From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([208.92.234.80] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1QpPz0-0006fn-S7 for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Fri, 05 Aug 2011 19:22:59 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 8561021C049; Fri, 5 Aug 2011 19:22:49 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail-wy0-f181.google.com (mail-wy0-f181.google.com [74.125.82.181]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A09A321C037 for ; Fri, 5 Aug 2011 19:22:39 +0000 (UTC) Received: by wyh22 with SMTP id 22so2890803wyh.40 for ; Fri, 05 Aug 2011 12:22:38 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=mime-version:sender:in-reply-to:references:date :x-google-sender-auth:message-id:subject:from:to:content-type; bh=q9tZLPJ5PgRRHwJYw7pUkiNsOXXThVI0EVPqBEV5NS4=; b=f0mzKxyLrZF0HBF5Bpx3zXA7ASYOp3iF2QwYcXQYJiQL+chIfcvgky4Z+nECn02Jic HfN+coygYzW3u7KwREqlXdV2QWNfI/YFSySsoqD16CE0mJq31WbUHdPhvNnSfYoKFcBv jy+oaK+AKa5uecOMZ7yLn5Spys5LTNpiMaZIs= Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Project discussion list X-BeenThere: gentoo-project@lists.gentoo.org Reply-To: gentoo-project@lists.gentoo.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.227.195.197 with SMTP id ed5mr2200004wbb.104.1312572158824; Fri, 05 Aug 2011 12:22:38 -0700 (PDT) Sender: freemanrich@gmail.com Received: by 10.227.142.19 with HTTP; Fri, 5 Aug 2011 12:22:38 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <4E3C1EAE.1040604@gentoo.org> References: <1312307887.2901.2@NeddySeagoon> <4E38B4D9.7020603@gentoo.org> <1312404150.2882.2@NeddySeagoon> <20110804200630.GE4840@comet.ucsd.edu> <1312496361.2864.0@NeddySeagoon> <4E3BC710.6090402@gentoo.org> <20110805104952.GK81662@gentoo.org> <4E3BCD6E.8030101@gentoo.org> <4E3BED69.6060003@gentoo.org> <20110805134412.GC17729@gentoo.org> <4E3BF61F.7050300@gentoo.org> <4E3C1B32.2020105@gentoo.org> <4E3C1EAE.1040604@gentoo.org> Date: Fri, 5 Aug 2011 15:22:38 -0400 X-Google-Sender-Auth: vkur0HultCJitc9b4KkkJSaTlcI Message-ID: Subject: Re: [gentoo-project] Council discuss: overlapping council terms of two years From: Rich Freeman To: gentoo-project@lists.gentoo.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 X-Archives-Salt: X-Archives-Hash: 3bf954f56f97116f28ba998952e50819 On Fri, Aug 5, 2011 at 12:47 PM, Markos Chandras wrote: > Right, exactly what I am saying. A single developer has to put his > effort to push things forward. Last time I remember something similar > was when Ben (yngwin) tried to introduce changes and he was "forced" to > retirement. Awesome. You know very well that if a single person tries on > his own to change things, he will lose motivation sooner or later. So, here's the thing. If a huge number of devs are against an idea, then it is probably best NOT to approve it unless it is just a matter of bikeshedding. What is the alternative? One guy wants to make a huge change to Gentoo. Most don't agree. Democratically elected council is thus unlikely to back it. Instead suppose we have a dictator for the year or whatever and he happens to support it, so he issues an edict that the one guy is the prophet for this year. The result is that most people either end up ignoring the prophet and the dictator and doing their own thing. Or, maybe the prophet and dictator manage to kick out half the devs who then just fork the project. Either way the initiative fails. The only way you're going to succeed in an initiative like this with everybody in opposition is to show true leadership and win people over. You don't need to be elected to do that. If we're just talking about a few hold-outs than I doubt that the current system would prevent progress. Let's look at the whole /usr thread. It started out with lots of shock and general opposition with one or two guys pushing for a change. They than brought forward arguments and I'd judge from recent comments that they won over a good chunk of the dev population - now we're just haggling about the how and not arguing so much over to-FHS or not to-FHS. By the time the council is asked to do anything (if they even need to get involved) there will probably be a clear majority consensus. That's how you drive change. If you can't win over a lot of devs then trying to force change is likely to end you in X11R6 land. Rich