I’d like to offer my genuine congratulations to both Guillaume and Mikel for being elected to the OSMF board this year (along with Allan and Rory).

Though I certainly have had my differences with Mikel, there cannot be any doubt to his dedication to OSM and open data, especially with respect to underserved communities.

I lift my glass to toast the new board, looking forward to 2020!

After some private conversations, I want to clarify a bit about the term “bully”.

Mikel never called me ugly, stupid, used an ethnic slur, or pulled my gym shorts down in front of all the other students cough bad memories cough. That’s definitely not Mikel.

I’m using the term for “throwing his weight around”, which I completely stand by even if one might reasonably claim I’m overusing the “b” word.

This is a personal diary entry meant to communicate with those who know me or my work, and I don’t want to turn it into a tribunal. I’m afraid the best you can do here is asses the words as written, perhaps disregarding claims you feel are too unsupported to warrant your support.

@Mikel this wasn’t a misunderstanding.

You were an authoritarian who completely lost sight of his duties to the Foundation.

Global Logic tried to game an election, lied to the board about it, and multiple members of the OSMF board acted as if the Membership Working Group was a bigger problem than attempted election fraud.

There were others, but you were a bully about it. I still have all the emails.

Yes, Guillaume and I pushed the timeline aggressively, and I’m sorry you didn’t like that, but we were concerned that:

1. the board would sit on / bury the report
2. the report would leak prematurely
3. the membership had a right to know this (aka transparency)

The only deadline we imposed was for public release to the members, which we believed was our duty. We never demanded that the board actually DO anything, that being beyond MWG’s remit.

More than one one person has suggested that you singlehandedly ruined any chance of MWG and the board working cooperatively, and no doubt you’d say the same about me.

I don’t believe you should have the opportunity to do that again.