DIF was established to represent our fast-changing community and create a safe space for designing and prototyping ambitious new identity architectures. From the original handful of members 9 years ago, DIF grew into an organization with over 400 member companies contributing thousands of lines of code and documentation and changing the conversation in the tech industry.
Since its inception, DIF has been governed by a Steering Committee, like most Linux Foundation projects. The Steering Committee is comprised of volunteers from core member organizations; its primary functions are to set strategy, deliberate on finer points of DIF’s direction and identity, maintain the processes of the organization, provide guidance to the executive director, and tend to the health of the community and its conversations.
Periodically, DIF holds elections for roughly half of the Steering Committee’s seats to keep representation and community needs aligned. The process is specified here, but the following overview may be a faster read:
- Dates:
- 2025 election
- Announcement of election + Nomination period opens - Today (Thurs 11 Sep)
- Last day to propose questions to the candidates (Thu 9 Oct)
- Nomination period closes & Platform statements due (Thu 16 Oct)
- SC ballot opens (Thu 23 Oct)
- SC ballot closes (Thu 30 Oct)
- First meeting of newly-reconstituted SC (Thur 6 Nov)
- 2025 election
- Who votes: Associate Members (one ballot per organization)
- How private are votes: Seen and tallied only by DIF staff, stored in case of complications
- Who can stand on the steering committee:
- Any DIF member can nominate and any DIF member can be nominated.
- Reminder: DIF members include Associate members, Contributors, individuals who signed a Feedback Agreement, and DIF liaison organizations
- Nominations should be sent to nominations@identity.foundation
- To be on the ballot, nominees must, via email by Thurs 16 Oct:
- accept the nomination before the nomination closes
- provide a short biography and statement describing the nominee’s interest in and qualifications for serving (600 words max)
- provide answers to the "platform"/philosophy questions sent out 17 Oct (600 words max)
- these will be published all together on the DIF website and linked from the ballot
- Early nominations are encouraged!
- Any DIF member can nominate and any DIF member can be nominated.
- Questions to candidates
- All members are encouraged to submit questions for all the SC candidates on issues regarding the management and direction of the Foundation.
- DIF Staff will compile and synthesize the questions and provide an anonymized, representative sample to all SC candidates to prompt their statements
- Election Logistics
- Each DIF Associate member submits one organizational ballot with votes for up to the number of seats then contested for the Steering Committee (6).
- The election lasts for 1 week between 23rd Nov and 30th Nov
- Associate members will be contacted during the nomination period to confirm each organization's point-of-contact