Re: is Debian an anarchist organization/project?
On Wed, 30 Oct 2002 10:06, Glenn McGrath wrote:
> > I've heard some people saying that Debian is a good example of
> > anarchy in action. If it is, how does that fit in with the statement
> > mimeographed below? Maybe we aren't anarchist after all... What should
> > I tell people who ask if Debian is anarchic?
>
> I think the free software community as a whole is a better example of
> anarchy in action.
>
> Debian elects a minority of individuals to have power over other members.
>
> Debian has policy.
I think that Debian is more like the Roman republic. Debian developers have
great independance in setting policy due to a relaxed attitude to
enforcement, and when there are disputes it comes to a vote of developers.
When it comes to a vote only developers can vote just as only patricians voted
in Rome.
NB This is not just a matter of the decisions being made by the people doing
the work. Upstream maintainers do a lot of work, but as they aren't Debian
developers we can choose to ignore their requests. There are many times when
I have disagreed with the upstream developers on how software should be
packaged, I just do it the way I think is best and it's not a problem.
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