Re: [gentoo-project] On the way Devrel is constituted

[William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org>]

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On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 11:41:17PM +0200, hasufell wrote:
> On 06/19/2013 10:43 PM, Petteri R￤ty wrote:
> > On 19.6.2013 23.18, hasufell wrote:
> >> What is a possible solution? Let the council elect all members.
> >> That way the power still comes from the dev community, although
> >> they do not vote devrel directly. The council should vote
> >> anonymously, so that no connection between council member and
> >> elected devrel member can be drawn which could otherwise affect
> >> the election of the council. This system should prevent people
> >> from thinking two steps ahead when voting the council.
> >> 
> > 
> > The council can already do that if they so choose. Granted if this 
> > process was made explicit it could have some influence on the
> > turnover. In practice so far oversight has not been a problem
> > (though since for quite a few years I have been part of both bodies
> > the two have been quite connected).
> > 
> 
> If they choose... that means the current form of control over devrel
> is only of a _reactive_ nature. That nature is also necessary, but
> that is not how "control" is defined in the context I was explaining
> in the first post.
> 
> What happens if power has been abused and damage is already done? The
> council can just pick up the pieces then, revert decisions (if
> possible) and try to deescalate.
> Then people will ask... who is responsible? Why was there no explicit
> election?
> That might even lead to devrel losing respect. People will think they
> just have that power because they came first.
> It's not just about saying retroactively that someone wasn't fit for
> devrel after he messed up, it's about saying who IS fit. Then people
> know why that person got that kind of authority.

who is "fit" is always going to be subjective. is it just someone who
has been in gentoo for a while? is it someone who has had professional
experience in conflict resolution e.g. a manager?

You aren't going to be able to detect who might abuse power until after
it is done, so I don't really see a way to guarantee that a scenario
like that will never happen.

> Also... we still don't have any rotation, except when devs resign from
> that project.

Rotation is another issue entirely. Do we want forced rotation? Do we
want to force people to resign from devrel after x amount of time?

> Another thing: what do we do if devrel blocks actions against it's own
> members? Because that's what gentoo projects have partly evolved
> into... a group of buddies. I don't have much of a problem with that
> in general, as it can improve effectivenes from some standpoints, but
> this is not about a regular project.

The council can override anything devrel does, including forcing
someone off of devrel if they think that person has gotten out of line,
so I don't see a problem here.

> I don't even claim that current devrel is not fit or that they just
> form their group of buddies, but why should we not try to minimize
> those possibilities?
> 
> If we want them to use the sledgehammer, it should be clear who gets
> that sledgehammer and why. Make it explicit, rule out uncertainties.
> Rotate that role, so people don't lose focus.

That is done, the lead gets to use the sledgehammer under certain
circumstances [1], and the lead is selected by the project members
yearly under glep 39 just like any project.

William

[1] http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/devrel/policy.xml

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