Gentoo Archives: gentoo-project

From: Aaron Bauman <bman@g.o>
To: gentoo-project@l.g.o
Subject: Re: [gentoo-project] [RFC] Triumvirate in Gentoo
Date: Thu, 04 Jun 2020 19:02:01
Message-Id: 20200604190149.GA15411@bubba
In Reply to: [gentoo-project] [RFC] Triumvirate in Gentoo by "Michał Górny"
1 On Thu, Jun 04, 2020 at 09:15:37AM +0200, Michał Górny wrote:
2 > Hello, everyone.
3 >
4 > Gentoo is technically led by two bodies -- the Council and the Trustees.
5 > While this somewhat works for many years, people have repeatedly pointed
6 > out that it's far from perfect and that it is preventing Gentoo from
7 > gaining more popularity. Some of them are looking into the times of
8 > BDFL with longing, others are considering it the worst thing ever.
9 > Nevertheless, there are problems with the current state of things.
10 >
11
12 I do not recall any discussions on how the current model is impacting
13 popularity of the distro. I am not asking for evidence, but if this is
14 purely based around previous "power struggles" then I would agree.
15
16 > Firstly, we have two leading bodies and still no clear distinction
17 > between their roles. Some developers agree on split being here, some
18 > developers put it elsewhere but in the end, nothing has been really
19 > decided. From time to time one of the bodies tries to push their border
20 > forward, then backs down and we're back where we started.
21 >
22
23 There have been struggles that I recall in the past with the foundation
24 attempting to over step it's bounds. As others have mentioned, this is
25 inevitable regardless of structure barring any BDFL like scenarios.
26
27 I have postulated that the current structure works and there are avenues
28 to codify distinct roles in the "two bodies." This can be done in the
29 by-laws.
30
31 Ultimately, the council runs the distro and the foundation ensures that
32 the distro is supported financially and legally. Pure and simple. The
33 Foundation has no play in technical matters or determining how the
34 council is to govern the distro (OFC, unless something bleeds over into
35 legal matters).
36
37 I am not speaking for Robin here, but I completely agree with his
38 approach for how infra interacts with the various entities within
39 Gentoo. This same "due diligence", based on role, is imperative for all to
40 understand regardless of personal opinion.
41
42 > Secondly, for historical reasons the both bodies are elected by two
43 > electorates that only partially overlap. Surely, today the overlap is
44 > reasonable but is there any real reason for different people to elect
45 > both bodies? In the end, it is entirely possible for one body to
46 > arbitrarily change their electorate and made it completely disjoint.
47 >
48
49 This definitely must be fixed. I believe a decision to determine the
50 electorate should be made and it must be the same.
51
52 > Thirdly, large governing bodies don't really work. Instead of having
53 > one consistent vision of Gentoo, we have 12. What we get is a semi-
54 > random combination of parts of their visions that just happened to hit
55 > majority in their votes. It gets absurd to the point that a body can
56 > make half-way decisions just because first half passed vote
57 > and the second didn't (remember closing -dev but leaving -project
58 > open?).
59 >
60
61 Assuming roles are clearly defined, I believe this point becomes moot.
62 Someone should own the ML's from a governing perspective.
63
64 > On the other, it's small enough for them to be able to actively work
65 > together and directly establish a common set of goals (i.e. via
66 > an agreement rather than a majority vote).
67 >
68 >
69
70 Agree with others that this lowers the bar even more for a possible
71 takeover.
72
73 --
74 Cheers,
75 Aaron

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Re: [gentoo-project] [RFC] Triumvirate in Gentoo "Michał Górny" <mgorny@g.o>