GNOME – 2023 Board of Director Candidate

Community Elections and Referendums
1

Name: Khairul Aizat Kamarudzzaman

Nickname: fenris

Affiliation: GNOME & Ubuntu

Email: khairulaizat[at]gnome.org / fenris[at]ubuntu.com

Hi Foundation Members,

I would like to announce my candidacy for the GNOME Foundation Board of Directors 2023 election. As a GNOME Foundation member for almost two years now, my goal has been to support diversity within the GNOME project.

I’ve been with GNOME desktop users for more than a decade and just recently involved with GNOME Community in 2019 where I first joined GNOME Asia Summit 2019 in Indonesia. Since then, I’m actively contributing to GNOME by organizing GNOME Asia Summit 2020 ~ GNOME Asia Summit 2022 with the GNOME Malaysia Community.

These efforts would not have been feasible without the members and contributors of GNOME, who have always volunteered to support us on this journey. I firmly believe in the value collaboration brings to open source. I aim to continue this endeavor by collaborating with more individuals and organizations within and outside the GNOME community to strengthen and broaden the GNOME project’s influence across Asia.

Open Source is not new to me, As a former System Engineer at Open Source Competency Center (OSCC) under Malaysia Administrative Modernisation And Management Planning Unit (MAMPU) back in 2008, I got involved with various open source projects and used Ubuntu as my preferred operating system. Since 2012, I’m being elected to as Ubuntu Membership Board (1) and still serving to date. Just not that, I helped the Malaysian Government, especially the Ministry of Education (MOE) by promoting Ubuntu and Endless OS to local primary and secondary schools.

This motivates newcomers to join GNOME and feel a sense of belonging in open source. Hence, if I’m selected for this next term of the board in 2023, I intend to collaborate with members and contributors in brainstorming around diversity and inclusion metrics that would help improve our effort of diversity within the GNOME projects globally.

With my more than 15 years of progressively responsible experience, I offer a distinguished career earmarked by accomplishments in leading and directing information-technology operations across broad disciplines, including hardware, software, development, testing, production support, project management, database technologies, customer satisfaction, vendor relationships, strategic planning, staff development, promoting change and improvement, and technology implementation.

My proven track record includes planning the implementation of new technology projects and developing technology strategies that align with business needs while ensuring that products meet customer needs and corporate goals. In fact, in several organizations, I have played a major role in planning and directing IT solutions to support operations and achieve goals. Your organization will gain from my strong sense of dedication, solid work ethic, teamwork skills, and ability to find solutions.

Joining the GNOME project has allowed me to contribute towards building a diverse and sustainable free software that everyone can trust. It will be a privilege to continue in this capacity and serve on the Board of Directors in 2023. As a Linux user, I am proud of our impact on desktop applications and the open-source space. I would like to use this medium to thank all GNOME contributors, volunteers, and staff serving in their various capacities in consistently releasing different versions of GNOME and aiding usability. Thank you all.

Regards,

Khairul Aizat Kamarudzzaman (fenris)

(1) https://wiki.ubuntu.com/fenris

3 Likes
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Hi Khairul, and thanks for the introduction!

Could you elaborate on your general direction for increasing diversity and inclusion? These are definitely important issues to work on, but are also very broad issues. Are there specific areas you find more critical, or more attainable?

For example, cultural and international diversity (e.g. more non-English speaking events and locales), race/gender/etc inclusion (e.g. Outreachy), making events and contributing more feasible financially, initiatives for accessibility technologies, or maybe trying to engage with youth and education systems?

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Hi @andyholmes,

Thanks for the question.

It is a very broad issue, Why I put it generally because I’m not sure yet which part of my capacities I can focus and work on. As part of supporting the GNOME project, engaging the youth and education systems caught my interest as I have experience working with Endless OS Foundation in my country. Both foundation synergy will help us reach the outreach area with the recent technologies and education development.

Not just that, I will try to contribute more and follow the other’s Board of Directors directions for the GNOME Foundation :blush:

1 Like
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Great, thanks for the response!

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Hi Khairul,

Thanks for your candidacy - I’d be happy to second your nomination. Robert McQueen / robert@mcqueen.me.uk

Thanks,
Rob

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I am happy to support Khairul’s candidacy as well.

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I’m happy to second your candidacy too.

felipeborges@gnome.org

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I forgot to state that I support candidacy as well!

andyholmes@gnome.org

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I’d like to second this nomination.

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@averi Does this candidacy not approved?

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My bad, missed this one, this candidacy is also approved. Updating the voting forms and announcements now, thanks!

1 Like
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I’ve invalidated all the tokens and resent a new set to make sure Andy is also part of the election choices as it should be, thanks for reporting!

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GNOME Foundation 2023 Elections Candidates still needs to be updated.

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Pushed a fix for that now, Khairul, what’s your corporate affiliation?

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my corporate affiliation : Consultant [at] Informology (Informology.asia)

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Er, just so I didn’t confuse anyone (I’m sorry if I did), I was intending to support the candidacy of @khairulaizat as opposed to running myself!

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No worries James, misread it myself!

1 Like