++ ++ ++
I'm not convinced that the right decision on something like this is going to get made in 1 week. If drobbins had a plan of some sort that would be one thing - but his approach is:
1. Appoint me in charge
2. Know in advance I'll appoint replacements for any positions with legal authority
3. I won't promise anything other than the fact that leadership will be decisive, and that paperwork will get filed on time.
Legally he could just turn gentoo into a commercial outfit, relicense all gentoo-copyrighted materials under any license he wanted, and do whatever with the distro. Sure, that would just lead to a fork, and things would be back in the state they are in now, except that we'd all be on forums.some-other-domain.org. I doubt that this is exactly what would happen, but I'm not keen on just turning over the reigns without a plan because ANYTHING-could-be-better-than-the-status-quo - I'm not convinced that this is entirely true (not that the status quo is ok).
We really do need to elect a full set of trustees, and they need to get the paperwork/etc taken care of expediently. Not necessarily in a week - but they should start the ball rolling ASAP.
About gentoo vascilating between options and picking neither - I agree that this is true in many cases, but I don't think we're entirely doomed here. Keep in mind that just making huge controversial choices isn't without cost as well. I'm guessing that the first thing drobbins would do is completely ban cirianm from just about any involvement - and quickly ban any devs that proxy for him if they don't "shape up quickly." Now, I'm not the world's biggest fan of Cirian's tact (or complete lack thereof), or tendency to tick off just about EVERYBODY who isn't in COMPLETE agreement with him - but at least he is actually writing new code for what should be core components of the distro. There has to be some kind of happy medium - and until somebody with a nicer personality is willing to fork paludis/etc (or otherwise improve portage to a point where nobody feels the need to replace it) we probably just have to deal with him.
Ultimately stuff like install media doesn't get done because nobody is stepping up to do it. If you really are frustrated and don't want the hassle of being a dev, then maybe at least you could bundle up your own. However, if you have the aptitude I'm sure the appropriate team would take you on board (and it isn't like devs HAVE to get involved in political arguments - most just do their thing day-to-day quietly).
Sure, action is needed - but we also need leaders who can work with the people under them. Appointing a dictator that will cause an overnight mass-dev-exodus will just lead to major pain (and probably a fork). Sure, I think that more needs to be done to communicate with end-users and keep them happy - but the fact is that a distro where 90% of the users are happy and 90% of the devs are ready to quit won't be viable for long - you need to have both (and a distro can exist without users far more effectively than without devs - the whole scratch-an-itch thing - not that this is ideal).
In short - I think we need more thinking and less panic. The current mess does need some cleanup, but we're already seeing positive developments. There is interest in reviving the GWN in monthly format and automating the routine parts of it to make it a little less painful to distribute (personally I'd be happy to just drop everything but the articles if that would make it easier on the editors - that is what most users probably care about anyway, and the rest could be slowly added back as it can be automated).
