RE: [gentoo-council] Extent of Code of Conduct enforcement

[Ferris McCormick <fmccor@gentoo.org>]

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After yesterday's Council meeting, I asked a question about just where
the current Code of Conduct was, or the status of the posted version.  I
asked this in the context of (1) I was surprised to see that the posted
version still talked about proctors, even though that project was
disbanded about a year ago, and (2) I remembered several discussions in
the previous council about amending CoC to explain its scope and how we
actually *did* intend to enforce it.

I thought this was a simple question the answer to which would be either
(1) Actual (proposed for revision?) Code of Conduct is <here>, or (2)
Council still has pending action on proposed revisions from last
council.  All of this is relevant, because this thread must apply to
current (proposed for revision?) code of conduct; it does not fit well
with a Code of Conduct enforced by proctors.  And I don't think anyone
can make much of an informed decision without some sort of Code of
Conduct which reflects reality (such as we don't have proctors) to work
from.

The reaction to my question seemed to suggest I was visiting from some
other universe or something, Hold over Council member(s) did not seem to
recall what if anything old council had done with Code of Conduct, and
everything here should be read in context of posted Code of Conduct.
Now, that can't be correct because it erases several months of
discussion and decisions from the history of previous council.

Anyway, people asked me to post my questions here, so that is what I am
doing.  Everything needs to be read in the context of the summaries of
the Council meetings from 20071011 -- 20080214 (five months).  Also,
there seem to be two proposals for Code of Conduct revision, both from
Donnie.  The first is discussed in a thread here:
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.council/82
In fact, at the time I supported that idea enthusiastically, but others
pointed out difficulties.

Eventually, this was revised here:
http://archives.gentoo.org/gentoo-council/msg_ba125098c929ea31f34051dfb009d436.xml
advantage that it did not require any approval at all, but it most
certainly *did* imply revisions to the Code of Conduct itself, because
effectively it stripped out any authority from the (non-existent)
proctors and instead identify a small group of people who would take
aside CoC violators (in private) and suggest they quit doing whatever
they were doing wrong.  For the record here, my response to this was:

[quote]
'Nice idea and worth a try.  I have one concern.  Since we are talking
CoC here, I'd like to emphasise that "assholeness" should be determined
within the guidelines of the CoC.  Not by some person's own conception
of "assholeness" --- I'd hate to see a flame war about just who is being
the asshole in any particular instance.'
[/quote]

As best as I can tell, this proposal was *APPROVED*, and at 20080214, was left like this:

================================
Code of Conduct enforcement
---------------------------
	Promote individual devs responding to people who are being jerks.
	Keep responses private, unless that person gets out of hand.

	dberkholz will get things going.
	To help or get advice, contact him.
===================================

I think the final intent was that Council expected the Code of Conduct
to be pretty much self-enforcing, driven by members of the community who
cared enough to take violators aside and calm them down, beat them over
the head, or whatever.

So, my question remains:  Did this resolution ever make it into a
revision of the Code of Conduct or not.  I thought it did, but can't
find it.  If it didn't, it probably should, and this entire discussion
should be interpreted with that intent.

In passing, I'll note something else.  The underlying assumption of the
entire Code of Conduct threads over five months last year was that:

[quote from Donnie]

A primary focus of CoC enforcement is deterrence from continued 
violation, so permanent action is unnecessary. Thus, what seems 
necessary is a way to take rapid, private, temporary action.

[/quote from Donnie]

The focus here was on errant developers, but by validating userrel's role in
all of this, we know it now explicitly applies to the entire community.
However, the underlying "immediate and temporary" assumptions still apply,
I would think.  Anything else would be a fundamental change as best as I
can tell, and discussion should be framed and clearly understood on that
context.

I guess the answer to my question is that Council did approve changes to the Code
of Conduct, but if they ever got incorporated into the official document, I
can't find it.

Regards,
Ferris

-- 
Ferris McCormick (P44646, MI) <fmccor@gentoo.org>
Developer, Gentoo Linux (Devrel, Sparc, Userrel, Trustees)

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