Free Software Foundation completes its board member review
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today announced the completion of the review and re-confirmation of five sitting board members. The entire board of directors is a group of eight deeply committed and experienced individuals. This latest milestone in the board of directors' commitment to governance improvements leaves the FSF very near to completing its promises made to the community four years ago.
The FSF board of directors made a series of commitments in 2021 and 2022 to improve its governance and transparency. As part of these improvements, the board amended the FSF's by-laws to protect the FSF's licenses, drafted a board member agreement, and developed a board member code of ethics. The board also opened a seat to a union-elected staff member in 2021, and used a newly designed process with input from the FSF's associate members to elect three new board members in June 2024. These latest efforts now constitute another major step towards fulfilling all commitments made.
These reforms established a review process for the FSF's associate members and other supporters to contribute to the board's deliberations regarding both new and sitting board members. In the process, associate members posed relevant questions, gathered information, and shared their findings with each other inside the forum. This, in turn, helped the ten voting members decide whether to retain each currently-sitting board member.
The review examined board members Ian Kelling, Geoffrey Knauth, Henry Poole, Richard Stallman, and Gerald Sussman. The process generated detailed philosophical and policy discussions between board members and the FSF's global associate members on topics ranging from the firmness of the Free Software Definition, developments in machine learning, to the board's president position.
"The values of our movement were on proud display in the FSF's board discussion forum, which highlighted passion and vision within our community by placing the diverse perspectives of the Foundation's members - our concerns and fears, as well as our hopes and aspirations - directly in the foreground during this key and timely moment of introspection," said Corwin Brust, an associate member of the FSF.
After the forum discussions with eligible associate members and contributors, the voting members held internal discussions for several weeks on the review itself, the lessons learned from its period of introspection, and the discussion process generally. Then the voting members voted on April 26, 2025 to re-confirm the five board members who had been reviewed.
"The community made itself heard. This kind of open, direct engagement among our directors and our associate members is exactly what we wanted to see from the new governance process," said FSF president Geoff Knauth.
Sincerely,
The Free Software Foundation Board of Directors