Ubuntu Governance: Reboot?

[Stephen Michael Kellat]

On Fri, 14 Nov 2014 10:59:33 -0800
Jono Bacon <jono at jonobacon.org> wrote:

> Hi All,
> 
> I shared my wider thoughts on this topic on
> http://www.jonobacon.org/2014/11/14/ubuntu-governance-reboot/ -
> primarily so it reaches the wider Ubuntu audience who may have views
> on this.
> 
> I think this is best discussed here though (as Elizabeth suggested).
> 
> I think it could be worthwhile exploring a new set of core goals for
> our governance, and then transform those principles into a charter.
> 
> Thoughts?
> 
>    Jono
> 
[snip]

Just to bring the thread up to speed from some of the comments seen as of this time tick on the original post:

Alan Bell -- Perhaps Canonical itself is lacking direction as to where it is going?
Charles Profitt -- Invited direct conversation one-to-one
Jef Spaleta -- Ubuntu is drifting away from congruence with Debian increasingly with Touch/Mir/Click Packages as well as with Kubuntu's implementation of Plasma.  Cloud is breaking new ground.  Do old forms still apply with possible pending pain points of such paradigm shifts?
Craig Maloney -- Are we just going through the motions of community/governance?  Was Unity a polarizer that results in folks either not caring or moving on to other things?  Otherwise stated, did Unity cause Disharmony?
kereltis -- Last release seemed to lack excitement.  Is this call by Mr. Bacon mere "moral panic"?
Randall Ross -- Shall we reinvigorate "Ubuntu Evangelists" and tear out as much of the governance bodies as possible?

And now for my views in the matter:

First and foremost, I am well aware of the turmoil Debian is experiencing at the moment.  To an extent we're protected from that due to the fluidity of some of our processes.  Looking in from the outside I've seen plenty of examples of how demoralizing the current unpleasantness can be in Debian.

In part, I agree with Alan Bell.  I'm not really sure this is a matter of lacking inspiration *yet*.  We are lacking a concrete vision with *tangible* endpoints.  Touch moves from being a hypothetical concept to being "real" once somebody has a device in-hand running it that didn't have to be rooted or flashed to have it.  The unexpected reaction of people wanting to buy instances of The Orange Box to have their own small server clusters to play with is also where the intangibles of Juju shift from being hypothetical to "real".

Tangibility still leads to excitement.  Having something in your hands leads to a sense of ownership a mere rsync doesn't.  The return of sales to end consumers of vinyl records even on Amazon shows a desire for such tangibility.

Now, turning to where you find your inspiration is a difficult matter.  Is Mark to be our shining leader on a white horse conquering all with us following behind?  Is some nebulous panel who people mostly see as characters in an IRC stream supposed to stimulate us forward into making great things?  This question has implications beyond just Ubuntu et al.

I frankly don't see what we're going to gain at the moment from fiddling with governance structures.  If anything, battles over governance have fueled much of Debian's recent turmoil.  Mr. Bacon works for an organization dedicated to trying to push the boundaries in a lot of fields and tries to stimulate such work through offering financial incentives.  In reading his post I see reflected the malaise and stagnation that seem endemic in many parts of life in the United States today.  When I am not furloughed and am actually on the job, I work in a public-facing position talking to citizens about their interactions with a federal agency and trying to work out their problems with that agency while dealing with their financial woes.  Malaise and stagnation are here at least economically whether we want to admit it or not.

To turn around what Jono's written, I think we're missing two things.  The first mentioned above is a clear, tangible target.  The second is a sense of completion.

We're going to feel a sense of completion once phones are released by OEMs and you can walk into Best Buy/RadioShack/WalMart/wherever to buy one.  The setting of S.M.A.R.T. targets for the future beyond the conclusion of the next semiannual iteration is some planning that existing bodies need to engage in outside the trap our release cadence seemingly sets at times.

Fiddling with governance makes it merely **look** like we're doing something.  Delivery of the two things above would actually be more substantive and more productive.

Stephen Michael Kellat