Re: [gentoo-dev] ML changes

[George Prowse <cokehabit@gmail.com>]

Chris Gianelloni wrote:
> On Mon, 2007-07-16 at 06:45 -0500, Andrew Gaffney wrote:
>> That was my thought as well. We (the developers) owe nothing to the community at 
>> large. We are volunteers, and if we want to treat Gentoo as our own personal toy 
>> (which we currently aren't), then so be it.
> 
> Exactly.
> 
> I work on Gentoo because I want to work on it.  It scratches an itch
> that I have.  I like using it personally and also professionally.  I
> find it easier to help improve Gentoo, thereby making it better for
> myself, than to simply ask others to fix it for me and hope that they're
> interested in changing things in the same manner as I am.  This is
> exactly why I became a developer and why I still am a developer.
> 
> That being said, I know that I, as well as many other Gentoo developers,
> will gladly accept payment to work on what YOU want me to work on, but
> until such time as I am in someone else's employ, I'll be working on
> what I choose to work on myself.
> 
> If you don't like what a developer is working on or would rather they
> work on something that interests you, offer to pay them.  Unless they're
> your employee, they owe you nothing.
> 
Maybe you should change the Gentoo philosophy: 
http://www.gentoo.org/main/en/philosophy.xml

Us, the Gentoo Proletariat, respect the developers because of the great 
work they do for free but that doesn't absolve you of any responsibility 
towards Gentoo, quite the opposite. The Gentoo philosophy and how it 
states the need for Gentoo to accomodate the needs of it's users 
establishes a minimum level of responsibility from the Distro to it's 
userbase so basically stating "I do what I want and how I want" is not 
in keeping with the way Gentoo was meant to be run and shouldn't be how 
it is being run at this moment in time.
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