Bradley M. Kuhn

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Repeated Mistakes Lead to Unfair OSI Elections

Monday 3 March 2025 by Bradley M. Kuhn

Update 2025-03-21: This blog post is extremely long (if you're reading this, you must already know I'm terribly long-winded). I was in the middle of consolidating it with other posts to make a final, single “wrap up” post of the OSI elections when, in the middle of doing that, I was told that Linux Weekly News (LWN) published an article written by Joe Brockmeier. As such,I've carefully left the text below as it stood it stood 2025-03-20 03:42 UTC, which I believe is the version that Brockmeier sourced for his story (only changes past the line “Original Post” have been HTML format fixes). (I hate as much as you do having to scour archive.org/web to find the right version.) Nevertheless, I wouldn't have otherwise left this here in its current form because it's a huge, real-time description that as such doesn't make the best historical reference record of these event. I used my blog as a campaigning tool (for reasons discussed below) before I knew how much interest there would ultimately be in the FOSS community about the 2025 OSI Board of Directors election. Since this was used as a source for the LWN article, keeping the original record easy to find is obviously important and folks shouldn't have to go to archive.org/web to find it. Nevertheless, if you're just digging into this story fresh, I don't really recommend reading the below. Instead, I suggest just reading Brockmeier's LWN article because he's a journalist and writes better and more concise than me, and he's unbiased and the below is my (understandably) biased view as a candidate who lived through this problematic election.

Original Post

I recently announced that I was nominated for the Open Source Initiative (OSI) Board of Directors as an “Affiliate” candidate. I chose to run as an (admittedly) opposition candidate against the existing status quo, on a “ticket” with my colleague, Richard Fontana, who is running as an (opposition) “Member” candidate.

These elections are important; they matter with regard to the future of FOSS. OSI recently published the “Open Source Artificial Intelligence Definition” (OSAID). One of OSI's stated purposes of the OSID is to convince the entire EU and other governments and policy agencies will adopt this Definition as official for all citizens. Those stakes aren't earth-shattering, but they are reasonably high stakes. (You can read i a blog post I wrote on the subject or Fontana's and my shared platform for more information about OSAID.)

I have worked and/or volunteered for nonprofits like OSI for years. I know it's difficult to get important work done — funding is always too limited. So, to be sure I'm not misquoted: no, I don't think the election is “rigged”. Every problem described herein can easily be attributed to innocent human error, and, as such, I don't think anyone at OSI has made an intentional plan to make the elections unfair. Nevertheless, these mistakes and irregularities (particularly the second one below) have led to an unfair 2025 OSI Directors Election. I call on the OSI to reopen the nominations for a few days, correct these problems, and then extend the voting time accordingly. I don't blame the OSI for these honest mistakes, but I do insist that they be corrected. This really does matter: since this isn't just a local club. OSI is an essential FOSS org that works worldwide and claims to have a consensus mandate for determining what is (or is not) “open source”. Thus, (if the OSI intends to continue with an these advisory elections), OSI's elections need the greatest integrity and legitimacy. Irregularities must be corrected and addressed to maintain the legitimacy of this important organization.

Regarding all these items below, I did raise all the concerns privately with the OSI staff before publicly listing them here. In every case, I gave OSI at least 20-30% of the entire election cycle to respond privately before discussing the problems publicly. (I have still received no direct response from the OSI on any of these issues.)

(Recap on) First Irregularity

The first irregularity was the miscommunication about the nomination deadline (as covered in the press. Instead of using the time zone of OSI's legal home (in California), or the standard FOSS community deadline of AoE (anywhere on earth) time, OSI surreptitiously chose UTC and failed to communicate that decision properly. According to my sources, only one email of 3(+) emails about the elections included the fully qualified datetime of the deadline. Everywhere else (including everywhere on OSI's website) published only the date, not the time. It was reasonable for nominators to assume the deadline was US/Pacific — particularly since the nomination form still worked after 23:59 UTC passed.

Second Irregularity

Due to that first irregularity, this second (and most egregious) irregularity is compounded even further. All year long, the OSI has communicated that, for 2025, elections are for two “Member” seats and one “Affiliate” seat. Only today (already 70% through the election cycle) did OSI (silently) correct this error. This change was made well after nominations had closed (in every TZ). By itself, the change in available seats after nominations closed makes the 2025 OSI elections unfair. Here's why: the Members and the Affiliates are two entirely different sets of electorates. Many candidates made complicated decisions about which seats to run for based on the number of seats available in each class. OSI is aware of that, too, because (a) we told them that during candidate orientation, and (b) Luke said so publicly in their blog post (and OSI directly responded to Luke in the press).

If we had known there were two Affiliate seats and just one Member seat, Debian (an OSI Affiliate) would have nominated Luke a week early to the Affiliate seat. Instead, Debian's leadership, Luke, Fontana, and I had a complex discussion in the final week of nominations on how best to run as a “ticket of three”. In that discussion, Debian leadership decided to nominate no one (instead of nominating Luke) precisely because I was already nominated on a platform that Debian supported, and Debian chose not to run a candidate against me for the (at the time, purported) one Affiliate seat available.

But this irregularity didn't just impact Debian, Fontana, Luke, and me. I was nominated by four different Affiliates. My primary pitch to ask them to nominate me was that there was just one Affiliate seat available. Thus, I told them, if they nominated someone else, that candidate would be effectively running against me. I'm quite sure at least one of those Affiliates would have wanted to nominate someone else if only OSI had told them the truth when it mattered: that Affiliates could easily elect both me and a different candidate for two available Affiliate seats. Meanwhile, who knows what other affiliates who nominated no one would have done differently? OSI surely doesn't know that. OSI has treated every one of their Affiliates unfairly by changing the number of seats available after the nominations closed.

Due to this Second Irregularity alone, I call on the OSI to reopen nominations and reset the election cycle. The mistakes (as played) actually benefit me as a candidate — since now I'm running against a small field and there are two seats available. If nominations reopen, I'll surely face a crowded field with many viable candidates added. Nevertheless, I am disgusted that I unintentionally benefited from OSI's election irregularity and I ask OSI take corrective action to make the 2025 election fair.

The remaining irregularities are minor (by comparison, anyway), but I want to make sure I list all the irregularities that I've seen in the 2025 OSI Board Elections in this one place for everyone's reference:

Third Irregularity

I was surprised when OSI published the slates of Affiliate candidates that they were not in any (forward or reverse) alphabetical order — not candidate's first, last, or nominator name. Perhaps the slots in the voter's guide were assigned randomly, but if so, that is not disclosed to the electorate. And, Who is listed first, you ask? Why, the incumbent Affiliate candidate. The issue of candidate ordering in voting guides and ballots has been well studied academically and, unsurprisingly, being listed first is known to be an advantage. Given that incumbents already have an advantage in all elections, putting the incumbent first without stating that the slots in the voter guide were randomly assign makes the 2025 OSI Board election unfair.

I contacted OSI leadership within hours of the posting of the candidates about this issue (at time of writing, that was four days ago) and they have refused to respond nor have they corrected the issue. This compounds the error, because OSI consciously choosing to list the incumbent Affiliate candidate first in the voter guide on purpose.

Note that this problem is not confined to the “Affiliate district”. In the “Member district”, my running mate, Richard Fontana, is listed last in the voter guide for no apparent reason.

Fourth Irregularity

It's (ostensibly) a good idea for the OSI to run a discussion forum for the candidates (and kudos to OSI ( in this instance, anyway ) for using the GPL'd Discourse software for the purpose). however, the requirements to create an account and respond to the questions exclude some Affiliate candidates. Specifically, the OSI has stated that Affiliate candidates, and the Affiliates that are their electorate, need not be Members of the OSI. (This is actually the very first item in OSI's election FAQ!) Yet, to join the discussion forum, one must become a member of the OSI! While it might be reasonable to require all Affiliate candidates become OSI Members, this was not disclosed until the election started, so it's unfair!

Some already argue that since there is a free (as in price) membership that this is a non-issue. I disagree, and here's why: Long ago, I had already decided that I would not become a Member of OSI (for free or otherwise) because OSI Members who do not pay money are denied voting rights in these elections! Yes, you read that right: the election for OSI Directors in the “Members” seat literally has a poll tax! I refuse to let OSI count me as a Member when the class of membership they are offering to people who can't afford to pay is a second-class citizenship in OSI's community. Anyway, there is no reason that one should have to become a Member to post on the discussion fora — particularly given that OSI has clearly stated that the Affiliate candidates (and the Affiliate representatives who vote) are not required to be individual Members.

A desire for Individual Membership is understandable for an nonprofit. Nonprofits often need to prove they represent a constituency. I don't blame any nonprofit for trying to build a constituency for itself. The issue is how. Counting Members as “anyone who ever posted on our discussion forum” is confusing and problematic — and becomes doubly so when Voting Memberships are available for purchase. Indeed, OSI's own annual reporting conflates the two types of Members confusingly, as “Member district” candidate Chad Whitacre asked about during the campaign (but received no reply).

I point as counter-example to the models used by GNOME Foundation (GF) and Software In the Public Interest (SPI). These organizations are direct peers to the OSI, but both GF and SPI have an application for membership that evaluates on the primary criterion of what contributions the individual has made to FOSS (be they paid or volunteer). AFAICT, for SPI and GF, no memberships require a donation, aren't handed out merely for signing up to the org's discussion fora, and all members (once qualified) can vote.

Fifth Irregularity

This final irregularity is truly minor, but I mention it for completeness. On the Affiliate candidate page, it seems as if each candidate is only nominated by one affiliate. When I submitted my candidate statement, since OSI told me they automatically filled in the nominating org, I had assumed that all my nominating orgs would be listed. Instead, they listed only one. If I'd known that, I'd have listed them at the beginning of my candidate statement; my candidate statement was drafted under the assumption all my nominating orgs would be listed elsewhere.

Sixth Irregularity

Update 2025-03-07. I received an unsolicited (but welcome) email from an Executive Director of one of OSI's Affiliate Organizations. This individual indicated they'd voted for me (I was pleasantly surprised, because I thought their org was pro-OSAID, which I immediately wrote back and told them). The irregularity here is that OSI told candidates that the campaign period would be 10 days, including two weekends in most places — including orientation phone calls for candidates. They started the campaign late, and didn't communicate that they weren't extending the timeline, so the campaign period was about 6.5 days and included only one weekend.

Meanwhile, during this extremely brief 6.5 day period, the election coordinator at OSI was unavailable to answer inquiries from candidates and Affiliates for at least three of those days. This included sending one Affiliate an email with the subject line ”Rain Check” in response to five questions they sent about the election process, and its contents indicated that the OSI would be unavailable to answers questions about the election — until after the election!

Seventh Irregularity (added 2025-03-13)

The OSI Election Team, less than 12 hours after sending out the ballots (on Friday 2025-03-07) sent the following email. Many of the Affiliates told me about the email, and it seems likely that all Affiliates received this email within a short time after receiving their ballots (and a week before the ballots were due):

Subject: OSI Elections: unsolicited emails
Date: Sat, 08 Mar 2025 02:11:05 -0800
From: "Staffer REDACTED" <staffer@opensource.org>

Dear REDACTED,

It has been brought to our attention that at least one candidate has been emailing affiliates without their consent.

We do not give out affiliate emails for candidate reachouts, and understand that you did not consent to be spammed by candidates for this election cycle.

Candidates can engage with their fellow affiliates on our forums where we provide community management and moderation support, and in other public settings where our affiliates have opted to sign up and publicly engage.

Please email us directly for any ongoing questions or concerns.

Kind regards,
OSI Elections team

This email is problematic because candidates received no specific guidance on this matter. No material presented at either of the two mandatory election orientations (which I attended) indicated that contacting your constituents directly was forbidden, nor could I find such in any materials on the OSI website. Also, I checked with Richard Fontana, who also attended these sessions, and he confirms I didn't miss anything.

It's not spam to contact one's “FOSS Neighbors” to learn their concerns when in a political campaign for an important position. In fact, during those same orientation sessions, it was mentioned that Affiliate candidates should know the needs of their constiuents — OSI's Affiliates. I took that charge seriously, so I invested 12-14 hours researching every single of my constituents (all ~76 OSI Affiliate Organizations). my research confirmed my hypothesis: my constituents were my proverbial “FOSS neighbors”. In fact, I found that I'd personally had contact with most of the orgs since before OSI even had an Affiliate program. For example, one of the now-Affiliates had contacted me way back in 2013 to provide general advice and support about how to handle fundraising and required nonprofit policies for their org. Three other now-Affiliate's Executive Directors are people I've communicated regularly with for nearly 20 years. (There are other similar examples too). IOW, I contacted my well-known neighbors to find out their concerns now that I was running for an office that would represent them.

There were also some Affiliates that I didn't know (or didn't know well) yet. For those, like any canvasing candidate, I knocked on their proverbial front doors: I reviewed their websites, found the name of the obvious decision maker, searched my email archives for contact info (and, in some cases, just did usual guesses like <firstname.lastname@example.org>), and contacted them. (BTW, I've done this since the 1990s in nonprofit work when trying to reach someone at a fellow nonprofit to discuss any issue.)

All together, I was able to find a good contact at 55 of the Affiliates, and here's a (redacted) sample of one the emails I sent:

Subject: Affiliate candidate for OSI Board of Directors available to answer any questions
REDACTED_FIRSTNAME,

I'm Bradley M. Kuhn and I'm running as an Affiliate candidate in the Open Source Initiative Board elections that you'll be voting in soon on behalf of REDACTED_NAME_OF_ORG.

I wanted to let you know about the Shared Platform for OSI Reform (that I'm running for jointly with Richard Fontana) [0] and also offer some time to discuss the platform and any other concerns you have as an OSI Affiliate that you'd like me to address for you if elected.

(Fontana and I kept our shared platform narrow so that we could be available to work on other issues and concerns that our (different) constituencies might have.)

I look forward to hearing from you soon!

[0] https://codeberg.org/OSI-Reform-Platform/platform#readme

Note that Fontana is running as a Member candidate which has a separate electorate and for different Board seats, so we are not running in competition for the same seat.

(Since each one was edited manually for the given org, if the org primarily existed for a FOSS project I used, I also told them how I used the project myself, etc.)

Most importantly, though, election officials should never comment on the permitted campaign methods of any candidates before voting finishes in any event. While OSI staff may not have intended it, editorializing regarding campaign strategies can influence an election, and if you're in charge of running an impartial collection, you have a high standard to meet.

OSI: either reopen nominations or just forget the elections

Again, I call on OSI to correct these irregularities, briefly reopen nominations, and extend the voting deadline. However, if OSI doesn't want to do that, there is another reasonable solution. As explained in OSI's by-laws and elsewhere, OSI's Directors elections are purely advisory. Like most nonprofits, the OSI is governed by a self-perpetuating (not an elected) Board. I bet with all the talk of elections, you didn't even know that!

Frankly, I have no qualms with a nonprofit structure that includes a self-perpetuating Board. While it's not a democratic structure, a self-perpetuating Board of principled Directors does solve the problems created in a Member-based organization. In Member-based organizations, votes are for sale. Any company with resources to buy Memberships for its employees can easily dominate the election. While OSI probably has yet to experience this problem, if OSI grows its Membership (as it seeks to), OSI will sure face that problem. Self-perpetuating Boards aren't perfect, but they do prevent this problem.

Meanwhile, having now witnessed OSI's nomination and the campaign process from the inside, it really does seem to me that OSI doesn't really take this election all that seriously. And, OSI already has in mind the kinds of candidates they want. For example, during one of the two nominee orientation calls, a key person in the OSI Leadership said (regarding items 4 of Fontana's and my shared platform) [quote paraphrased from my memory]: If you don't want to agree to these things, then an OSI Directorship is not for you and you should withdraw and seek a place to serve elsewhere. I was of course flabbergasted to be told that a desire to avoid proprietary software should disqualify me (at least in view of the current OSI leadership). But, that speaks to the fact that the OSI doesn't really want to have Board elections in the first place. Indeed, based on that and many other things that the OSI leadership has said during this process, it seems to me they'd actually rather hand-pick Directors to serve than run a democratic process. There's no shame in a nonprofit that prefers a self-perpetuating Board; as I said, most nonprofits are not Membership organizations nor allow any electorate to fill Board seats.

Meanwhile, OSI's halfway solution (i.e., a half-heartedly organized election that isn't really binding) seems designed to manufacture consent. OSI's Affiliates and paid individual Membership are given the impression they have electoral power, but it's an illusion. Giving up on the whole illusion would be the most transparent choice for OSI, and if the OSI would rather end these advisory elections and just self-perpetuate, I'd support that decision.

Update on 2025-03-07: Chad Whitacre, candidate in OSI's “Member district”, has endorsed my suggestion that OSI reopen nominations briefly for this election. While I still urge voters in the “Member district” to rank my running mate, Richard Fontana first in that race, I believe Chad would be fine choice as your second listed candidate in the rank choice voting.

Posted on Monday 3 March 2025 at 11:00 by Bradley M. Kuhn.

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