2026 Governing Board Elections

2026 GB Elections
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It is election season yet again for the FOSS United Community. For the second year, 3 members of the inaugural Governing Board (GB) are stepping down. That means we are electing three new GB members from the Community!

What’s new this year:

  • Two-year terms for GB members. With an option to step down after one year.
  • The nomination process takes place on the forum. Community members can submit nominations using the template and make a post on the forum.
  • Goodbye custom voting platform. Hello to a commercial offering. Following feedback from last year, we’ve decided to go ahead with a popular voting platform to conduct this season of Elections. More details on that soon.

(For more context on the Why Governing Board, check out the explainer from last season here, and if time permits, read notes from previous GB meetings to gain context and perspective)

Timelines:

Phase Dates
Nominations open August 10 - Sept 5
GB reviews & finalises candidates Sept 6 - Sept 8
Promotions and Campaign period Sept 9 - Sept 23
Voting Sept 24 - Sept 27, 3 PM
Result. Say hello to the new GB Sep 27, 5 PM

How to nominate yourself?

Create a new post using the Nomination Template, under Category: 2026 GB Elections and Topic: Nominations, with the post title “ Nomination | Your Name - 2026 GB Elections ”.

Tell the community who you are, your stake in the wider digital commons community and FOSS United, and why you are running for the GB.

Please note that after you submit your nomination, the Governing Board will filter the nominations and determine the final ballot. Submitting a nomination does not mean that you automatically qualify for the ballot.

If elected, Governing Board members are expected to

  • Proactively respond to async communication via email and/or IM
  • Dedicate at least 10 hours per month to Governing Board duties, which includes a 2-hour monthly gathering of the Governing Board, participating in open community calls, and additional volunteering duties with the Staff/Community
  • Volunteer/get involved in at least one of FOSS United programs/projects/initiatives
  • Shape FOSS United annual budgeting and fundraising
  • Read notes from previous GB meetings to gain context and perspective.

Coming up next week

  • FOSS United Governing Board: FAQs
  • Guidelines on Voter Eligibility
  • Reflections on one year of the GB

If you have any questions, please drop a comment here or write to governing-board@fossunited.org.

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Bump - 4 days more for nominations to end.

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Update: Nominations phase for the 2026 GB elections has closed. We’ve received about 10 nominations for the 3 open GB seats.

The nominations are (in alphabetical order)

The campaigning period starts from tomorrow. Stay tuned for more details.

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can you tag folks in this post ? That will trigger emails, if they have them enabled

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Happening today!

Virtual Open House | Meet the GB candidates!
Sept 15, 07:00 PM IST
Link to RSVP: Open House | Governing Board Elections 2026

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Small note on Who can vote and how the voting happens?

Last year, every account on the platform received a ballot. But over the last few years, we’ve seen an uptick in spam and bot accounts on the platform. To address this, this year we’ve tightened the voter roll. You’re eligible to vote if you’ve bought a ticket to a FOSS United event or RSVP’d for one in the past.

The final voter roll will be locked on the evening of September 23, and ballots go out the morning of September 24.

This year, we are using BetterVoting’s platform to conduct the elections.

  • The Python community recently used it to organise their elections.
  • We are in touch with the BetterVoting platform team, and they helped us figure out a bunch of things.

We intend to follow STAR voting (bloc) methodology. As opposed to ranked-choice voting. This is a change from what we had discussed earlier.

  • It is a simpler-to-understand method for voters
  • It makes the process much more expressive for voters.
  • Difference between Ranked-Choice and Star voting on the face of it:
    • RCV asks: “Put these movies in order from best to worst.”
    • STAR asks: “Rate each movie out of 5 stars.”
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