(long reply) Re: NM saga (all of it - Joey, this means you)
(Joey, this is CC'ed to you because of the DAM bit, please take it to
heart).
> As I mentioned before, I have passed all tasks and skills to become a NM, I'm
> just waiting DAM approval.
You too? Whacky. Seems to be the tale of virtually every person in the NM
queue I know. Passed P&P. Passed T&S. Passed ID. Waiting, waiting, waiting
for DAM approval. (OK, I can't speak, still waiting for my AM to approve my
ID stage. But I know about 5 people in a similar stage, who have been for
months).
I think Craig (Sanders) summed it up beautifully in his email where he said
that the DAM was a servant-type job, not a master. How would you like it if
a submarine captain just vanished on holiday without telling anyone because
he couldn't be stuffed going on his next mission? The president? You get the
picture. Joey, you've been given responsibility. You've been trusted. Your
job as DAM is to take NM's, look at the AM's recommendations, and,
eventually, assign accounts.
See those last 2 words? ASSIGN. ACCOUNTS. This isn't happening! And, if you
ARE on holiday, why did you not see fit to tell anyone? (I know I'm not on
-private, but several of those who are have verified he hasn't said a word).
> At the moment, I live 2000 km from home, I don't have a Debian system at hand,
> and at work, I'm only allowed to use Suse, other distribution is prohibited.
Well, I have a sid machine which is generally broken. Pentium. 48 meg of
RAM. 2 gig all up, lucky to have a couple of hundred meg free, and that's
when I'm not maintaining 2 kernel trees to do Netfilter work. But what if my
software I maintain breaks on potato? Woody? Big-endian? PPC? What do I do
then?
You see, Anthony, not everyone has the money to buy computers. There are 4
in this house (3 of which work), the rest are NT and 98, because they're my
family's work machines, and they're rabid about me touching them. At 15, I
don't have much of an income to speak of, and that which I do have goes
towards trying to scrape together some semblance of a life and do stuff. No
way in hell can I afford a new PC. Hell, at the moment, I have NEGATIVE
$158.83. Negative. Not nearly enough to get a new PC.
Enter the Debian machines.
Oh, wait. I'm an NM. I'm some evil h4x0r bastard who just wants a l33t
@debian.org email address. Oops. I'd better hope one of the l^Husers fixes
it. See what's wrong with this picture?
(Russell, thanks very much for your generous offer. Might have to take you
up on it one day).
> I'm /home-less and I'm not rich enough to buy a computer now. If DAM would
> accept me as NM I could work remotely on Debian machines and improve the
> packages I have already build.
Hip-hip-horray!
> I also think that when someone actively participate in a volunteer project, he
> (she) has the right to take part in the decisions made (votes, ie) and guide
> the future of this project.
Well said! You see, if countries worked like this, we'd be electing
fifty-something year old pres ... oh, wait. Anyway, my basic point is that
at 18, I become eligible to vote. I have the same rights as every other
voting Australian citizen. My vote is one vote. I can speak freely. I can
criticize who I want. I am free to do whatever.
That, my friends, is democracy.
Enter Debian, 2001. Democracy. (Yeah, my arse). NMs aren't allowed to speak
a non-positive word against so-called "senior developers" because they're
just little, unimportant NMs. Nor are they allowed emails. Or machine
access. Even if they need machine access to do a wider range of packages on
a wider range of machines, so they can one day become a fabled "senior
developer". Whoops. Then, we're left with the Ben Collinses and the Joseph
Carters, and the ... you get the point. Every member of Debian has equal
rights. Access. Email. Votes. A SAY.
A say. This, my friends, is free speech (no, not as in GPL, as in true free
speech). What's this about NMs not being allowed to speak out against these
"senior developers"? That is bullshit, to be honest, complete and utter
bullshit. (Hey, Ben, want a trip to China? I think you'd get along well with
the Communist Party there, especially wrt free speech - i.e. don't criticize
the established ones/those in power).
Some have been established special tasks - DAM (and, oddly enough, Joey, the
DAM actually has to DO his job), FTP-type guy, Web maintainer, you name it.
Those are responsibilities, and you do what you have been trusted to (Joey),
and you don't abuse your position of power (again, Joey). If you have,
congratulations. Try not to fuck up. Most of all, don't do it deliberately.
Because what you're doing, is not only annoying the shit out of the other
people, but abusing the trust that has been placed in you; please don't.
This is not good, not good at all.
Debian's a free, open organisation (within reason, of course - hence, the NM
checks, bloody strenuous as they are). Let's keep it that way.
That's my $au0.02. And the other 2c. And the other, and the ...
Daniel.
On Sat, Jan 13, 2001 at 11:10:32AM +0100, Martin Schulze wrote:
> People, stay calm! For a lot of work, no "official Debian
> Maintainership" is required:
>
> . Fixing bugs
> . Working on boot floppies
> . Revising bug reports
> . Quality assurance
> . Testing
> . Helpping the web team
> . uploading packages (through a sponsor)
>
> Only for very few tasks you will require to be an official Debian
> maintainer.
>
> If you were really interested in helping the project, you would
> perform some of the tasks listed above instead of whining and
> complaining and eating up the time that senior developers need to read
> all of this flame shit which keep them from their regular Debian work
> (like development, key tasks, bugfixing etc. pp.)
>
> No, I don't read these threads, I'm sick of it. If you are not
> patient and only want to gain that uberkewl @debian.org address, go
> away and get al life!
>
> Once important tasks are done and no other problems with new
> applicants occur they will be accepted and receive their account.
> Please be advised that there are only very few people performing key
> tasks (most maintainers only want to maintain their single
> package(s)), which takes time.
>
> This Mail does not require any replies, so don't send me some.
>
> Regards,
>
> Joey
>
> --
> GNU GPL: "The source will be with you... always."
>
>
> --
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