Nikaia Foundation

The Nikaia Foundation is the name of the governance initiative of the Nikaia programming language. How the project is governed, how people take part in decisions, how money is handled and how decisions are recorded is set out in its governance charter: Nikaia Foundation Governance Charter, in the governance repository.

The charter is a draft (version 1.0, draft for community review). This page describes what that draft says; where the two differ, the charter counts.

What it is

• Not a legal entity. Nikaia is an initiative without a separate legal entity. The name “Nikaia Foundation” does not mean that a legally constituted foundation exists, nor that the project has charitable or tax-exempt status. Contributions are not tax-deductible on the strength of the name. A later legal or fiscal form (an association, a company, fiscal hosting) is possible; the charter requires none.
• Coordinated from Baden-Württemberg, Germany. This is not a registered office.
• Its purpose is to develop, investigate, document and maintain the language and its ecosystem for public use: research, tooling, publications, reproducible measurements, education and project infrastructure. Code, documentation and decisions are published where practicable. Commercial use of Nikaia is welcome.

What it does

• Records decisions. Material decisions are recorded with the question, the alternatives, the decision and its reasons, and who took it: in ADRs, issues, proposals or the governance repository.
• Defines roles with a scope, limits and an annual report: Project Lead, Membership Review, Architecture and Process Review, Budget Review, Expenditure Review, Charter Guardian and Tie-Breaking.
• Keeps money apart from control. A contribution or sponsorship buys no ownership, no vote and no authority over the architecture. Nobody, the founder included, is entitled to project funds for personal use, and assets are not distributed privately if the project ends.

Who decides, honestly

Anyone may contribute. Contributing does not by itself give membership or a vote. Governance members, admitted under a published procedure, may vote, propose motions and amendments, and nominate people for roles.

The charter does not claim majority rule. In the early phase it deliberately gives the founder substantial control:

• the founder holds every role of Article 5.3 unless one is recorded as assigned to someone else;
• the founder appoints, reassigns and revokes roles; members cannot force a transfer of a role by majority vote;
• the Membership Review Role may veto the admission of a member, and the Charter Guardian Role may veto an amendment of the charter; both are held by the founder;
• one person may hold several roles, including both financial review roles, which the charter names a limitation on independent oversight;
• no independent oversight body exists yet.

This is not an unrestricted democratic process, and the charter says it must not be presented as one. It also requires the distribution of authority to be reviewed every year and responsibilities to be separated as the project grows.

Founder

Keywan Ghadami founded Nikaia. During the initial phase, under the charter, he holds the roles of Article 5.3 not recorded as assigned to another person:

• Project Lead (Article 6.1)
• Membership Review Role (Article 4.4)
• Architecture and Process Review Role
• Budget Review Role
• Expenditure Review Role
• Charter Guardian Role (Article 8.6)
• Tie-Breaking Role

and the authority to appoint, reassign or revoke internal roles (Article 5.4). Salary or personal compensation to the founder is excluded until a sufficiently independent decision-making arrangement exists (Articles 3.3 and 7.5).

Open call: a leadership role

The project is looking for a person to take on a leadership role in its governance: a role with real weight in the language’s architecture and in how the project is organised. Which role, or which roles, and their exact scope are settled with the candidate and recorded at appointment. The roles the charter defines include the Architecture and Process Review Role, which reviews major technical architecture and organisational-process proposals and may veto or return them; a person admitted as a governance member also votes.

How it works under the charter:

• the founder makes the appointment under Article 5.4, and it is recorded with the date, the role and the person;
• the role has a defined scope, limits and an annual report (Articles 5.3, 5.7); a fixed term or succession procedure may be adopted for it (6.4);
• it is an internal project role, not a board seat, director position or signatory of a legal entity, and it does not authorise anyone to sign contracts for Nikaia (Articles 5.1, 5.8, 6.5);
• the charter promises no payment; compensation for actual work may be proposed later and decided only by unconflicted decision-makers (7.5).

To apply, open an issue in the governance repository saying who you are, what you have worked on, and which part of the project you want to take responsibility for.

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