Re: [gentoo-council] User Relations authority

[Donnie Berkholz]

On 13:55 Thu 10 Jul     , Ferris McCormick wrote:
> On Thu, 2008-07-10 at 11:49 +0000, Jorge Manuel B. S. Vicetto wrote:
> > To summarize, my proposal was that we should have a method to "keep
> > away" people that do nothing but cause continuous issues - this is about
> > the "poisonous people" that are long-time and repeated offenders.
> > As I've stated back then "I believe that the greatest reward anyone can
> > have to participate in Gentoo is getting credit for work done on Gentoo.
> > As such, as a last measure, we must be ready to deny such contribution
> > from banned users."
>
> I don't think I've ever seen anyone at all who does nothing but
> continually causs "issues" and so qualifies as poisonous.  We have a
> large community and everyone is abrasive at times, and everyone gets
> abuse at times (even me, but probably not from people you have in mind
> as "poisonous", if you have any).  But I consider this just a normal
> part of doing business and can't imagine what it would take to get me
> to make a formal complaint about it.
>
> For example, I have had little contact with Linus Torvalds, but I have
> had a fair amount of contact with David Miller (davem --- the sparc
> kernel developer).  I'm pretty sure that davem would seem more
> "poisonous" to us than anyone we've ever seen in Gentoo, and by
> reputation, Linus makes davem look like a pussy cat.  (Although davem
> seems to be mellowing.)  But I rather doubt that if for some reason
> either one started participating in Gentoo that we'd consider banning
> them or refusing their contributions. :)

I agree that the Linux kernel community has different standards and 
expectations than the Gentoo community, and that's exactly the point. 
You act within the context of your community. I don't care if people in 
northern Canada practice cannibalism, it's not OK around these parts.

> > | 4.  Here's what I think is meant by a complete ban.  *These are only my
> > | own inferences from reading between the lines and trying to put
> > | different comments together in some coherent fashion.*
> > |      Under some rather unclear conditions, some combination of
> > |      devrel/userrel/trustees/infra could decide to impose a complete,
> > |      permanent ban on a member (user or, I suppose developer) of our
> > |      community.  This would have the following effects:
> >
> > Some people seem to support that userrel can make such decisions on its
> > own. As I've stated, as an userrel member, I was willing to involve
> > other teams. We also need to agree to which body should appeals be sent.
>
> I would not support giving userrel that authority or userrel+devrel that
> authority.  Now, I oppose this absolutely.  But in general I don't thing
> any group(s) in gentoo should have such sweeping authority to make such
> major decisions secretely in private.  If we want to impose such a ban
> on someone, we really should have the courage and resolve to work in
> public.

I dislike your use of emotional words to imply that anyone you disagree 
with is cowardly.

> > My comment about this has always been that in extreme cases and if we
> > have a close partnership with upstream, we might want to share with them
> > our decision and let them judge for themselves if the actions that made
> > such person be banned on Gentoo are relevant to them or not.
> >
> Why?  It's hardly our concern who participates upstream.

I agree with this, as I mentioned above with the context of the 
community.

> > The point here is that such a decision is not terminal. If people feel
> > more comfortable about it, don't call it permanent bans, but call it a
> > ban until further notice.
>
> What's the practical difference?  And why not make it something sensible
> and definite?  The authority to lift an indefinite ban most likely rests
> with whoever imposed it in the first place, and that doesn't provide for
> much.

I dislike the implication that anything else is not sensible.

> > I assume what you mean here is that there would be no attempt of
> > mediation with said person. As my proposal states this is an *extreme*
> > decision meant only for *long-time* and *repeated* offenders. When we
> > get there, there's no possibility for mediation - that's something that
> > would have been tried a long time before we get there.
>
> See above.  And as i said, I've never seen anyone who fits such a
> profile, so perhaps we're spending a lot of time here defining how we
> treat the empty set.

I think it's clear that your opinion does not necessarily represent the 
opinions of everyone else in Gentoo, so arguing that your empty set is 
Gentoo's empty set is not valid.

> > | 8.  [Argument]  I note that we are likely to institute some form of
> > | possible moderation for the gentoo-dev mailing list (presumably based on
> > | Code of Conduct violations), and if we do that, it effectively satisfies
> > | the intent of any absolute ban, but is not nearly so traumatic to the
> > | system.  I note that this is a minority view among those who have
> > | discussed this.
> >
> > Ferris, I do hope the moderation will prevent so many abuses on the mls,
> > but it alone won't change people's mindsets and actions. Although posts
> > can be moderated, it doesn't mean that people will stop trying to send
> > abusive mails and that a few might even get to the lists. Also, it
> > doesn't address irc, bugzilla and other mediums abuse.
>
> If we have your hypothetical poisonous person running around loose
> somewhere and put him (or her) into a must-be-moderated list for
> gentoo-dev, the problem there should disappear because posts will be
> shunted to the moderators.  #gentoo-dev is a more general concern than
> just a few specific people and falls generally under Code of Conduct for
> immediate correction.  Bugzilla looks like a bigger problem than it is,
> because when it explodes it can be spectacular.  But it is not limited
> to one or two people, either (even I have lost control on bugzilla, and
> I generally appear pretty calm and rational, I think).

I don't think moderation is the answer, because it's a very small group 
of people who become regular, recurring problems.

> Jorge, you know, if you and I were both forced to come up with a list of
> five poisonous people to consider for application of such a ban, I
> suspect their intersection might be empty.  What then?
>
> It is my view that both userrel and devrel may enforce the Code of
> Conduct,

I agree.

> but also Code of Conduct should be limited to quick response to
> immediate situations.

I do not agree. Just because something happened in the past does not 
mean it never happened and should not be considered.

> I think devrel and userrel are the wrong bodies to be rooting around in
> the past if that's what you are proposing.  Neither of us is set up to
> do that.  We act on current behavior, and if discipline is warranted,
> then we can take to past behavior for guidance if we wish.  I don't
> think anyone in Gentoo currently has the charter to look at the
> community and say "X has been causing trouble long enough --- let's just
> boot X."  Nor do I think we want anyone to have such authority ---
> surely we're more tolerant and flexible than that.

Again I dislike your implications that anyone who would act on past 
behavior is intolerant and inflexible. Please stop using implications 
like this.

-- 
Thanks,
Donnie

Donnie Berkholz
Developer, Gentoo Linux
Blog: http://dberkholz.wordpress.com