Re: Censorship in Debian

From	Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net>
Newsgroups	linux.debian.project
Subject	Re: Censorship in Debian
Date	2019-01-08 04:40 +0100
Message-ID	<xdQpb-8eh-3@gated-at.bofh.it> (permalink)
References	(8 earlier) <xdFtM-1eH-21@gated-at.bofh.it> <xdI8i-2Vv-9@gated-at.bofh.it> <xdNUl-6th-3@gated-at.bofh.it> <xdOdH-6OP-1@gated-at.bofh.it> <xdP9M-7nj-9@gated-at.bofh.it>
Organization	linux.* mail to news gateway

Show all headers | View raw

On 1/7/19 9:12 PM, Russ Allbery wrote:
> Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> writes:
>
>> Well, first off, the process led to the resignation of the chair of the
>> Technical Committee - out of a feeling that the process had become too
>> "personalized."
> Some decisions are just hard.  I think nearly all of us involved in making
> that decision burned out in various ways.  I'm not saying we couldn't have
> done a better job... well, hm.  Actually, I am kind of saying that, if by
> "couldn't" I include the people that we were at the time with the
> emotional reserves that we had and the understanding that we had.
>
> I could certainly do a better job *now* if I could rewind time, but that's
> cheating, and humans don't get to do that.

We do get to learn from things, however.

>
> I'm with Steve in that I'm pretty dubious that the process was the core of
> why that decision was so hard.  I think it was so hard because it spanned
> the gamut from technical to social issues, involved some issues that were
> relatively concrete and others that were quite nebulous (such as the
> interactions between the goals of the systemd developers and the broader
> community), and also involved deep social divisions in the project between
> folks who want Debian to be a platform for all things and folks who want
> Debian to be more tightly integrated and more technically excellent along
> a single axis.


Well, I'd argue that part of it had to do with who had a voice, and who 
didn't.  (More below.)


>
> This stuff is inherently very hard, particularly when friends end up on
> opposite sides and believe passionately in how important their concerns
> are.
>
> I think we sometimes analyze process to death and refight the last
> fourteen wars and dig up problems to argue about them some more.  We're
> human, this stuff is hard, some things are going to be brutal to get
> through when we disagree, and it's okay to forgive ourselves for not being
> perfect.  Or even being pretty shitty at it.
>
> That's not to say that we shouldn't look for opportunities to fix things
> that we can.  For example, we certainly uncovered some nasty edge cases in
> the voting mechanism for the TC, which are now fixed.  And many of us felt
> that people serving for extended periods of time on the TC wasn't socially
> healthy for either us or the project, so we fixed that too.
>
> But I think there's a idealistic, utopian tendency among a lot of
> technical people, myself included, to believe that any serious conflict or
> (from our perspective) incorrect decision is a bug in a process somewhere,
> and if we can just find the right process, we can fix the bugs.  And it's
> just not true.  Humans are messy and humans disagree, and sometimes stuff
> is just really hard, and is going to be really hard no matter how you do
> it.
>
>> Beyond that, there are a rather large number of folks, impacted by the
>> decision, who did not have a seat at the table.  Those of us who rely on
>> Debian in production, for example.  Upstream developers for another.
>> Some of us knew about the issues & debates, without having a
>> "franchise," others found out after the fact.  Seems to me that lack of
>> representation is, in itself, a rather big failure of governance.
> Debian is *more* willing to try to take into account the needs of its
> users than most free software projects, but Debian is still a volunteer
> free software project, and the rule of just about every volunteer,
> unfunded free software project is that the people who are doing the work
> are the ones who are going to make the decisions.
>
> Think of it this way: the people who are sufficiently invested in the
> project to spend our time and energy on it over a long enough period of
> time to become members are deeply invested in it and want to control where
> it goes.  Plus, we're all volunteers and don't have to work on anything we
> don't want to work on, which means maintaining our engagement is
> absolutely necessary for the project to survive.


I think you're minimizing the level of investment & commitment it takes 
to either use Debian, particularly in production, and even more, 
minimizing the efforts of upstream, and kernel, developers upon whom 
Debian ultimately depends.  There are also those who contribute by 
providing support - e.g., answering user questions on Debian lists.

As far as I can tell, the only people who count, in Debian decision 
making, are packagers - which strikes me as a rather bizarre case of the 
tail wagging the dog.  I remain amazed how much the impacts on users, 
systems administrators, and upstream developers were dismissed as 
irrelevant.

On a larger note, I point to the IETF as an example of a much larger 
community, running huge infrastructure, where pretty much anyone who 
shows up has a voice.
>
> I understand your desire to have a say in something that's important to
> you, but, well, if it's that important to you, the New Maintainer process
> is right over there?  We always need more help.  Absent that, the people
> who have put their blood, sweat, and tears into the project are the people
> who are going to make the decisions, of course with an eye to our project
> agreement to try to prioritize our users.  But it's going to be our
> interpretation of what's good for our users.

>
> If people who weren't doing the work, who weren't part of that community
> and taking part of the load, were calling the shots and the rest of us had
> to obey them, well... we have a word for that.  It's called a job, and the
> entire relationship with the work is different, and I would expect to be
> paid.
>
> If it helps, think of having a voice in the decisions to be the pay that
> we get for working on Debian.
>
>> It might, however, have led to the Technical Committee giving more
>> weight to the impacts of the decisions.
> I always have to laugh at statements like that, since I think they come
> from a well-meaning place of almost total lack of understanding of what it
> was like to be on the TC during that decision.
>
> I think I put more thought into all of the aspects of that decision,
> including weight on the impacts of the decisions, than just about any
> other decision I've made in my life.  I have put less thought into where I
> live than into systemd.
>
> I think this is part of that all-too-human belief that one's own position
> is so obviously correct that if anyone disagrees with you, it's just
> because they've not thought about the problem hard enough.  And it's just
> not true.

I'm sorry to say this, but the only value that Debian provides to the 
world, is packaging.  And, personally, over time, I've found it more and 
more necessary to download, build, and compile from source - reducing 
the value of Debian.

Pretty soon, I expect I'll be migrating.

And, next time I do any serious developing, I expect the only init 
scripts I'll provide are sysvinit based.  That suggests that my platform 
will be something other than Debian.

Miles Fidelman


-- 
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
In practice, there is.  .... Yogi Berra

Thread

Censorship in Debian Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> - 2018-12-20 22:50 +0100
  Re: Censorship in Debian Adam Borowski <kilobyte@angband.pl> - 2018-12-20 23:20 +0100
  Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2018-12-20 23:20 +0100
    Re: Censorship in Debian Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> - 2018-12-21 00:20 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2018-12-21 00:50 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> - 2018-12-21 01:30 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian "Paul R. Tagliamonte" <paultag@gmail.com> - 2018-12-21 01:50 +0100
          Re: Censorship in Debian Steve McIntyre <steve@einval.com> - 2019-01-04 14:40 +0100
            Re: Censorship in Debian Scott Kitterman <debian@kitterman.com> - 2019-01-04 15:00 +0100
              Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 19:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Roberto C. Sánchez <roberto@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 19:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 19:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Roberto C. Sánchez <roberto@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 20:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 21:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Wouter Verhelst <wouter@debian.org> - 2019-01-06 13:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Anthony Towns <aj@erisian.com.au> - 2019-01-05 05:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-05 05:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2019-01-05 18:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Martin Steigerwald <martin@lichtvoll.de> - 2019-01-06 00:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-06 01:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2019-01-07 19:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Martin Steigerwald <martin@lichtvoll.de> - 2019-01-07 19:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Josh Triplett <josh@joshtriplett.org> - 2019-01-10 00:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-10 01:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Ben Hutchings <ben@decadent.org.uk> - 2019-01-10 06:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-10 15:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Steve Langasek <vorlon@debian.org> - 2019-01-10 21:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-10 22:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Matthew Vernon <matthew@debian.org> - 2019-01-10 23:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-11 12:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Matthew Vernon <matthewv@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2019-01-11 14:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-11 20:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Sam Hartman <hartmans@debian.org> - 2019-01-12 00:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-11 18:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-10 01:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Scott Kitterman <debian@kitterman.com> - 2019-01-04 19:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 20:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Scott Kitterman <debian@kitterman.com> - 2019-01-04 20:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 20:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-04 21:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Steve Langasek <vorlon@debian.org> - 2019-01-06 07:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-06 23:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2019-01-07 17:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Martin Steigerwald <martin@lichtvoll.de> - 2019-01-07 17:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian <flackjacket5@tutanota.com> - 2019-01-07 19:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-07 19:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Steve Langasek <vorlon@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 02:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 02:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Eldon Koyle <ekoyle@gmail.com> - 2019-01-08 02:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 04:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 04:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Scott Kitterman <debian@kitterman.com> - 2019-01-08 04:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Sam Hartman <hartmans@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 16:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 05:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 05:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 10:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 03:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 04:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 05:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 10:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Jonathan Dowland <jmtd@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 11:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 11:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Christian Kastner <ckk@kvr.at> - 2019-01-08 12:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2019-01-08 14:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 18:20 +0100
                [OT] distributions without systemd (was: Re: Censorship in Debian) Martin Steigerwald <martin@lichtvoll.de> - 2019-01-08 20:00 +0100
                Re: [OT] distributions without systemd Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> - 2019-01-08 21:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2019-01-08 20:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-08 20:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Tollef Fog Heen <tfheen@err.no> - 2019-01-08 19:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Sean Whitton <spwhitton@spwhitton.name> - 2019-01-05 21:50 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Scott Kitterman <debian@kitterman.com> - 2019-01-05 22:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Steve Langasek <vorlon@debian.org> - 2019-01-05 23:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Jonathan Carter <jcc@debian.org> - 2019-01-05 23:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Wouter Verhelst <wouter@debian.org> - 2019-01-06 13:30 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Scott Kitterman <debian@kitterman.com> - 2019-01-06 20:10 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Sean Whitton <spwhitton@spwhitton.name> - 2019-01-06 17:20 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Martín Ferrari <tincho@tincho.org> - 2019-01-08 13:10 +0100
              Re: Censorship in Debian Jonathan Carter <jcc@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 21:40 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-04 22:10 +0100
            Re: Censorship in Debian Philip Hands <phil@hands.com> - 2019-01-04 23:50 +0100
              Re: Censorship in Debian Eldon Koyle <ekoyle@gmail.com> - 2019-01-05 02:00 +0100
                Re: Censorship in Debian Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org> - 2019-01-05 02:30 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian Eldon Koyle <ekoyle@gmail.com> - 2018-12-21 08:10 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian Martin Steigerwald <martin@lichtvoll.de> - 2018-12-21 11:30 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Steve McIntyre <steve@einval.com> - 2018-12-21 01:50 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> - 2018-12-21 09:40 +0100
          Re: Censorship in Debian Chris Lamb <lamby@debian.org> - 2018-12-21 12:10 +0100
          Re: Censorship in Debian Geert Stappers <stappers@debian.org> - 2018-12-21 19:00 +0100
          Re: Censorship in Debian Josh Triplett <josh@joshtriplett.org> - 2018-12-22 19:30 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Jonathan Dowland <jmtd@debian.org> - 2018-12-21 09:30 +0100
    Re: Censorship in Debian Adam Borowski <kilobyte@angband.pl> - 2018-12-21 04:50 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Raphael Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org> - 2018-12-21 10:10 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian Bernd Zeimetz <bernd@bzed.de> - 2018-12-23 21:00 +0100
          Re: Censorship in Debian Marcin Kulisz <debian@kulisz.net> - 2018-12-24 10:20 +0100
            Re: Censorship in Debian Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> - 2018-12-24 13:00 +0100
  Re: Censorship in Debian Gunnar Wolf <gwolf@debian.org> - 2018-12-21 04:00 +0100
  Re: Censorship in Debian Norbert Preining <norbert@preining.info> - 2018-12-25 17:40 +0100
    Re: Censorship in Debian martin f krafft <madduck@debian.org> - 2018-12-26 00:00 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Dominik George <natureshadow@debian.org> - 2018-12-26 00:20 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Steve Langasek <vorlon@debian.org> - 2018-12-29 06:40 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian martin f krafft <madduck@debian.org> - 2018-12-29 09:30 +0100
    Re: Censorship in Debian Charles Plessy <plessy@debian.org> - 2018-12-26 09:40 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Andrey Rahmatullin <wrar@debian.org> - 2018-12-26 09:50 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Holger Levsen <holger@layer-acht.org> - 2018-12-26 14:40 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Charles Plessy <plessy@debian.org> - 2018-12-28 07:50 +0100
        Re: Cyberbullying (was: Censorship) in Debian Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> - 2018-12-29 00:30 +0100
    Re: Censorship in Debian Enrico Zini <enrico@enricozini.org> - 2018-12-26 15:50 +0100
      Re: Censorship in Debian Norbert Preining <norbert@preining.info> - 2018-12-26 16:00 +0100
        Re: Censorship in Debian "Paul R. Tagliamonte" <paultag@gmail.com> - 2018-12-26 17:00 +0100
          Re: Censorship in Debian Norbert Preining <norbert@preining.info> - 2018-12-27 03:40 +0100
            Re: Censorship in Debian "Paul R. Tagliamonte" <paultag@gmail.com> - 2018-12-27 17:00 +0100
          Re: Censorship in Debian Gunnar Wolf <gwolf@debian.org> - 2018-12-27 14:50 +0100
            Re: Censorship in Debian Wouter Verhelst <wouter@debian.org> - 2018-12-28 08:50 +0100
            Re: Censorship in Debian martin f krafft <madduck@debian.org> - 2018-12-29 01:30 +0100

csiph-web