[gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Markos Chandras]

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Hi,

It is unfortunate to observe constant bullying, insults and trolling
across our public media. Developers have been warned over and over that
such behaviour is not acceptable and they should try to behave
properly. However, people have ignored such warnings for a very long
time. This ends today.

The DevRel policy states that:
"If the issue is deemed critical, the developer in question may have
his or her access suspended while a vote takes place. In such
situations, the Developer Relations lead may act without a vote of the
remaining Developer Relations team; this power is granted by Council.
Except in critical situations where immediate action is required, such
disciplinary action is determined by members of the Developer Relations
project."[1]

For me, this problem is critical. Devrel is working on formalizing a new
policy, and we will announce news on this soon. In the meantime, to
prevent further escalations,  I will use my lead powers to request
immediate bans whenever I see one of you violate the CoC[2] and ignore
the previous warnings.

My fellow developers, it's time you finally realize that
you are part of a community and you must learn to behave
and respect each other even if you have different technical views.
We are all people sharing a common interest: Gentoo.

[1] http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/devrel/policy.xml#doc_chap2
[2] http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/council/coc.xml

- -- 
Regards,
Markos Chandras - Gentoo Linux Developer
http://dev.gentoo.org/~hwoarang
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Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Rich Freeman]

On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 1:35 PM, Markos Chandras <hwoarang@gentoo.org> wrote:
> For me, this problem is critical. Devrel is working on formalizing a new
> policy, and we will announce news on this soon. In the meantime, to
> prevent further escalations,  I will use my lead powers to request
> immediate bans whenever I see one of you violate the CoC[2] and ignore
> the previous warnings.

Perhaps a bit of a sledgehammer approach, but right now I think it is
safe to say that we're leaning far too on the side of leniency.  I
look forward to the new policy proposals.

Oh, I do endorse the previous suggestion that we come up with another
way of appointing people to Devrel.  My personal opinion is that it
should be appointed by Council (perhaps taking into account
recommendations from the Devrel team and others).  Others have
suggested direct election.  Either would give the team a bit more of a
mandate.  That isn't really directed at the current team in particular
- it just seems like a better practice.  Maybe an analogous situation
that works well is that the Trustees grant an annual budget to Infra
for routine maintenance.  Anything reasonable charged against that
budget gets signed off by the Treasurer with no further discussion,
and any need outside the budget goes through the normal approval
process.  Delegate and hands off...

Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[William Hubbs]

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On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 01:59:03PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 1:35 PM, Markos Chandras <hwoarang@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > For me, this problem is critical. Devrel is working on formalizing a new
> > policy, and we will announce news on this soon. In the meantime, to
> > prevent further escalations,  I will use my lead powers to request
> > immediate bans whenever I see one of you violate the CoC[2] and ignore
> > the previous warnings.
> 
> Perhaps a bit of a sledgehammer approach, but right now I think it is
> safe to say that we're leaning far too on the side of leniency.  I
> look forward to the new policy proposals.

Markos, I want to also publically say thanks for handling this. The
bullying/trolling/etc has been going on for far too long. Yes, it may be
a sledgehammer approach, but there are times when the big sledgehammer
is needed, and imo this is one of those times.

Thanks,

William


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Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Tom Wijsman]

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On Wed, 19 Jun 2013 13:49:24 -0500
William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:

> On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 01:59:03PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 1:35 PM, Markos Chandras
> > <hwoarang@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > > For me, this problem is critical. Devrel is working on
> > > formalizing a new policy, and we will announce news on this soon.
> > > In the meantime, to prevent further escalations,  I will use my
> > > lead powers to request immediate bans whenever I see one of you
> > > violate the CoC[2] and ignore the previous warnings.
> > 
> > Perhaps a bit of a sledgehammer approach, but right now I think it
> > is safe to say that we're leaning far too on the side of leniency.
> > I look forward to the new policy proposals.
> 
> Markos, I want to also publically say thanks for handling this. The
> bullying/trolling/etc has been going on for far too long. Yes, it may
> be a sledgehammer approach, but there are times when the big
> sledgehammer is needed, and imo this is one of those times.

+1; for cases that aren't worthy of a sledgehammer, I hope there will
be short templated warnings to put the developers back on track. Good
to see Developer Relations stepping up; there has been a bit too much
noise on the mailing list lately, most of those took a considerable
amount of time that could have been invested on more useful matters.

-- 
With kind regards,

Tom Wijsman (TomWij)
Gentoo Developer

E-mail address  : TomWij@gentoo.org
GPG Public Key  : 6D34E57D
GPG Fingerprint : C165 AF18 AB4C 400B C3D2  ABF0 95B2 1FCD 6D34 E57D

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Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Ultrabug]

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On 19/06/2013 21:04, Tom Wijsman wrote:
> On Wed, 19 Jun 2013 13:49:24 -0500
> William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 01:59:03PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
>>> On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 1:35 PM, Markos Chandras
>>> <hwoarang@gentoo.org> wrote:
>>>> For me, this problem is critical. Devrel is working on
>>>> formalizing a new policy, and we will announce news on this soon.
>>>> In the meantime, to prevent further escalations,  I will use my
>>>> lead powers to request immediate bans whenever I see one of you
>>>> violate the CoC[2] and ignore the previous warnings.
>>> Perhaps a bit of a sledgehammer approach, but right now I think it
>>> is safe to say that we're leaning far too on the side of leniency.
>>> I look forward to the new policy proposals.
>> Markos, I want to also publically say thanks for handling this. The
>> bullying/trolling/etc has been going on for far too long. Yes, it may
>> be a sledgehammer approach, but there are times when the big
>> sledgehammer is needed, and imo this is one of those times.
> +1; for cases that aren't worthy of a sledgehammer, I hope there will
> be short templated warnings to put the developers back on track. Good
> to see Developer Relations stepping up; there has been a bit too much
> noise on the mailing list lately, most of those took a considerable
> amount of time that could have been invested on more useful matters.
>
+1 thanks a lot for stepping in and taking this burdenMarkos.

-- 
Ultrabug
Gentoo / cluster


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[gentoo-project] Re: [gentoo-dev] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Luca Barbato]

On 06/20/2013 05:53 AM, Diego Elio Pettenò wrote:
> Does this mean the QA lead finally gets to suspend people who are
> patently not suited for developing a stable distribution without
> asking devrel? Because last time we got into the same judge, jury,
> and executioner argument, which I guess was just sent for the gallows
> (pun intended).

I'm not against that, but I prefer setting some fast track involving at
most 3 people and some procedure also for it.

E.g. : you can ask for 6h suspension on direct request and by contacting
a single devrel person to get an 1week suspension within 2 days.

> Mind, it's not like I disagree with at least one of the actions that
> you took recently, but given your surge approach I would like to
> point out that is not your task judging code quality, and yes that
> does make me uncomfortable, that you want to pick up the full power
> at once, and not collaborate with whom should have been involved in
> the process.

As said, this whole thing is just an interim solution till fast-path
procedures get deployed.

lu

[gentoo-project] Re: [gentoo-dev] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Petteri Räty]

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On 20.6.2013 6.53, Diego Elio Pettenò wrote:
> Does this mean the QA lead finally gets to suspend people who are
> patently not suited for developing a stable distribution without asking
> devrel? Because last time we got into the same judge, jury, and
> executioner argument, which I guess was just sent for the gallows (pun
> intended).
> 

GLEP 48 as it currently stands on [1] delegates suspensions to devrel.

> Mind, it's not like I disagree with at least one of the actions that you
> took recently, but given your surge approach I would like to point out
> that is not your task judging code quality, and yes that does make me
> uncomfortable, that you want to pick up the full power at once, and not
> collaborate with whom should have been involved in the process.
> 
> 

I agree with you that it's not Devrel's job to be in the code quality
business (which I have also pointed internally).

Regards,
Petteri

[1] http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0048.html

-- 
A. Because it breaks the logical sequence of discussion
Q. Why is top posting bad?


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Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Rick "Zero_Chaos" Farina]

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Hash: SHA1

On 06/19/2013 01:35 PM, Markos Chandras wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> It is unfortunate to observe constant bullying, insults and trolling
> across our public media. Developers have been warned over and over that
> such behaviour is not acceptable and they should try to behave
> properly. However, people have ignored such warnings for a very long
> time. This ends today.
> 
> The DevRel policy states that:
> "If the issue is deemed critical, the developer in question may have
> his or her access suspended while a vote takes place. In such
> situations, the Developer Relations lead may act without a vote of the
> remaining Developer Relations team; this power is granted by Council.
> Except in critical situations where immediate action is required, such
> disciplinary action is determined by members of the Developer Relations
> project."[1]
> 
> For me, this problem is critical. Devrel is working on formalizing a new
> policy, and we will announce news on this soon. In the meantime, to
> prevent further escalations,  I will use my lead powers to request
> immediate bans whenever I see one of you violate the CoC[2] and ignore
> the previous warnings.
> 
> My fellow developers, it's time you finally realize that
> you are part of a community and you must learn to behave
> and respect each other even if you have different technical views.
> We are all people sharing a common interest: Gentoo.
> 
> [1] http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/devrel/policy.xml#doc_chap2
> [2] http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/council/coc.xml
> 
> 
> 

I look very much forward to the day when I no longer read "devrel is
useless" on the ML, I have a feeling that day is tomorrow. Thank you Markos.

- -Zero
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Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Chí-Thanh Christopher Nguyễn]

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Markos Chandras schrieb:
> In the meantime, to prevent further escalations,  I will use my lead
> powers to request immediate bans whenever I see one of you violate the
> CoC[2] and ignore the previous warnings.
> 
> My fellow developers, it's time you finally realize that you are part of
> a community and you must learn to behave and respect each other even if
> you have different technical views. We are all people sharing a common
> interest: Gentoo.

So, gathering some of the responses I tried to draw a complete picture of
what is going to happen (where references are not publicly archived, I
supplied their Message-ID):

Enforcement of CoC will be proactive, not reactive[0,1]. This in my
understanding means that devrel will not wait for reports of CoC
violations. Instead, they or their assistants will be policing mailing
lists and bugzilla[2] for infractions, and make an example of the first
developer who transgresses the CoC[3].

Bannable offenses will not be limited to direct personal insults, but also
include trolling, being judgmental[4], labeling proposals or software as
"crap"[5], saying things that could be seen as offensive in certain
cultures or to people with certain personality traits[6], as well as making
non-constructive statements[7].

To me this is a very grim picture. If hope it is not accurate, but if it is
I hereby speak out against this. I'd like to see any emergency action
limited to response to personal attacks and insults, and any stricter rules
set only in place after Council decision.


Best regards,
Chí-Thanh Christopher Nguyễn

[0] http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.project/2673
[1] http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.project/2678/focus=2681
[2] <20130620140439.3397ff68@gentoo.org>
[3] http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.project/2673/focus=86324
[4] <20130620104912.71d9b1cd@TOMWIJ-GENTOO>
[5] <CAN3AtvoObhp_w1Ca7ryuzyLhpDhf1W4DyWqfwuPg6vWSKP+fPg@mail.gmail.com>
[6] <20130620104736.1d2c26e4@gentoo.org>
[7] <CAGfcS_kT1gbgdH6Z++F-q791OgNcxO_pfys4A17yatUhCNXdzQ@mail.gmail.com>
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Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Rich Freeman]

On Thu, Jun 20, 2013 at 5:34 PM, Chí-Thanh Christopher Nguyễn
<chithanh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> Enforcement of CoC will be proactive, not reactive[0,1]. This in my
> understanding means that devrel will not wait for reports of CoC
> violations. Instead, they or their assistants will be policing mailing
> lists and bugzilla[2] for infractions, and make an example of the first
> developer who transgresses the CoC[3].
>
> Bannable offenses will not be limited to direct personal insults, but also
> include trolling, being judgmental[4], labeling proposals or software as
> "crap"[5], saying things that could be seen as offensive in certain
> cultures or to people with certain personality traits[6], as well as making
> non-constructive statements[7].
>
> To me this is a very grim picture. If hope it is not accurate, but if it is
> I hereby speak out against this. I'd like to see any emergency action
> limited to response to personal attacks and insults, and any stricter rules
> set only in place after Council decision.

Frankly, I think it sounds great.  I believe Markos already said that
outright bans are going to be based on patterns of behavior and
disregarding of warnings.  I think that seems perfectly reasonable.
I'm content to wait and see how things turn out.  I'm sure that
they'll use progressively more discretion as offenses become less
drastic.

Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[Markos Chandras]

On 20 June 2013 22:34, Chí-Thanh Christopher Nguyễn <chithanh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> Markos Chandras schrieb:
>> In the meantime, to prevent further escalations,  I will use my lead
>> powers to request immediate bans whenever I see one of you violate the
>> CoC[2] and ignore the previous warnings.
>>
>> My fellow developers, it's time you finally realize that you are part of
>> a community and you must learn to behave and respect each other even if
>> you have different technical views. We are all people sharing a common
>> interest: Gentoo.
>
> So, gathering some of the responses I tried to draw a complete picture of
> what is going to happen (where references are not publicly archived, I
> supplied their Message-ID):
>
> Enforcement of CoC will be proactive, not reactive[0,1]. This in my
> understanding means that devrel will not wait for reports of CoC
> violations. Instead, they or their assistants will be policing mailing
> lists and bugzilla[2] for infractions, and make an example of the first
> developer who transgresses the CoC[3].
>
> Bannable offenses will not be limited to direct personal insults, but also
> include trolling, being judgmental[4], labeling proposals or software as
> "crap"[5], saying things that could be seen as offensive in certain
> cultures or to people with certain personality traits[6], as well as making
> non-constructive statements[7].
>
> To me this is a very grim picture. If hope it is not accurate, but if it is
> I hereby speak out against this. I'd like to see any emergency action
> limited to response to personal attacks and insults, and any stricter rules
> set only in place after Council decision.
>
>

No it is not accurate. You need to read the threads again. For
example, nobody ever said that
we will punish people for calling a software "crap". Please read more
carefully what I wrote.
I also said that we will warn people before we kick them out. Again,
please read more carefully what
I wrote before.

-- 
Regards,
Markos Chandras - Gentoo Linux Developer
http://dev.gentoo.org/~hwoarang

Re: [gentoo-project] Temporary DevRel actions for CoC violations

[IAN DELANEY]

On Fri, 21 Jun 2013 00:19:47 +0100
Markos Chandras <hwoarang@gentoo.org> wrote:

> 
> No it is not accurate. You need to read the threads again. For
> example, nobody ever said that
> we will punish people for calling a software "crap". Please read more
> carefully what I wrote.
> I also said that we will warn people before we kick them out. Again,
> please read more carefully what
> I wrote before.

I'd like to pitch in here possibly in the magnitude of a grenade,
don't really know, although I'm a little late to this party.  the bulk
of this I've copied from an attempt over a week ago which didn't make
it thru to project ML, but it mostly pertinent to the topic at hand.
It prob. belongs as a reply to the opening thread by Marcos. 

"
To attempt a succinct summary here (an extended one will lose everyone),
from the body of knowledge I gained from back in the day, sure people's
basic personal traits are formed and set for life at various
CRITICAL stages of youth, and the pages once writ aren't subject to
being re-written.  Our admins and devs are adults, predominantly very
young adults with an established persona and values at entry to gentoo.

The task here isn't to change the person at their core. If anyone is
'trained' to do that it's a psycho-analyst, not a gentoo dev or a
Foundation member.  The task here is to change that relatively
thin shell that encompasses a person, namely outward behaviour.

> If you need a slap to make you behave
> nicely, then this is not going to work in the long-term. And you can't
> improve a distribution technical wise, if you have people who can't
> work together.
> - We've been requesting this for a very very long time, yet 2 days ago
> we had another incident. So I'd say, no, we can't.

Snide, aggressive, hostile, insolent remarks wrapped in a common
package of abuse and oft used 4 letter expletives are the topic at hand
here I gather, and I don't know offhand what the recent incident is, but
in the light of lxnay's extended highlighting of the subject and his
declaration to collect his marbles and wander back home, for all the
back slapping and encouraging to stick around because you're a good
'guy' / 'bloke' 'citizen', dev .. ' ' .., still the display of brash
ignorance carries on it seems with impunity, undented, unaddressed,
unabated, until now...........

This isn't a case of managing the unmanageable, however its management
frankly cries out for management skills that are simply not in the
personal toolboxes of most who are in any way vaguely authorised and
therefore in a position to 'pounce' on those of us who come out with
naughty behaviour.  To sketch out a rather black or bleak picture of
this whole affair, assuming NeddySeagoon's depiction of devs (well and
developer or admin personnel) as predominantly alpha males with
retarded social skills, what we have here in >95% of cases is a case of
1 alpha male with retarded social skills made responsible for managing /
reeling naughty outward behaviour of an alpha male with retarded
social skills. Grief!  No wonder lxnay buckled!!

This outward behaviour is INDEED changeable, and hence manageable.

in case you missed that

This outward behaviour is INDEED changeable, and hence manageable.
Outward behaviour is changeable, modifiable, malleable even.  Modifying
behaviour is for cryin' out loud a whole stream of the science known as
psychology.  Its technicians are termed behaviourists.
Now for the bad news.  Due to the rampant incidence of the above, we
can anticipate this behaviour management coming to pass in our
precious gentoo haven just as sure as we can expect pigs to sprout
wings and fly.

So despite my assertion that hwoarang's statement is erred in fact (a
prior thread but never mind), it kind of becomes an utterly moot point
since the formula to achieve this end requires, well, behaviourists.
Let's invite all such duplicate qualified devs to submit their
nominations for executing the CoC and ., eeer, oh bump, damn those
flying pigs, got me right in the head.

If there is any positive slant to this, my guess is that it's that
behaviourists don't hold a monopoly on how to talk someone into finally
gaining an insight that 'they're not the messiah, they're but very
naughty boys'.  So much of psychology has its roots in real life, hence
many of the behaviourist's tools are to be found in the toolboxes of
Joey Blogs with a cool composure and a mature head.  This kind of
maturity is in fact not confined to those experiencing the onset of
greyed or absent hair, but also in some quick developers who are still
in the category oft termed 'youngens', well, young adults. 

My experience of these outbursts of slander come insolence lead me to
assert that;
1. The chief protagonists are also the chief outstanding
contributors in gentoo, 
2. They piously misbelieve that they have earned a right to throw out a
series of 1 liner put downs at whim without hesitation since they have
earned impunity by holding anyone who dares rebutt them to ransom by
virtue of their prolific contribution history, therefore 
3. despite being technical intellects, they are naively ignorant of how
wrong they are in the prior assertions. They are, in a word, ignorant.

We're not talking rapists and robbers behaviour, we're talking 'naughty
talking'. Get a grip. This relatively 'minor' level of erroneous /
aberrant behaviour surely falls into the category of unlearning what
they internalised as 'ok / acceptable / normative' and re-learning
higher social standards / norms.  Any mature heads out there??????
"
------------------------------------------------

I'd like to propose a longer term method of this real issue.  The key
word is mentor.  The aspect of rebuttal by punishment leaves a sour
taste in everyone's mouth.  I don't think that a punishment response
here is the catchall fix, rather, an involuntary internship of
offenders to one with a mature head.   On devrel becoming notified and
becoming aware of a dev being an offender, devrel then assesses and
reviews the 'offensive data' and then can elect to put the dev under
the supervision of one with a mature head, a new level mentor.  Picking
them is the hard part.  

Applying a simple principle of behaviourist theory, the rights of the
dev are switched from being open slather, e.g. on all MLs, to you can't
submit to this ML until your intended submission is vetted and
approved by the ALLOCATED mentor.  He has his wings clipped. Clipping
wings in irc channels would be more difficult really.  Commit rights I
don't see as an apt target to be clipped since commits are purely
technical data.  

The process here is to make an offender accountable for being (socially
not technically) an ignorant dimwit shooting and shouting without
due cause. He (there are no shes) then need earn his way back to a
status of a full wing spread to re-use my analogy.

Offensive remarks are basically remarks put in a clumsy hostile manner
and I reckon mostly without even knowing it. Offensive is not cast in
stone but is open to perception of the remark, so there is no choice
here but to deal with the many shades of grey.

There are many ways to skin the proverbial cat, and the task of the
mentor is essentially to take on the involuntary and disgruntled
mentoree and thrash out some come all of these many other ways that the
remark can be revised re-worked, re-packaged and re-presented to the
offendee minus its ugly uncalled for insolence and unwelcome baggage.
Rationale; level headed valid feedback, back peddle on fundamental
approach to expressing oneself, unlearn, re-learn, learn more.
done
The offendee's new level mentoreeship finishes when and only when agreed
upon by the mentor unilaterally or in consensus with those of devrel.

and that's the short version.  Now for the flack.

-- 
kind regards

Ian Delaney