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| Should the Gentoo trustees accept Daniel Robbins offer? |
| yes |
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91% |
[ 638 ] |
| no |
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8% |
[ 58 ] |
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| Total Votes : 696 |
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| Author |
Message |
MoonWalker
Guru
Joined: 04 Jul 2002
Posts: 510
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 Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:26 pm Post subject: |
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| AllenJB wrote: | | MoonWalker wrote: | | I think one should be clear about one thing, even if Drobbins comes back as President, it doesn't mean he will be in the position of being an almighty dictator. here surely will have some power over things, but before he left he made sure to decentralize the Gentoo power structure so no one could come in and just "take it over" with some smart actions. |
I have to disagree with you. I think he effectively would be a dictator. Have you actually read his terms on his blog? He effectively says "You'll allow me to do what I want, but I'm not going to tell you what I want to do before you make a decision". |
Yes I have read his blog, and yes hi set terms but he also outline what he wants to do etc.. Sure there is details missing but I don't think all that is needed at this moment, and after all he has presented more info then the current leadership have done regarding the matter. He also say "things will be very very different", but what is the alternative? In the end I think it's a question of trust, a capital current leadership hasn't spent very wisely imho.
when I read tsuman's blog "In response", linked above, if he now is a trustee I don't know, it's obvious someone want to make this a "power struggle" - but to benefit of who? And as things have turned out, one may ask oneself if Gentoo not already has a dictatorial leadership? I don't say it is so, but how can someone or some being responsible for such a large legal body as Gentoo fail to deal with obligatory administration - unless there is a hidden motive behind? I don't say this is the case either, but it's a possibility. Fact remains, we still don't know much about what really have been taken place or what will be in the future. But when I read the above blog post I fear the worst, unless this systematic melt down is a part of the most brilliant plan for a "new Gentoo".
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valkyrite
Apprentice
Joined: 19 Sep 2002
Posts: 241
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:30 pm Post subject: |
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| ronmon wrote: | Dear Trustees,
Please accept Daniel's offer and allow him to rescue our beloved distribution.
Thank You,
From a long-time dedicated user. |
++^inf |
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AllenJB
Veteran
Joined: 02 Sep 2005
Posts: 1285
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:30 pm Post subject: |
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| octoploid wrote: | | IMHO Daniel made some very bad decisions in the past (leaving gentoo, working for MS) and there is no way for him to restore his original reputation. His current offer seems like a desperate attempt to make himself relevant again, but it is going to fail, because he has been out of touch for too long. |
I don't believe drobbins reputation was damaged by working for Microsoft at all. Any one who thinks it did needs their head kicked in, IMO. However, his last 2-day stint at Gentoo certainly didn't do him any favours.
| Quote: | | The best thing that could happen, would be a fork by the paludis people. They have the expertise and knowledge to build something powerful from this collapsing distribution. |
The paludis people only concentrate on a package manager. While a package manager is an important part of a distro, it's not all of it. I firmly believe that if Gentoo collapsed and a "fork" started in its place, the vast majority of current active developers would join that project. I don't think it would be too far-fetched to say that the situation would end up similar to what happened when XFree changed their license. |
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rich0
Developer
Joined: 15 Sep 2002
Posts: 161
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:33 pm Post subject: |
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| kernelOfTruth wrote: | | Quote: | | In short - I think we need more thinking and less panic. |
what's so bad about a benevolent dictator anyway ? you see linus and the linux-kernel, there are things which need to be decided in a certain time period; if decisions need to be made there's the probability that one thing / project has to be dropped in favor of the other - for good
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I agree, but not all benevolent dictators are automatically good. Personally, I've never worked with drobbins, but it seems like quite a few who have done so have issues with him, and that should give people pause.
Imagine if Linus stepped away from linux for a few years, and it went its separate way. Then he came back and decided to take it over again - that wouldn't automatically be a good thing. Perhaps linux went in a direction he didn't like - and he'll tick a bunch of people steering it back again. And if linux is so successful, why would he leave in the first place?
I wouldn't take the poll too seriously just yet - this has only been news for a few hours - most gentoo devs probably aren't even aware the discussion is going on yet. I've always been one to say that user opinion should matter more - but the reality is that gentoo NEEDS devs right now - and I'm not sure we can really afford to do something that a LARGE number of devs wouldn't like.
Considering that most devs only became of the trustee situation a few days ago I think it is a bit early to assume that they can't resolve the issue. And regardless there needs to be more transparency - the little discussion over the last year has apparently been on a seldom-monitored mailing list (gentoo-nfp).
Again though - I would caution everybody that just because the status quo needs changing doesn't mean that ANY change is a good one... |
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neysx
Retired Dev
Joined: 27 Jan 2003
Posts: 795
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:34 pm Post subject: |
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| Ibn al-Hazardous wrote: | | What happens if someone starts Gentoo Inc and steals the trademark? If there is noone to defend the trademark, we'll lose it. |
Robbins still owns the trademark. If he hasn't defended it properly, he'll lose it, and it will be entirely his fault. Maybe it's too late already and the trademark has become worthless (I'm not saying it is) but that does not prevent him from trying to sell it.
A new release is being worked on, a new newsletter is being worked on, probably on a monthly basis, a news item on our front page is being worked on.
The big issue that really needs someone to step up for is to sort out the legal aspect of Gentoo and Robbins's offer goes much much further than that, far too far IMHO. The delay alone is not reasonable.
€0,01, and BTW
| curl -I http://www.funtoo.org/ wrote: | HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Sat, 12 Jan 2008 15:41:02 GMT
Server: Apache/2.2.3 (CentOS)
Last-Modified: Mon, 31 Dec 2007 01:23:28 GMT
ETag: "1789ff-200e-e42e4400"
Accept-Ranges: bytes
Content-Length: 8206
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8 |
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neysx
Retired Dev
Joined: 27 Jan 2003
Posts: 795
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:37 pm Post subject: |
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| octoploid wrote: | The best thing that could happen, would be a fork by the paludis people.
They have the expertise and knowledge to build something powerful
from this collapsing distribution. |
Drobbins and ciaranm working together, that'd be fun to watch again. |
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speeddemon
Apprentice
Joined: 27 Sep 2003
Posts: 162
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:43 pm Post subject: |
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| kernelOfTruth wrote: | | Quote: | | In short - I think we need more thinking and less panic. |
we all need to calm done, yes, that's one thing,
but people in charge need to act soon - what have they done in the last 3 years, btw (?) - otherwise gentoo will get into legal problems and that's for sure (if some closed-minded lawyer gets his hand on gentoo's domain, e.g.)
what's so bad about a benevolent dictator anyway ? you see linus and the linux-kernel, there are things which need to be decided in a certain time period; if decisions need to be made there's the probability that one thing / project has to be dropped in favor of the other - for good
I don't get it why a lot of you are so negative about Daniel becoming / being gentoo's new/old "boss" for some time and setting it on the "right" track (!= sinking)
was his behavior that arrogant and harassing ? I read the posts on the mailing lists in question and it didn't appear to be that offensive
you have to consider that he once was / is the creator of this whole everything around gentoo - shooting one's own's flesh isn't all too good after all, don't you think  |
Yep.
A democracy is a bad business model. Look at governments and you will see. Its full of posturing, nothing gets done, its wastes resources, and everybody points fingers and blames everybody else in the end. Thats what Im seeing with Gentoo. A business (yes, even though its non-profit it still is one) needs that one voice, that leader. Even your biggest corporations have a CEO who runs things day to day. Getting a group of people to take care of every single issue will never work. It hasn't worked for gentoo so far.
Some devs don't like drobbins and don't want him back. The community, while largely uninformed of the "issues" wants him back (or so it seems). These "issues" are issues with the what has happened in the past. If people can't put the past behind them and work together towards a common goal, then no, we don't need them. There are plenty of talented people here that would be willing to work for/on gentoo, but simply don't like the current way of doing it (politics/whatever other reasons).
Last edited by speeddemon on Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:55 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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bmichaelsen
Veteran
Joined: 17 Nov 2002
Posts: 1277
Location: Hamburg, Germany
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:50 pm Post subject: |
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| octoploid wrote: | IMHO Daniel made some very bad decisions in the past (leaving gentoo, working for MS)
and there is no way for him to restore his original reputation. |
Dont post, if you dont know what you are talking about. It was far more complicated than "drobbins leaving" - actually others were the driving force behind the founding of the foundation and finally the departure of drobbins. And what he did out of necessity to support himself and his family after he got into deep debts for the gentoo project has little to do with it. And you should not judge it before you have not sacrificed a small fortune of hard cash on credit into gentoo.
| Quote: | | The best thing that could happen, would be a fork by the paludis people. |
Yes, please. They should have done that a long time ago and would have spared themselves and gentoo a lot of trouble. |
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mikegpitt
Advocate
Joined: 22 May 2004
Posts: 3224
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 4:56 pm Post subject: |
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I've skimmed about half the comments here, but I figured I'd put in my two words, and if someone else already said it, then disregard 
While, I don't think the problems with the foundation will have any short term (1 year or maybe 2) effect on Gentoo, in the long term if the leadership falls apart, and the foundation completely disappears, then Gentoo may suffer greatly. This is all speculation mind you, and the best part of open source is that even if Gentoo did fall apart it could survive in another form as a fork... but let's not try to make that a goal.
I voted to accept Daniel's offer. I don't really know the inner working and politics of the Gentoo consul, but I think it's inexcusable that the legal paperwork was not filed on time, putting the foundation in jeopardy. This one act shows problems with the current leadership, and requires immediate action.
I like how Daniel only wants to come back "part-time" to head the foundation. From what I understand, the reason he left the 2nd time was over developer disputes... this proposal would avoid that.
I strongly depend on Gentoo in both my personal and business life (not to mention entertainment through the forums!) and it seems like Daniel's offer will end the current mess, and the future would be handled responsibly. |
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MoonWalker
Guru
Joined: 04 Jul 2002
Posts: 510
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:04 pm Post subject: |
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| AllenJB wrote: | | octoploid wrote: | | IMHO Daniel made some very bad decisions in the past (leaving gentoo, working for MS) and there is no way for him to restore his original reputation. His current offer seems like a desperate attempt to make himself relevant again, but it is going to fail, because he has been out of touch for too long. |
I don't believe drobbins reputation was damaged by working for Microsoft at all. Any one who thinks it did needs their head kicked in, IMO. However, his last 2-day stint at Gentoo certainly didn't do him any favours.
|
Well I have my own thoughts about that 2 days, and maybe I am wrong, but I think already then Drobbins came back as he saw things was drifting in a direction wasn't meant to happen... but that time he meant to came in with a "low profile" in mind, which maybe isn't his "true nature" really, and then he ran into ciaranm... which certainly triggered things and the flame was on. I think he left instinctively as he realized his presence at the time only would make things worse and we all remember the "tsunami" that swept over Gentoo the following days and weeks. I think it's ridiculous to "use" this as a weapon against Drobbin, anyone with some common sense would do the same in his position.
It's very true he has a motive to come back that time and as a long time Gentooer I understand him, and he didn't play his cards very well taken by surprise of the fire flaming up, but doesn't those things happen to us all at some time? Does it mean we are not reliable because we realize we got in on the wrong foot, and quickly takes of to somewhere else?
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Living on earth is expensive, but it includes a free trip around the sun
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MoonWalker
Guru
Joined: 04 Jul 2002
Posts: 510
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:12 pm Post subject: |
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| speeddemon wrote: | | The devs don't like drobbins and don't want him back. |
I think the truth is that some, several among the most dominant devs, don't want him back. The others don't speak up in favour, out of various reasons, but I am sure a "closed vote" would turn out in favor. Well that's just my instinct, I could be wrong, but I sense fear hidden behind pride and other things here.
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Living on earth is expensive, but it includes a free trip around the sun
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ferr0084
n00b
Joined: 28 Mar 2004
Posts: 5
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:14 pm Post subject: the point |
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| Insanity5902 wrote: | | NeddySeagoon wrote: | Hmm, theres lots of predudice and very little information.
Its not possible to judge the rights and wrongs of how Gentoo got where it it is today with the information available to everyone, in any case, finger pointing serves no useful purpose.
We are where we are, we need to evaluate that position, determine where we want to be then all work together to get there.
Like I've already said, we need a lot more information than we have now to enable an informed decision to be made.
This information may well already be available to the trustees. |
You are right, we don't have any information but that of what Daniel Robbins has provided. The foundation works without letting the community know, there is no transparency, the users aren't informed. And it is obvious there is no direction.
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The fact that no one knows what's going on is exactly the point.
I've never been a gentoo dev but I've been a user for years and the fact that I've been completely unaware that things have deteriorated to this level is enough for me to believe that the current trustees need to hand over the reigns. Nothing personal, I just like Gentoo too much to see it fall apart. |
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lucre
n00b
Joined: 12 Feb 2007
Posts: 4
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:24 pm Post subject: |
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One thing that I do know is that the status quo of gentoo is currently unacceptable. Instead of moving forward, there is a slow decay. Bad politics is hindering my swiss army knife distro. (Baselayout2 development and retirement as one example of many.)
I'd welcome new/old blood in gentoo. Time for a captain instead of individuals with captain hats (some of whom have already jumped ship)... at least in the interim. |
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BitJam
Advocate
Joined: 12 Aug 2003
Posts: 2508
Location: Silver City, NM
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:35 pm Post subject: |
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My gut feeling is I think the trustees should/will eventually accept drobbins offer. Unfortunately the poll question was poorly worded IMO. I think it should have been: | Quote: | | Should the Gentoo trustees pursue Daniel Robbins offer? |
I think Neddy is right that we need more information before deciding for sure. Having the trustees indicate intent to pursue drobbins offer within the next 6 days is the best way to get that extra information.
The trustees do not need to decide now whether to accept the offer, they just need to decide to pursue it or not. I think they definitely should. |
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Nerdanel
Apprentice
Joined: 27 Apr 2003
Posts: 161
Location: Finland
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:43 pm Post subject: |
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You don't have to be a Gentoo developer to realize that things aren't going in a good direction. For example, take a look at the trustees. According to this page there are five trustees. But the page hasn't been updated since 2006 and now I hear that three of the trustees are gone and the remaining two don't do their legal duties, let alone take care that the Foundation's web page is kept current.
I've been here for some time even if I haven't posted much, and I can see that the new leadership hasn't been able to lead instead of letting things deteriorate gradually. Daniel Robbins's track record heading Gentoo was the very opposite. Results matter. |
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rich0
Developer
Joined: 15 Sep 2002
Posts: 161
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 5:46 pm Post subject: Re: the point |
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| ferr0084 wrote: | | I've never been a gentoo dev but I've been a user for years and the fact that I've been completely unaware that things have deteriorated to this level is enough for me to believe that the current trustees need to hand over the reigns. Nothing personal, I just like Gentoo too much to see it fall apart. |
I agree that communications are an issue.
One thing to keep in mind in this thread is that most devs don't hang out on the forums - most discussion tends to happen on the -dev or -project mailing lists. So, if you tend to mainly just read the forums you'll tend to miss out on the direction things are going.
The whole issue with the foundation was only pointed out to the devs one or two days ago on -core (which isn't really where it belongs - but it was posted there to get attention). There were really only a few trustees, and the biggest problem seems to be that not many are interested in this aspect of gentoo. I think that if drobbins wanted to take over the foundation only most devs would be ok with that - but essentially he also wants to take over some of the role of the council (which isn't asleep at the wheel for the most part - even if there are a few issues that need to be taken care of).
I think a lot of this may just be growing pains - certain things used to be done by certain people who were taken for granted, and a lot of emphasis was made on individuals instead of processes for some things. When you depend on individuals and they go and get married or get a new job, then you have gaps. Also - development is mostly scratch-an-itch - and people who are running gentoo don't have as much need for install media as new users do. Still, these things have to be taken care of. That's why I signed up for the amd64 arch team - keywording packages stable isn't always glamorous, but I think most users appreciate that somebody made sure that things work before deploying them everywhere.
There are lots of ways to get involved with gentoo without committing to a huge amount of work (arch testing comes to mind as one of the easiest, and ANYBODY can feel free to look at a bug and attach a patch file to it that fixes it (just ping the bug owner and I'm sure they'll be happy to do a quick test and resolve the bug)).
While there was a lot of upset a few months ago things have quieted down a little, and behind the scenes there does seem to be sign of some positive trend. I'm sure that if given a little attention that a few devs will sign up to be trustees and get things moving along again.
Oh, since I didn't see any mention of it in this discussion - part of the reason for the lapse in apparent-trustee-activity is that there was a move to put gentoo under the umbrella of a larger open-source foundation (the SFC). Its goal was to take care of legal stuff for lots of open-source projects so that devs wouldn't have to worry about this stuff. Since things seemed to be moving in that direction a lot of the foundation activities were put off. Unfortunately, even the SFC move didn't get quite enough momentum (probably due in part to lack of interest from the rest of the devs) and so it didn't get done quickly enough to prevent the current mess.
mod edit: fixed quote box --bunder |
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speeddemon
Apprentice
Joined: 27 Sep 2003
Posts: 162
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:01 pm Post subject: |
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| MoonWalker wrote: | | speeddemon wrote: | | The devs don't like drobbins and don't want him back. |
I think the truth is that some, several among the most dominant devs, don't want him back. The others don't speak up in favour, out of various reasons, but I am sure a "closed vote" would turn out in favor. Well that's just my instinct, I could be wrong, but I sense fear hidden behind pride and other things here. |
Not surprising.
I definately have gotten the sense over the years that some devs seem to think of gentoo as their distro (they should make all decisions), and that average user's opinions and ideas don't matter at all. Thats what seems to be going on here, they think because they are the devs they should get a much louder voice over the fate of gentoo rather than the user base. The devs aren't the distro, the community is. Devs are a small part of the community. If you would rather do your own will than the communities, go make your own distro. |
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hoschi
Advocate
Joined: 19 Jul 2003
Posts: 2517
Location: Ulm, Germany, Europe
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:17 pm Post subject: |
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- No Universal-CDs, but useless und unloved LiveCD with a buggy Installer and no Stage3 for Networkless-Install
- No roadmap, no project goals or other improvments
- Online Portage not active, currently nearly unusable
- No news since october, no real news about the project or the lose of the foundation-status
- No 2007.1 release, no roadmap to 2008.0 currently
- No leadership through the gentoo board/council viewable for me???!!!
- The website redesign project is...?!
- The gentoo-shop still overs Gentoo-2006.1, this is no joke
- Take any reason you want, the only good one in the last to years is the new baselayout-2.0 (which is still not implement as stable)
- Current foundation structur (board/council/electionperiod) seems not very effecitve
I don't want a "dictator" or "führer", but yes, I want Drobbins back now.
And in long term he is welcome as member of the foundation, with a democratic system.
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AllenJB
Veteran
Joined: 02 Sep 2005
Posts: 1285
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:19 pm Post subject: |
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| speeddemon wrote: | | MoonWalker wrote: | | speeddemon wrote: | | The devs don't like drobbins and don't want him back. |
I think the truth is that some, several among the most dominant devs, don't want him back. The others don't speak up in favour, out of various reasons, but I am sure a "closed vote" would turn out in favor. Well that's just my instinct, I could be wrong, but I sense fear hidden behind pride and other things here. |
Not surprising.
I definately have gotten the sense over the years that some devs seem to think of gentoo as their distro (they should make all decisions), and that average user's opinions and ideas don't matter at all. Thats what seems to be going on here, they think because they are the devs they should get a much louder voice over the fate of gentoo rather than the user base. The devs aren't the distro, the community is. Devs are a small part of the community. |
And why shouldn't they? They're the ones who volunteer their time to work on Gentoo. It's their right to choose what gets done first. I don't think anyone should have any illusions - most open source developers in any project will do what's interesting to them first. Devs are really a rather large part of the community - without them there would be no community.
| Quote: | | If you would rather do your own will than the communities, go make your own distro. |
They did. Then you came along and started demanding they listen to you. |
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bmichaelsen
Veteran
Joined: 17 Nov 2002
Posts: 1277
Location: Hamburg, Germany
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:26 pm Post subject: Drobbins offer, tsunams respone and the structure of gentoo |
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Drobbins offer and tsunams respone
This is a try at an response to tsunams "in response" 
| Quote: |
This is something we like to call the council. There was a reason for the separation of the guidance of the project direction from the legal issues, of which you were at one point agreeable with. ... As well as we got momentum another possibility would come along and we’d start all over as it was a “better options”. That is a failing on our part, one that really has cost us far more then anything else in a real sense then any personal orideological issue that we’ve fought over and had been reported to the media.
I can continue on with reasons if you’d like about why the separation from the direction of the technical aspect from the legal is good. I could always mention any decent sized company has legal departments, the board of directors doesn’t do legal and direction the company takes…just checks with the lawyers typically to make sure its A-OK. |
And the gentoo council is actually one of the week points of gentoo. It is design-by-commitee and every veto stalls the process. The council should be the technical lead of gentoo, but it should not be the management - because devs suck at management. Thus, things that are not technical (PR, devrel, userrel for example) should report to the trustees. The skills trustees need for their work will allow them to judge those issues better than the devs in the council.
Should the council report to the trustees? Yes, in a limited sense. Trustees will be allowed to force the concil to decide on questions. For example:
- Are we holding on to a 2007.1 release or will we skip it?
- Will we accept GLEP XXX or wil we postpone it for X month?
- Will someone step up to take over GWN until XXX or do we need to put a note on the website that it is on hiatus?
Essentially the trustees set timelines (devs are not good at this) and ask the council if they are still realistic.
Equally anything development related is _not_ the realm of the trustees. When they post on development issues or on a development channel (IRC, mailing list or whatever), they should act like guests. If unsure, they should submit their idea/proposal to a friendly dev for forwarding.
| Quote: | | I’m sure a few people would say that I don’t contribute to a positive and pleasant environment…so should I go? Or how about Ciaranm who many people dislike but while he’s disliked you can’t say that he hasn’t as a user contributed to many improvements to gentoo as a basis, and created/leads a very popular alternative to portage/emerge that is feature compatible with emerge, and extends functionality. Should he be banned because of personality differences? |
Not because of personal differences, but certainly when he misbehaves. There is no excuse for this, no technical merit will make up bad communication. Also Ciaranm is not a one man show. PMS and paludis have team members that are better communicators. His technical skills will push his projects, his trolling wont. The same applies as above: He should act like a guest. If unsure, he should submit their idea/proposal to a friendly dev for forwarding.
| Quote: | | I say no to you being the benevolent semi-parttime dictator with minions who will follow your orders as if they are the word of god. |
I guess its not that easy. Daniel made an offer you cannot refuse. Well, actually you can, but not without providing an alternative solution. Even if you write "your proposal is problematic", it is still the best proposal presented so far. Just saying "there has got to be a better way" leads directly to the situation you describe in your post (council and better options).
The Drobbins/Ciaranm collision is not really the thing this should be decided on. The real question is how does one fix the structure of gentoo. I just outlined a few proposals. And I invite the forum to provide more.
Last edited by bmichaelsen on Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:48 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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nixnut
Bodhisattva
Joined: 09 Apr 2004
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Location: the dutch mountains
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:38 pm Post subject: |
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merged above post here
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Kasumi_Ninja
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Joined: 18 Feb 2006
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Location: The Netherlands
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:52 pm Post subject: |
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If you sum up the for and against arguments you'll see that the arguments for DR's return are more emotional and less rational then the arguments against his return:
For
| Quote: | Daniel Robbins should come back.
There are many developers in Gentoo Team, but Gentoo needs real love, and real work of somebody who has wider overview of situation. |
| Quote: | | I think, that for a long time people know that there is a problem with Gentoo. We don't exactly know what kind of problem but we all see it and feel it. |
| Quote: | | Drobbins has my support. All things being equal, I believe he has at heart the best interests of Gentoo. |
| Quote: | | Gentoo needs Robbins! |
| Quote: | | Well, one thing has been proven already: something is seriously wrong. As I'm writing this, 127 votes out of 139 or 91% say 'yes' to Mr Robbins, which strongly suggests that the trustees don't have the trust of the community. |
| Quote: | | Please accept Daniel's offer and allow him to rescue our beloved distribution. |
| Quote: | | Fact is, this started as Mr. Robbin's baby, and whether you like to admit it or not we have not tended to it well at times to include now. |
| Quote: | | Gentoo has lost focus. Strong leadership sounds like a good thing at this point. I hope Robbins offer is accepted |
| Quote: | | Gentoo needs direction and someone who can push for its goals. I haven't seen that since he left. I followed the dev list for a long time and I could see things starting to choke a few years ago. |
| Quote: | | One thing that I do know is that the status quo of gentoo is currently unacceptable. Instead of moving forward, there is a slow decay. Bad politics is hindering my swiss army knife distro. (Baselayout2 development and retirement as one example of many.) |
Against
| Quote: | | Last time Drobbins joined Gentoo he got into many fights in little time with other devs in dev-mailinglist. Why on Earth would we want him as a President? We need someone who gets along with most devs and users. |
| Quote: | | I don't think we should accept the offer. Not with the strings attached. I respect Daniel quite a bit, but we should not be dictated to by someone who came back to Gentoo (in part) because he was looking to pick a fight with a certain developer, and left after just one day. |
| Quote: | | drobbins is offering to fix the perceived problems without saying how, by when, with whose help at what cost and so on. |
| Quote: | He left Gentoo to set up a commercial company based on Gentoo.
His attempt failed.
He then worked at Microsoft and left because of conflicts
He then worked at ABC Coding Solutions in Albuquerque and left after 4 months
His next stint at FSMLabs lasted 11 months
He has been at his current job for around 6 months.
ie: He seems to want Gentoo back since he failed in private enterprise.
My concern is that once he takes over Gentoo, sacks the trustees and appoints a puppet board, he may try to commercialise it Gentoo again. |
| Quote: | | What, there is no 2008 stages and no gwn updates and suddenly gentoo is in crisis? |
| Quote: | | What is new is that this developing situation has been raised as an issue that needs to be fixed quickly. |
| Quote: | drobbins did not provide direction and goals for all of Gentoo when he was Chief Architect.
Like the rest of the volunteers, he did what he was interested in. |
| Quote: | | I agree, but not all benevolent dictators are automatically good. Personally, I've never worked with drobbins, but it seems like quite a few who have done so have issues with him, and that should give people pause. |
| Quote: | | A new release is being worked on, a new newsletter is being worked on, probably on a monthly basis, a news item on our front page is being worked on. |
| Quote: | | The big issue that really needs someone to step up for is to sort out the legal aspect of Gentoo and Robbins's offer goes much much further than that, far too far IMHO. The delay alone is not reasonable. |
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rockhoppa
n00b
Joined: 12 Jan 2008
Posts: 1
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:56 pm Post subject: Should the Gentoo trustees accept Daniel Robbins offer? |
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The trustees have failed to keep the legal status of the Foundation by failing to file paperwork. Those who have resigned seem to have known their limitations. Perhaps those who remain should be thanked for their dedication. I have no idea whether all or only some of the trustees are responsible. But I do know that they need to take Robbins offer. It takes a lot of muddle-headedness to screw up several filing deadlines.
One unmentioned consequence to losing nonprofit Foundation status is that donations are not tax deductable. This can mean fewer donations. Why would a donor give to a Gentoo Foundation that has lost its nonprofit standing rather than to the EFF (and other important free software causes)? Personally, I'd like to see our developers get something at least, if not stipends perhaps equipment?
Robbins has said that he will preserve the "not-for-profit" status of Gentoo. I see absolutely nothing in his track record to prevent our believing him.
I think the poll is correctly worded. Only those who are unhappy to see the overwhelming support for and trust in Robbins are interested in obscuring the results with additional options. We will never know enough since the trustees have been so reclusive. I vote for open discussion and turning the reins over to Robbins. |
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AllenJB
Veteran
Joined: 02 Sep 2005
Posts: 1285
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 6:56 pm Post subject: Re: Drobbins offer, tsunams respone and the structure of gen |
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| bmichaelsen wrote: | | I guess its not that easy. Daniel made an offer you cannot refuse. Well, actually you can, but not without providing an alternative solution. Even if you write "your proposal is problematic", it is still the best proposal presented so far. Just saying "there has got to be a better way" leads directly to the situation you describe in your post (council and better options). |
So you're saying that just because drobbins is the only person to provide a possible solution so far, we should immediately go for it instead of considering other possible solutions? I think that's the dumbest argument I've heard so far!
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| rockhoppa wrote: | | I think the poll is correctly worded. Only those who are unhappy to see the overwhelming support for and trust in Robbins are interested in obscuring the results with additional options. We will never know enough since the trustees have been so reclusive. I vote for open discussion and turning the reins over to Robbins. |
Err, did you maybe stop and think for a moment that I and others don't think the current options cover all possible views? So 90% of those who voted think we should get drobbins. What if there's twice that many who think we're not currently informed enough to make a decision? Oh, I'm sorry, am I obscuring the result your desired with a more truthful view of the community's opinion???
Last edited by AllenJB on Sat Jan 12, 2008 7:05 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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speeddemon
Apprentice
Joined: 27 Sep 2003
Posts: 162
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| Posted: Sat Jan 12, 2008 7:02 pm Post subject: |
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| AllenJB wrote: |
And why shouldn't they? They're the ones who volunteer their time to work on Gentoo. It's their right to choose what gets done first. I don't think anyone should have any illusions - most open source developers in any project will do what's interesting to them first. Devs are really a rather large part of the community - without them there would be no community.
| Quote: | | If you would rather do your own will than the communities, go make your own distro. |
They did. Then you came along and started demanding they listen to you. |
Because there are plenty of people who would listen to reasonable direction and could still do the job. They are expendable, and they like to think they aren't. What should get done first is what needs to be done first, not what they want. We don't all get what we want all the time, its called life. Whining about it and refusing to help is childish. Sure you should get to work in the area that interests you, but that doesn't mean you get to make all decisions just because your a volunteer. How many other volunteer organizations work like that? You come and donate your time, they tell you where your time would be most helpful and you do it.
And I never demanded they listen to me, but they should listen to someone. |
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