From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([69.77.167.62] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1JEmHW-0005F2-3h for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:46 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 56C7BE0878; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:45 +0000 (UTC) Received: from smtp.gentoo.org (smtp.gentoo.org [140.211.166.183]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 10815E0878 for ; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:45 +0000 (UTC) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by smtp.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 9B48DB47E9 for ; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:44 +0000 (UTC) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at gentoo.org X-Spam-Score: 1.254 X-Spam-Level: * X-Spam-Status: No, score=1.254 required=5.5 tests=[AWL=-0.814, BAYES_50=0.001, RCVD_NUMERIC_HELO=2.067] Received: from smtp.gentoo.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (smtp.gentoo.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id YUlV57MkxtX7 for ; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:37 +0000 (UTC) Received: from ciao.gmane.org (main.gmane.org [80.91.229.2]) (using TLSv1 with cipher AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by smtp.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 535A3B49FF for ; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:36 +0000 (UTC) Received: from list by ciao.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.43) id 1JEmHE-0001aF-S5 for gentoo-project@gentoo.org; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:28 +0000 Received: from 91.84.87.165 ([91.84.87.165]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:28 +0000 Received: from slong by 91.84.87.165 with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:56:28 +0000 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ To: gentoo-project@lists.gentoo.org From: Steve Long Subject: [gentoo-project] Re: Re: A proposal to get out of this mess Date: Tue, 15 Jan 2008 14:02:50 +0000 Message-ID: References: <42ebd5dc0801141711m30bc22bv2721d86d81ae4990@mail.gmail.com> <478C7085.3070406@gmail.com> <42ebd5dc0801150445j65b7e85ev97d4ac9ea0b3d01f@mail.gmail.com> Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Project discussion list X-BeenThere: gentoo-project@lists.gentoo.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7Bit X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: 91.84.87.165 User-Agent: KNode/0.10.4 Sender: news X-Archives-Salt: 4abaa2f3-2d09-404d-ba99-95b88d81464f X-Archives-Hash: ec5f4f07f8eb000a13ad369a35f39857 Dominik Riva wrote: > On Jan 15, 2008 11:02 AM, Steve Long wrote: >> George Prowse wrote: >> > Dominik Riva wrote: >> >> Let the community vote on a constitution for the council. (One from >> >> the developers and as much others that have a substancial backing from >> >> the community. In Switzerland we normally can vote for 2 to 3 versions >> >> of a "hot iron" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Referendum#Switzerland) >> >> >> OK I think we're mixing terminology here, which could get confusing: >> there already is a Council, and it's the ultimate decision-making body on >> technical matters. > > I was referring to exactly that Council. I would like to see it > rebuild stronger then ever by being voted by the community at large > (including developers). Oh man, so we've gone from discussing the composition of the trustees to how the Dev Council is elected? That's nuts imo. Keeping the technical and support stuff separate is vital: it's like a company[1] focussing on it's core duties (via the Executives) and ancillary services (other Directors, eg Finance or Legal.) The separation of concerns allows both to focus effectively without having to worry about the other side of it. Yes that other side hasn't happened, since all the trustees were devs. (And this was discussed and acknowledged *openly* on the nfp list.) The devs appreciate that, and aren't about to volunteer to become trustees: they're just 1) calming down from the shock I imagine, since most of them paid as little attention to that list as the average user, and 2) taking some time to think over the options. There's zero benefit in users voting for technical leads: the devs wouldn't buy it and I hope nor would most of the users (when they think about it.) It would just be a popularity contest. While there's always an element of that, these guys know each other on a day-in, day-out basis, personality-wise and technically. Let them make their own minds up about who they want to lead them. We don't need politicians. We had userreps: I'm all for that idea, and for giving them some kind of influence, however that's best achieved (be it voice in #gentoo-foo, a gentoo.org address, assign ability on bugzilla or w/e I don't care: it's something we can discuss since we're not rushing to meet some artificial deadline.) They withered simply because they were seen as toothless. Yes there needs to be a new understanding between users and devs; hopefully the devs are seeing they can't just run everything on their own, and maybe they'll be a little less arrogant in the future (we can dream, eh? ;) They might even start to listen to some of their users who work in the real-world and use computers to make a living, not just at Uni, and see that massive, loyal and committed user base has a wealth of talent in all kinds of areas they know nothing about. PR, Legal & Admin spring to mind ;-) [1] OFC Gentoo is not a company: I'm just trying to make an analogy to show the separation; call it executive, legislature and judiciary if you prefer. > But it will in its new incarnation handling all matters Gentoo, that > needs a decision made by some sort of a lead. > I don't agree with merging the legal/admin side with the technical Council. It's a complete dead-end. Maybe having some sort of overall community meeting of Council, user-reps and staff/infra would be good. But at no point should that *ever* encroach on the technical decisions. That's what people go through the training for, and why we trust them to install our software: because they make the best technical decisions, irrespective of other concerns. Lose that and you lose what makes Gentoo so special, for me at least. >> *GENTOO STILL ROCKS!* > > But for how long if some big problems don't get addressed because they > are not technical by nature? > Well the main bugbear has been the dev m-l. NotTheProctors will be dealing with that at some point: watch the gentoo-council m-l for detailed proposals (not for a week or two at least, I'd imagine, given all this hullabaloo.) But that's been ongoing for at least 3 years afaict. Apart from that, loads of devs are working away on the software which is why it still rocks. Imagine how much quicker it would go if we could lose all the dramas/flamewars/noise and just get on with enjoying our software and our community. -- gentoo-project@lists.gentoo.org mailing list