Re: debian culture

[Martin Schulze <joey@infodrom.org>]

Pierre HABOUZIT wrote:
> > > When a NM joins i doubt he realises the self-destructive "mindshare"
> > > battle that goes on within debian.
> > 
> > If the mindshare is really self-desctructive, why does Debian still
> > exist?  Or when will Debian have itself finally destructed?
> 
>   well, I think self-destructive is abusive, I'd use the word : ineffciency.
> 
> > That's the wrong way of doing so.  You're trying to tell people what
> > they have to do.  That won't work in this area.  You may want to offer
> > your help and provide helpful input instead.
> 
>   well, here, my _very_ short experience tells me that a lot of DDs
> don't like to be told what they could/should/may do by some strangers,
> or wors, non-DD-strangers ...  whereas they obviously make some things
> wrong.

So argue what they make wrong and how it can be solved.  Also make
sure that wrong is objective and not your single opinion.  Still it
won't work for all cases, though.

>   I repeat in a shorter way what I told in a too long mail before, there
> should be a way to gather some groups having some knowledge and decision
> power on some subjects, and those groups should have some "leader" that
> is the man that make the final choice.  It has not to be very strict,
> but I guess in the X-Strike force for example, there is the people that
> make final choices, and the ones that follows.  for the apache guys too,
> and so on.  Because perfect democracy is not efficient, somewhere a
> group need to have a leader -- not necessarily the same for a long time
> but still a leader.

This will only work if the group agrees to accept said leader.  It
won't work if you try to link five people and a leader together.  It
will, however, work if you have one person feeling responsible for foo
and finding five more people who would like foo to succeed and help.

>   IMHO the inefficiency in debian comes from the fact that there is few
> 'rulers' (except the DPL, ftpmaster, and such quite respected people).

There are a lot of rulers.  Nearly every maintainer is a ruler.

Regards,

	Joey

-- 
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