The W3C Process defines a charter refinement phase to help ensure that charter drafts are mission-aligned, reflect community input and consensus, and have been well-socialized and widely reviewed before Advisory Committee review.

This document describes how the W3C Communications Team announces the start of charter refinement with a charter review notice. For information about when the Technical Strategy Team may request that the W3C Communications Team send this announcement and activities following this announcement, see How to create a Working Group or Interest Group.

Drafting the charter review notice

Per section 4.1 of the Process Document the charter review notice must include the following:

• A short summary of the proposal.
• The location of the charter draft, which must be public.
• How to participate in the discussion of this charter draft and where to file issues, including:
  • a link to the Github issues of the associated charter repository for public feedback
  • a communication channel for Member-only discussions (e.g., w3c-ac-forum)
• The expected duration of the charter refinement phase, which must not be less than 28 days, and should not be more than 6 months.
• Who the Chartering Facilitator is.

In addition, the Technical Strategy Team may include its own perspectives about the charter in the review notice.

Please use the charter review notice template to create an initial draft.

Sending the charter review notice

The W3C Communications Team sends the charter review notice to:

• w3c-ac-members@w3.org (then forwards it to chairs@w3.org).
• The affected group (in the case of a rechartering).

In addition, unless this notice requires Member-only confidentiality (which should be rare), the W3C Communications Team also sends the notice to:

• public-new-work@w3.org
• new-work@ietf.org

After the notice has been sent

Section 4.2 of the Process Document describes activities during the refinement phase, and in particular the role of the Charter Facilitator to seek consensus and how and when any Formal Objections are handled.

Note: Advance notice is not an indication that work will necessarily progress to Advisory Committee review.