Re: Discussing defaults (Was: [gentoo-dev] Re: [gentoo-commits] gentoo-x86 commit in virtual/ffmpeg: ffmpeg-9.ebuild ChangeLog ffmpeg-0.10.2-r1.ebuild)

[Peter Stuge <peter@stuge.se>]

Luca Barbato wrote:
> May I point you that ~10 people were the majority of what was FFmpeg,
> thus 10 people were enough to demote democratically the so called Leader
> and that guy got the name from Fabrice as his personal decision?

There was probably a reason for Fabrice to do that, and majority and
democracy doesn't have much to do with it. It is more likely that 10
people are "right" than that 3 are, but a group of 10 is still quite
small. I wouldn't mind reading about the backstory. Do you know of
some good links beyond the two that were posted already?


> I'm perfectly happy to develop my code as long I'm not dragged in the
> mud with outlandish statement or people annoying the hell of me because
> they want to force me to merge because would be so better.

Users will never be satisfied. But I guess you agree that API
compatibility will certainly avoid extra problems for users.


> Well, you are talking to one of the two guys that spent about 3 months
> behind the scenes trying to compose the situation before it ended with
> the in theory normal demotion of a so-called Leader by democratic means.

I don't think open source neccessarily is democracy, and of course a
disagreement about something fairly fundamental such as that can
be more than enough to cause a fork.


> Sadly or luckily the whole thing ended with us (the majority)
> having to give up the name and picking a different one.

I think the name itself doesn't matter much (FWIW I think libav is a
much better name) but API compatibility is a big deal, and all
branches should really make an effort to stay compatible.


//Peter