also sprach Brian Gupta <brian.gupta@brandorr.com> [2010.09.09.0703 +0200]:
> > Alexander, who still wonders, why everything press related is
> > always a PITA, when debconf is involved
>
> I can't speak for always, but I can say that for almost the year
> leading up to approximately one or two weeks prior to DebConf,
> unbeknownst to most, including myself, there was no active DebConf
> press team lead. While there are certainly lessons to be learned
> here, this situation has, at least for now, been addressed.
I am pretty sure I had communicated my inavailability rather early
in the process. Do I need to look through my mailboxes to produce
proof?
It's quite possible that as a newly joined member I was not on the right distribution lists. If you did communicate, and do to some (in)action on my part wasn't aware and should have been, I apologize.
I think one lesson learned though is that if at all possible, if a leader can't lead they should work to find at least a delegate, if not a replacement, and say something to them directly, "Hi I can't do this right now, can you be responsible for this, or at the very least be responsible for finding someone to do this?"
However at the end of the day, let's try to keep this in perspective. In the grand scheme of things the world kept going, and the conference happened, and we had decent turnout for Debian Day, and some press coverage of the event. The "worst" thing that I am aware happening was that the suddenness of discovering I was the only person left and that I had to run with the ball left me feeling quite a bit overwhelmed.
I want to say that none of this stuff is easy, and it takes a lot of work to do it, and not a lot to criticize those that are. (And sometimes we say things that inadvertently come across as hypercritical.) I have to believe we all want this stuff to work to the best outcome. (Keeping in mind some people may have different perspectives on "best").
I say this because as far as I can tell, considering everything, Martin has done a fairly great job up to the point he couldn't do it anymore. Maybe there were some things that could be improved, but there ALWAYS are. If we can work to improve them without diminishing anything else, I think we will have laid a good path forward.
A final note. I do think there is some focus on what either didn't work or people didn't like, and while we should certain document and review these things, equally as important is an effort to identify what did work, and what people did like. I think it's important, because it will both provide balance to the conversation, and give us some institutional knowledge of what works.
Fact is that there's been an SSH account on one of my machines for
several press people since October 2009, because SQL access to
debconf.org is IP-based, and it was easier to give other people
access that way.
And Alexander: I am sorry that it's been a PITA for you to deal with
me (did you ever?), but consider that I picked up the pieces of
DebConf press at a time, when Debian didn't even have a press team
and dealing with Joey was consistently a massive PITA too.
That said, I am quite aware that I was never a good team lead, never
documented the processes. I also never wanted to do that job[0].
I have never understood why DebConf needed its own press team.
I always considered it synergetically better if the Debian press
team offered their experience, contacts, and resources for the task.
Maybe now is the time that we can finally fuse the two efforts.
Although I cannot reliably allocate time to Debian yet (not quite
yet), due to my real life, I'll do whatever I can or whatever is
required of me to make that happen.
Thanks Martin, any time you can spare would be appreciated. Maybe to save your time, I'll first start by documenting the handover you gave me, adding any thing I discovered in the process, and then maybe you can review that and add anything else you feel is relevant? (I too don't have a lot of spare time to dedicate to this at the moment.)
0. Between the years of 2000 and 2006, I was very active in the
.de/.ch market and had many contacts all over Europe. I offered
multiple times to help out and join the press team, but Joey
never bothered to react. Since 2006, I've lost most of my
contacts and my enthusiasm for doing press work.
--
.''`. martin f. krafft <madduck@d.o> Related projects:
: :' : proud Debian developer http://debiansystem.info
`. `'` http://people.debian.org/~madduck http://vcs-pkg.org
`- Debian - when you have better things to do than fixing systems
in africa some of the native tribes have a custom of beating the
ground with clubs and uttering spine chilling cries. anthropologists
call this a form of primitive self-_expression_. in america they call
it golf.
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