An Election Under a Shadow of Doubt
Sun, 20 Apr 2025
This year, the Open Source Initiative's election for its board of directors was anticipated with the usual level of interest. However, what unfolded was far from ordinary, leaving a trail of questions and a significant cloud of suspicion over the entire process.
Even before the first ballot was cast, a movement for change was taking shape. Bradley Kuhn and Richard Fontana, respected voices within our community, announced their candidacy on a shared "OSI reform" platform. Their aim was precise: to address what they perceived as critical issues within the organization's governance and direction. One element of their platform, as detailed on https://codeberg.org/OSI-Reform-Platform/platform#readme, was Item 3: Removing the "code of silence" from the Board Member Agreement. This call for the allowance for respectful dissent within the board resonated with many who believed the OSI needed a shift in its approach.
As the election progressed, however, a series of missteps and controversial decisions began to overshadow the candidates and their platforms. These problems led to a highly unsatisfying outcome, prompting significant concerns regarding the fairness and transparency of the whole election process. Now, more than ever, it's imperative that the OSI address these concerns and uphold the very principles of openness and transparency it champions. The first step towards that is clear: the full results of the 2025 election must be made public.
Recap of the Election Issues: A Series of Questionable Missteps
The 2025 OSI Board of Directors election stumbled from the outset, raising concerns beyond simple administrative errors. What transpired has led many to question whether these were mere oversights or something more calculated.
The initial election announcement, disseminated by OSI's head of community, Nick Vidal, on January 22nd immediately sowed seeds of doubt. The number of open board seats was inaccurate, initially declaring one affiliate director and two individual director positions. This was subsequently "corrected", but only after the nomination period closed, revising the count to two affiliate director seats and one individual director seat. How this impacted candidate strategies is covered elsewhere on the internet. This abrupt change begs the question: was this a genuine error or a late-stage alteration to influence candidate strategies? The OSI's acknowledgment of the "mistake" and promises of procedural improvements do little to quell the unease.
Adding to everything was the handling of the nomination deadline. While the date, February 17th, was consistently communicated, the precise time zone, 11:59 p.m. UTC, was not. This discrepancy, present in only a fraction of the election communications, led to candidate Luke Faraone's disqualification. This raises significant concerns regarding the fairness of a process in which crucial deadline information is distributed inconsistently. The fair thing to do, when something like a time zone is unclear, would be to allow the nomination.
These initial intentional or unintentional irregularities set the tone for the entire election. They created uncertainty and eroded the crucial trust for any fair election. Instead of a smooth, transparent process, the OSI election was marred by inconsistencies that have fueled suspicion and distrust. These early problems laid a troubling foundation for the later, far more controversial, decisions that would further compromise the election's perceived integrity.
The Board Agreement Controversy: A Post-Voting Requirement with Troubling Implications
After the ballots had been cast and the OSI membership had presumably made their choices, a new requirement was introduced that threw the integrity of the election into serious doubt. Candidates for the board were asked to sign the OSI board agreement before the election results were even announced. This demand directly contradicted previous statements of the election process. It had been communicated that signing the board agreement was required for seated directors, a step taken after the election to formalize their commitment. It was never stated that it was a prerequisite for being a candidate.
This sudden shift in requirements, occurring after voting had concluded, raised immediate red flags, particularly in the context of the "OSI reform" platform. As mentioned, a central tenet of Kuhn and Fontana's platform was removing the "code of silence" clause within the board agreement. This clause mandates that board members "support publicly all Board decisions, especially those that do not have unanimous consent." Their public stance on this issue is well-known.
In response to concerns about this new requirement, OSI executive director Stefano Maffulli explained. He stated, in part, that "...we've heard that there may be candidates with no intention to sign the board agreement... we need to know who the actual candidates are before we run the STV calculation to determine the outcome of the vote. So for process efficiency, the board asked all candidates to confirm their good faith intention to serve on the board so that we can tell the software."
However, this explanation rings hollow, particularly when considering the known positions of candidates like Kuhn and Fontana. Their intent to serve was evident through their active campaigning and articulated a platform for reform. Considering that Bradley Kuhn and Richard Fontana had explicitly campaigned on a platform that included modifying the board agreement, Maffulli's statement about needing to know which candidates intended to sign it feels particularly pointed. Their "intention" was clear: to sign but with changes. It seems disingenuous to suggest that the OSI needed to ascertain their "good faith intention to serve" at this late stage, especially concerning an agreement they sought to modify. Using the existing, unmodified agreement as a gatekeeper at this stage appears less about determining a candidate's willingness to serve and more about ensuring compliance with the current board's norms before they even take office.
The OSI's explanation that they needed to know who the "actual candidates were before we ran the STV calculation to determine the outcome of the vote" also warrants scrutiny. The votes had already been cast. At that point, Kuhn and Fontana were candidates. The purpose of the STV calculation is precisely to determine which candidates were elected. Then, imposing a condition that could disqualify candidates before that calculation puts the cart before the horse. It suggests a desire to influence who is eligible to be considered a winner.
Furthermore, the timing is deeply problematic. By demanding signatures before announcing the results, the OSI effectively placed a hurdle that could disqualify candidates before it was even known whether they had won. This inverts the logical order of an election: one becomes subject to the requirements of a position after being elected to it. It appears to be a mechanism to filter candidates based on their willingness to adhere to the existing board agreement rather than allowing the election results to determine who the board members would be.
The timing of the board agreement requirement - imposed after voting had closed but before results were announced - naturally leads to a critical question: What was the true intent behind this decision? Was it a deliberate move to shape the outcome of the election?
The most troubling interpretation is that the OSI leadership, perhaps seeing voting numbers they were uncomfortable with, introduced this requirement as a mechanism to disqualify candidates who might advocate for significant change. If Kuhn and Fontana were leading in the vote count, requiring them to sign an agreement they had publicly stated they wanted to amend would create a significant obstacle to their being seated.
This raises the unsettling question of whether the OSI was attempting to preemptively exclude individuals who might challenge the status quo from within.
Of course, without the release of the full vote totals, this remains speculation. However, the sequence of events - the known reform platform, the post-voting agreement demand targeting a key element of that platform, and the subsequent exclusion of those candidates - creates a strong appearance of a targeted effort to alter the election's outcome. It begs the question: if the OSI was genuinely concerned about candidates not intending to sign any agreement, why not address this before the voting process began? The timing strongly suggests that the OSI reacted to the vote's outcome rather than proactively managing the election process.
The Missing Results: Fueling suspicion
The most glaring and troubling aspect of this election controversy is the OSI's refusal to release the full, detailed results of the 2025 Board of Directors election. This lack of transparency has amplified concerns and fueled widespread suspicion about the organization's motives.
In previous OSI elections, it has been standard practice to publish the vote tallies, providing members and the community with a transparent and accountable record of the electoral process. However, the OSI has deviated from that practice this time, choosing to withhold the data.
This departure from established norms raises serious questions. Why the sudden change? What is the OSI attempting to conceal? The absence of the vote totals creates a vacuum of information quickly filled with speculation and distrust. Examining the numbers, verifying the OSI's claims, or assessing the impact of the controversial decisions made during the election becomes impossible.
The OSI's argument that they excluded specific candidates due to their failure to comply with the post-voting agreement requirement rings hollow without supporting evidence of the vote counts. If, as some suspect, Bradley Kuhn and Richard Fontana received a significant number of votes, potentially enough to win, then the OSI's actions take on a far more sinister appearance.
The OSI's refusal to release the results creates the impression that it has something to hide. It suggests a lack of legitimacy in its process and a reluctance to subject its decisions to public scrutiny. In essence, the OSI's silence speaks volumes.
The simplest and most effective way for the OSI to dispel these concerns would be to immediately release the full election results. Doing so would demonstrate a commitment to transparency and accountability and allow the community to judge the election's outcome for themselves. The longer they withhold this information, the more damage they inflict on their credibility.
The Call to Action: Sign the Petition!
The time for speculation and unanswered questions is over, and a petition has been launched calling for the immediate release of the full, detailed election results. I encourage everyone to sign it: https://codeberg.org/OSI-Concerns/election-results-2025.