble.

    Lastly, unless more info came out or a new statement was made, this does not appear to have been transparent according to the normal definition. They hid the thread on their own forum without explaining why, then re-hid it without explanation, left a cryptic comment asking people to ‘calm down’ but without explaining what happened, and there were apparently wholly new charges discovered which had not been reviewed or disclosed, the exact opposite of transparent. And they appear not to have been consistent with their own rules. And they appear to have stripped their own former treasurer of mod ability so they couldn’t make the thread visible again.

    These should all be alarming to anyone thinking of whether they can trust that their donation will be handled transparently, or according to their own stated policies, or whether they can be stewards of a healthy, vibrant community. Maybe they will have an explanation that shows respect to their community and addresses all concerns. But even the way they have handled the disagreement and (failed) to communicate to their community is disappointing.