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On Tue, Feb 13, 2018 at 5:23 AM, Rich Freeman <rich0@g.o> wrote: |
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> On Tue, Feb 13, 2018 at 12:51 AM, Alec Warner <antarus@g.o> wrote: |
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> > |
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> > In some fields (law, or finance for example) there are rules against |
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> having |
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> > even potential conflicts. Should Gentoo emulate those rules and produce |
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> an |
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> > organization that avoids even the appearance of conflict? |
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> |
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> Absolutely! |
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> |
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> > A council member is on a team (not even necessarily QA / Comrel). That |
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> > team's lead makes a decision. The council member doesn't agree with the |
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> > decision and appeals to council. |
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> > I would argue the member raising the issue has a conflict and they should |
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> > not vote (recuse / abstain). |
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> |
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> Merely disagreeing with a decision is not a conflict of interest on its |
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> own. |
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> |
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> A conflict exists when somebody stands to personally benefit from a |
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> decision. What personal benefit does a member of a team get from |
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> appealing a disagreement? |
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> Now, if the decision concerned them personally in some way I could see |
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> a conflict, such as if it were about a reimbursement of an expense |
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> they incurred, or if it were about sponsoring them to go on a trip. |
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> |
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I wouldn't even consider it a conflict of interest if it were a QA |
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> decision on a commit they made, unless this commit furthered some kind |
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> of work they were doing outside of Gentoo (the commit benefited their |
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> employer or their consulting business). |
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> |
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> Conflict of interest isn't the same as disagreement. It is completely |
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> normal and healthy for people to disagree with things. This does not |
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> in any way make them prejudiced or likely to make a decision that is |
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> bad for the distro. |
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> |
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> Again, I'm completely in favor of avoiding conflicts of interest. It |
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> just seems that there is a popular notion around here of what a |
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> conflict of interest is which certainly wouldn't stand up in a court |
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> of law, or really in any organization. Perhaps this is why so many |
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> seem to be paranoid that there is some kind of cabal running the show. |
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> (One which is elected, so presumably this cabal is upwards of 30+ |
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> people.) |
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> |
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Ok I don't want to have a discussion about what is a conflict or not; |
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because I don't think the conversation solves the problems (which are |
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ill-specified, hoping William will use more words.) The original post |
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discussed appeals to the council. My understanding is that there is a |
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potential trust issue and William thinks removing 'conflicts' (and I use |
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the loosest definition of conflict here) will help improve trust. Assuming |
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developers have concerns about 'conflicts', having a conversation where you |
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say their concerns are invalid based on 'an interpretation of the phrase |
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conflict of interest' doesn't really address these developer concerns (and |
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in fact does the opposite.) |
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So I'd like to see the developer concerns expressed in a clearer way so we |
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can have a frank discussion. If there are no explicit concerns and we are |
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just discussing potential problems; then I'm less likely to advocate for |
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policy changes based on things that have not happened yet. |
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-A |
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> |
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> -- |
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> Rich |
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> |
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> |