Re: Timeline for official Debian cloud images for the Stretch release
Hi Richard and Steve,
So according to Richard, the issue is "How can Debian ensure that cloud images
a user might use are proper Debian?" and the solution is that "trademark team
asked the CD team if they would be willing to become a gatekeeper of sorts".
Concretely, the "CD team" is Steve. I still find it disturbing to see Steve
being appointed by the trademark team to oversee some works that he did not
initiate and that have been running well so far.
While standardising Debian cloud images, increasing quality controls and
hardening trust paths is a worthy goal, I think that the current situation with
the images in the Amazon, Google and Microsoft clouds is already good enough
and does not warrant the intervention of the trademarks team to regulate
whether these images can be called "Debian" or not.
At the moment, these cloud images differ only by a minor subset of packages,
each of which is well justified in its context. And they are prepared by
Debian Developers. No serious issues have been raised on this list nor in the
BTS, and I am not aware of complaints of users who felt that these images are
not up to the quality, Freedom and security standards expected from Debian.
Nomination of a manager by the trademarks team is a higly unusual process.
When the Debian Project needs people to be formally recognised as decision
makers for some topics, it is done through DPL delegations. But I do not think
that we even need a DPL delegate at the moment. Also, while Richard's answer
suggested that the DPL is involved in what is happening, there has been no
communication from the DPL on this list since Debconf 2015, which means that
whichever happened to have been disccussed there, it has not been translated
into concrete action by the DPL.
While I acknowledge the importance of the Debconf conferences, I think that it
is important to remember that they are not a place of decision about the works
being coordinated on this list, otherwise it would put a large number of people
out of the loop, for whom it is hard to attend Debconf. I think also that it
is very unfair to expect pepole to watch a video recording of a Debconf
meeting. People who have great ideas at Debconf should really translate them
it a more publically visible momentum on mailing lists. Otherwise, if we have
one community that organises itself by face-to-face and IRC meetings, and
another one that organises itself by the use of mailing lists and the BTS, then
we have a serious problem of communication.
Can we move forward by having excitement, consensus, empowerment and fun
driving our future developments, instead of trademark enforcement and top-down
appointments ? I recommend you to lead by inspiring others to join your
effort, not by giving them the prospect that if they do not follow your
directions, their work will be considered unworthy to be called Debian.
Cheers,
--
Charles Plessy
Tsurumi, Kanagawa, Japan
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