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On Tue, Jul 08, 2003 at 10:11:58AM -0400 or thereabouts, Grant Goodyear wrote: |
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> Replace "settle" with "mediate", as the ombudsman has no actual power |
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> other than persuasion; it's intended entirely to facilitate finding |
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> common ground through discussions and negotiations (good phrase; mind if |
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> I use it?). |
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Feel free. :) |
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|
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> > When is it appropriate to use this ombudsman? How does one contact the |
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> > person? Are disputes logged and/or public? |
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> |
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> In principle it is appropriate to use an ombudsman at any time, which |
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> one can do simply by sending an e-mail to ombudsman@g.o. A user |
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> who's ticked because her bug has been sitting on bugzilla for three |
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> months can send the ombudsman an e-mail, as can developer Y who's |
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> finally had it w/ developer X changing the ebuilds that Y maintains |
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> without consulting Y first. The ombudsman's first job is to listen, and |
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> then to try to mediate a solution. |
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> |
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> In practice ombudsmen tend not to be overwhelmed because people |
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> generally have to be pretty upset to go to the effort of complaining to |
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> an ombudsman. Of course, it's just those people who are likely to |
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> create significant havoc if things are allowed to blow up. |
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This is an area I'm not sure I agree with -- I can see the ombudsmen |
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quickly and easily getting overwhelmed. Though, to be fair, I think we're |
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both trying to envision how this process would work and I'm probably taking |
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the glass-half-empty approach. |
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In general, I dislike greasing squeaky wheels because I think it a) |
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encourages more squeaking and b) solves symptoms of problems, rather than |
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the more serious underlying issues. |
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Personally, I'd rather see this role morph (either formally or informally) |
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into more of a process-reengineering type person. They listen to users, |
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developers, etc. to understand what complaints and issues are currently |
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running through the community and then work to resolve the underlying |
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issues causing those problems in the first place. |
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As an example, say Joe User complains because his bug has been outstanding |
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for three months. It's easy enough for the ombudsman to badger the |
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responsible developer into fixing it, but that doesn't stop other bugs from |
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sitting around for 3 months, either. |
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As it stands, I see the proposed ombudsman role as nothing more than a tiny |
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pressure valve. It can relieve some of the pressure, certainly, but it can |
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only do so much before the pressure becomes overwhelming and things blow up |
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on an even larger scale. |
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> All that said, ombudsmen are hardly a panacea, since some disputes |
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> simply cannot be resolved effectively. Even so, an ombudsman might be |
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> able to mediate so that the parties affected can go their separate ways |
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> _without_ rancor, but maybe not. |
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I agree and I do see some value in having this role. Often, a pressure |
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valve can act as a stop gap solution while other folks work on solving the |
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real problem. |
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--kurt |