Re: Question about membership.
Le Fri, Mar 26, 2010 at 02:06:44PM +0100, Bernd Zeimetz a écrit :
> Charles Plessy wrote:
>
> > If I am elected DPL, I will re-open the discussion and lead them in a way that
> > maximises everybody's contribution, for instance by making pauses if necessary,
> > and by posting neutral summaries. After the discussion reaches conclusion, I
> > will initiate a GR.
>
> When did you talk with DAM and the NM FrontDesk people about such things? Do you
> think it is the DPL's job to initiate GRs to change such procedures? Is a GR
> necessary at all or how are such things decided in Debian? When would you need a GR?
Hi Bernd,
I think that discussions on membership have to be held in public. If a
pre-packed propsal is perpared behind the scenes and proposed to the DDs as a
fait accompli, I think that it will face a strong opposition.
I do not think that a DPL has the role of defining the content of a GR in such
a debate. However, our constitution gives to the DPL the role of leading
discussions, and to propose draft GRs. In my understanding of the constitution,
the content of the GR matches the result of the discussion, not the personal
opinion of the DPL. This is what I propose and nothing else. Here is the
content of my platform about membership:
‘Becoming a member gives motivation, responsibility and reward. Currently one
has to prove a lot to become become a DD, and I think that the level we require
for new members is nearly to be able to do distribution-wide quality control
and participate release operations. While it is exactly that manpower that we
are critically needing, I do not think that it is in the interest of the
project to be so restrictive on membership. I liked a lot an earlier
proposition that any DD can nominate a new member in the project. This
resembles how the DM status is working, and it is working well. Importantly, to
make it easier to enter the project also makes it easier to leave it for a
while. With a more appealing emeritus system, we can give motivations to DDs
who are lacking time to take a break officially instead of simply becoming
inactive for a long interval. And if lost membership can be recovered more
easily, I think that we can also ease the conditions for cancelling inactive
memberships. I will restart discussions on membership, with a vote as a goal.’
In the question I sent to the other candidates, to fuel the debate I reminded a
proposition that was made and that I find interesting. I tried to make a bit of
prospective, speculating that it would not be very popular, and wondering what
would make it feel more secure. Taking the recent Bits from the NM process as
an inspiration, which specifies that an account must be 6 month old to qualify
for becoming Application Managers, I wondered if that requirement for seniority
should be kept or not in a new system. Obviously, opinions about this differ.
I do not have a premade conclusion about Debian's membership process, and I am
not seeking to be elected for pushing one solution or the other. However, I am
campaining for having the membership issue solved in the next DPL's term, and
will put this priority high in my list if I am elected. Other candidates have
suggested that what Debian needs is a polished version of Joerg's proposal. If
as a result of my election, I lead a debate that results in a GR that does
this, I will consider it as an accomplishment, whatever my personal opinon is.
Have a nice day,
--
Charles Plessy
Tsurumi, Kanagawa, Japan
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