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On 06/20/2013 01:19 AM, Samuli Suominen wrote: |
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> On 20/06/13 05:03, Rich Freeman wrote: |
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>> On Wed, Jun 19, 2013 at 8:50 PM, Alexis Ballier <aballier@g.o> |
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>> wrote: |
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>>> On Wed, 19 Jun 2013 22:18:49 +0200 |
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>>> hasufell <hasufell@g.o> wrote: |
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>>> [...] |
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>>>> Who controls devrel? |
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>>>> Simple answer: no one. |
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>>> |
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>>> And this is good IMHO. Judiciary should be an independent power. |
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>> |
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>> The council is elected. No sane organization (democratic or corporate |
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>> or whatever) just has a self-appointing judiciary. I'm not convinced |
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>> we even need an independent judiciary, but nations that have |
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>> independent judiciaries still have elected representatives appoint |
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>> them. They also often have a means for elected officials to overturn |
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>> their decisions (at least in the direction of pardons). Lifetime |
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>> appointments |
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>> make sense when you're talking about basic laws and civil rights which |
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>> change on a timespan of centuries, but not when you're talking about a |
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>> computer operating system distribution that changes on a scale of |
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>> months. |
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>> |
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>> Corporations have elected boards appoint executives who appoint the |
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>> members of HR/Security. Democracies elect representatives who appoint |
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>> members of the judiciary. |
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>> |
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>> My feeling is that QA and Devrel should be council appointed. They |
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>> can of course recommend their own members, and Council can give |
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>> whatever deference they feel is appropriate to the recommendation. |
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>> |
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>> If you wouldn't trust somebody to appoint QA/Devrel members, then you |
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>> shouldn't be electing them to the Council. Likewise, if you wouldn't |
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>> trust somebody to not just seize control of the entire distribution |
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>> (infra, DNS, bank accounts, the Gentoo name, firing the Council, etc) |
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>> you shouldn't be electing them to the Trustees (a few years ago our |
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>> sole remaining Trustee was contemplating basically just turning the |
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>> entire distro over to a benevolent dictator (our founder), who legally |
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>> wouldn't be accountable to anybody including the Council (or even the |
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>> devs in general depending on whether the bylaws were modified)). |
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>> These are real governing bodies that essentially have all the powers |
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>> you don't want to give to anybody (well, save unelected QA/Devrel team |
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>> members) whether you like it or not (at least within the boundaries of |
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>> the Foundation charter/bylaws). |
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>> |
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>> I agree with hasufell's recommendation, although I would extend it to |
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>> QA as well. QA and Devrel are "special" projects and should probably |
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>> be accountable to the Council. I think they should be largely |
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>> self-governing much as infra is (even though infra is fairly dependent |
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>> on the trustees for funding/etc). It isn't about control so much as |
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>> accountability and mandate. I'd of course recommend that the Council |
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>> should be hands-off as long as things are going well, and there really |
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>> isn't anything that suggests they wouldn't be (certainly this has been |
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>> the trend with both the Council and Trustees). |
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>> |
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>> Part of me is thinking that we should just write up this proposal as a |
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>> GLEP and go from there. By all means devs should register their |
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>> opinions on it as it firms up, and we can leave it to the new Council |
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>> to decide how to handle it. |
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> |
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> I agree (to every point) |
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> |
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> The way devrel can be seen now when enforcing a decision without the |
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> council authorization gives automatic impression of an group of |
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> individuals trying to blackmail you, instead of the impression of |
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> distribution trying to push you into correct direction. |
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> Like, for example, if devrel had been council elected back when we had |
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> the ChangeLog debacle, we wouldn't have had a ChangeLog debacle. |
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> |
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> - Samuli |
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> |
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Ditto. I was going to respond in more detail, but there's nothing |
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really to add here. Especially an independent judiciary. It makes me |
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thing police state with no accountability for those who enforce the |
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rules. Imagine if the very people you think are disruptive to the |
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community get power on devrel. I also strongly agree with QA being |
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appointed by the council. |
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|
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-- |
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Anthony G. Basile, Ph.D. |
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Gentoo Linux Developer [Hardened] |
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E-Mail : blueness@g.o |
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GnuPG FP : 1FED FAD9 D82C 52A5 3BAB DC79 9384 FA6E F52D 4BBA |
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GnuPG ID : F52D4BBA |
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