Ubuntu Code of Conduct: omissions and suggestions

[Daniel Holbach]

Hello everybody,

we are going to have a session at UOS about it. It's going to be at:

  Wednesday 16:00 - 16:55 UTC
  http://summit.ubuntu.com/uos-1605/meeting/22669/code-of-conduct-review/

Maybe we can add the key points to the agenda doc already?

Hope to see you all there.

Have a great day,
 Daniel


On 05.04.2016 17:16, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
> Hi folks
> 
> When Ubuntu’s Code of Conduct
> <http://www.ubuntu.com/about/about-ubuntu/conduct> was published in
> 2005, it was groundbreaking. Few other open-source projects had one.
> It was far from perfect, but it had real benefits — most of all in
> establishing expectations, and rarely also in providing the authority
> to remove counterproductive project members.
> 
> The Code had a minor update in 2009,
> <https://mako.cc/copyrighteous/updating-the-ubuntu-code-of-conduct>
> and a major revision in 2012. Since then, tens of thousands of other
> open-source projects have discussed and adopted their own codes of
> conduct. So it’s no surprise that the state of the art has advanced.
> 
> By today’s standards, Ubuntu’s code of conduct falls short in four
> notable areas, as identified on the Geek Feminism wiki:
> <http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Code_of_conduct_evaluations>
> 
> 1.  No descriptions of common but unacceptable behavior. This means,
>     for example, that the Ubuntu IRC Council has had to provide their
>     own descriptions, even of things that don’t apply just to IRC.
>     <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/IRC/Guidelines>
> 
> 2.  No reporting instructions with contact information. This is perhaps
>     the most glaring omission (and what motivated me to write today).
> 
> 3.  No information about enforcement. Version 1.0 said “the Ubuntu
>     Community Council will arbitrate in any dispute”, with 1.1 adding
>     “Ubuntu governance bodies”, but 2.0 removed both of these.
>     <https://launchpad.net/codeofconduct> Matthew Garrett made a start
>     on defining the enforcement process in 2007, but it didn’t go
>     anywhere. <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/CodeOfConductDisputeResolution>
>     The current process may be precise and well-known to the Community
>     team, but defining it in the Code itself would be much more
>     reassuring to potential reporters.
> 
> 4.  No clear demarcation between an anti-harassment policy and more
>     general community guidelines. And more pertinently, no clear
>     anti-harassment policy at all.
> 
> I would add a fifth issue:
> 
> 5.  Needless bureaucracy of “signing” the Code. Firstly, this is
>     difficult to do: for example, step 1 is “Register an OpenPGP key”.
>     Secondly, it introduces weird questions about what happens if a
>     miscreant never signed the Code, or signed only an old version. And
>     thirdly, it’s unnecessary: Ubuntu governing bodies should be able
>     to sanction anyone using Ubuntu project forums or infrastructure
>     whether they have signed a document or not. For example, I have
>     never signed the Code (I tried once, but Launchpad lost my GPG
>     keys), but I would expect to be held to it regardless, merely
>     because I communicate on project channels and mailing lists.
> 
> Personally, I think the Ubuntu project would benefit from a revision
> that addressed these five issues.
> 
> Good reading on modern codes of conduct:
> 
> *   “Codes of conduct and the trade-offs of copyleft” by Sumana
>     Harihareswara
> <http://crookedtimber.org/2015/04/10/codes-of-conduct-and-the-trade-offs-of-copyleft/>
> 
> *   The “Codes of Conduct” section from Karl Fogel’s “Producing open
>     source software”
> <http://producingoss.com/en/producingoss.html#code-of-conduct>
> 
> *   “HOWTO design a code of conduct for your community” by the Ada
>     Initiative
> <http://adainitiative.org/2014/02/18/howto-design-a-code-of-conduct-for-your-community/>
> 
> *   “The complex reality of adopting a meaningful code of conduct” by
>     Christie Koehler
> <https://subfictional.com/2016/01/25/the-complex-reality-of-adopting-a-meaningful-code-of-conduct/>
> 
> 

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