> The inside will make decisions and the outside won’t understand and feel
left out.

This happens in all groups at a certain size, regardless of their structure
or organizational mechanism.

> Somebody will always come forward. It will just happen.

That's a faith I wish I shared. The liability is simply too large at this
point to count on the graces of a random fiduciary agent every year.
Structure for liability does not immediately invoke the death-by-committee
hierarchy C4L is trying to avoid.

Angela Galvan
Digital Resources and Systems Librarian | SUNY Geneseo
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On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 5:09 PM, Eric Lease Morgan <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> On Jun 7, 2016, at 10:53 PM, Mike Giarlo <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> >>> I'm also interested in investigating how to formalize Code4Lib as an
> >>> entity, for all of the reasons listed earlier in the thread…
> >>
> >> -1 because I don’t think the benefits will outweigh the emotional and
> bureaucratic expense. We already have enough rules.
> >
> > Can you say more about what you expect "the emotional and bureaucratic
> expense" to be?
>
> Bureaucratic and emotional expenses include yet more committees and
> politics. Things will happen increasingly slowly. Our community will be
> less nimble and somewhat governed by outside forces. We will end up with
> presidents, vice-presidents, secretaries, etc. Increasingly there will be
> “inside” and “outside”. The inside will make decisions and the outside
> won’t understand and feel left out. That is what happens when formalization
> take place.
>
> The regional conferences are good things. I call them franchises. The
> annual meeting does not have to be a big deal, and the smaller it is, the
> less financial risk there will be. Somebody will always come forward. It
> will just happen.
>
> —
> Eric Lease Morgan
>