DMB: Proposal for a different review process

Thu Aug 4 16:41:28 UTC 2011

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Hello,

On 08/04/2011 11:17 AM, Oliver Grawert wrote:
> hi, Am Donnerstag, den 04.08.2011, 10:56 -0400 schrieb Mackenzie
> Morgan:
>> On Thu, Aug 4, 2011 at 10:49 AM, Oliver Grawert <ogra at ubuntu.com>
>> wrote:
>>> hi, Am Donnerstag, den 04.08.2011, 10:12 -0400 schrieb Mackenzie
>>> Morgan:
>>>> More like: Ugh, these two getting upset about the people they
>>>> manage being rejected. Again. How predictable! *eye roll*
>>> and what forbids them from being like that ?
>> 
>> As far as I can tell: a rubber stamp.  Someone on Dustin's team 
>> applied. Better accept them if we want to avoid another fiasco!
> so avoiding the confrontation is better than convincing dustin ? 
> really, it is dustins problem, not canonicals, dustin could be the 
> leader of the foobar team that maintains the barfoo software in
> ubuntu and would be upset if one of his team members would be
> rejected. it has (once again my mantra) *nothing to do with
> canonical*

I agree that it has nothing to do with Canonical-the-company-personhood.
The company is not doing anything. Contrary to what US laws say,
companies are not persons and can not make actions. Only individuals
within those companies can make actions and decisions.

Thus, saying that Person Y who happens to work for Company A does
something, especially if it highly relates to the work they do for
Company A, is hard to disassociate from that company. That is why you
see personal blogs include statements like "These are my views and do
not necessarily reflect those of my employer." They are needed because
people's actions as they relate to work-related work, are associated
with the company.

Now, again, with that said, I agree with Scott that there is *no
evidence* of a systematic nefarious plan within Canonical. Far from it.
I see people trying to do the right thing (get their employees involved
with the Ubuntu Community). That is great. Please do more!

BUT! The first entry into the Ubuntu Community *can not be* an
application to any Membership Board. There must be something you can
point to that shows you have interacted with the community in some way.
Whether that be through bug reporting/triaging, submitting patches,
working tables at conferences, helping on IRC/Forums/AskUbuntu,
something that interacts directly with the community.

The Community Council will decide soon on where that line is drawn (what
is "directly with the community" in my parlance). We can rekindle that
part of the debate after they've decided (for little gain), but I'd
rather not.

But back to the issue that many perceive (from both the community and
from Canonical) as being easily titled "the community vs Canonical." I
think that it is an unfortunate, but sometimes true, issue. We've seen
it before with the controversy surrounding the name of Ubuntu One[0],
we've seen it with the Banshee "kerfuffle"[1], we've seen it with
copyright assignments for Canonical instigated projects, and we've seen
it with the membership process. I might be able to go one with that
list, but I don't feel that is productive. However, acknowledging that
it exists is the first step that *everyone* who is throwing words around
in this thread needs to do. Of course, how much of a dissonance there is
between the community and Canonical varies with everyone's perspective,
the situation at hand, and any other variables that come into play.

[0] https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntuone-servers/+bug/375345 (best
reference I could find quickly)
[1] http://blog.grossmeier.net/2011/02/24/the-kerfuffle/

Once we've all acknowledged that fact, we can work to remedy it in
whatever situation we find ourselves. No one person, or even group of
people, even the all powerful Community Council, can fix it. It takes
each and every one of us to "Do The Right Thing" in situations that
expose the issue. Without that, we fail. We fail when we knee-jerk at
each other over perceived wrongs. This is true not just in Ubuntu, but
everywhere.

What is the Right Thing? It is whatever brings us, Ubuntu, closer to
accomplishing our goals. I'm not talking about any specific goal, but
everything from fixing one FTBFS to Bug #1. Balances must be struck
between the solvency of Canonical and the health of the community (when
those are in contrast, which I don't think they normally are), between
releasing on time and fixing all those special bugs, and between
rewarding contributions to the community and rewarding contributions to
Canonical.

Let's just not try to remove one of the best things that the Ubuntu
community has: a vibrant, important, engaged, and nominally fair
membership granting process. It is true what Laura C. said, the
membership boards are made up of volunteers who are *highly* committed
to the best interests of Ubuntu, and when they hear individuals
repeatedly complain about their decisions in passive aggressive and
non-constructive ways (from people who should know better, I might add)
the boar members' morale goes down.

I've tried to stay out of this thread as much as possible as I'm on the
America's RMB, but I have to say, I'm feeling a little unwanted. Only by
some individuals, obviously. But the feeling is still there.

I hope this message is received in the manner it was intended; to bring
back our focus to what really matters.

All the best,

Greg

- -- 
|       Greg Grossmeier |
| http://grossmeier.net |
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