Re: Proposed GR: Repeal the 2005 vote for declassification of the debian-private mailing list
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
Thanks for the reply.
On Wed, Sep 21, 2016 at 03:07:43PM +0000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> ] This list has hosted a number of significant discussions over the years,
> ] including most of the discussion inspiring the original statement
> ] of Debian's Social Contract and the Debian Free Software Guidelines,
Those seem like they have actual value. But in 11 years nobody cared to do it,
so perhaps it wasn't all that important.
> ] the reinvetion of the new-maintainer process, debate on the qmail to
> ] exim/postfix transition for Debian mail servers and more.
I don't have a problem with such discussions being declassified, but I also
think there is near zero value.
> ] This trend continues today, with the six months just past have averaged
> ] around 190 posts per month.
Nowadays, I don't see any discussions of the type you mention above (which
shouldn't have been on -private, at least not by our current standards).
Counting posts is not a good way to show that they are incorrectly posted
there.
(But again, I do understand that you can't just say "this post here".)
> Since then there have been other important discussions; ones that come to
> mind include the actual and potential expulsion of various developers,
I thought about that, but it is an excellent example for something that should
definitely never be declassified, IMO. Not unless the authors and the subject
all agree, so there it's even harder than for topics that aren't about people.
> how to deal with money in various ways, and relationships with various
> companies including special deals offered to DDs.
Of the posts on such subjects I saw, a good reason was always given that they
were posted to private. Or they were quickly moved to a public place.
> I don't think it's hard to come up with ways in which the above *could*
> involve DDs acting in their own interests rather than the interests of
> Debian's users and the free software community.
>
> Making the discussions public is a way of demonstrating conspiracy theories
> along those lines are unfounded.
Wait, this whole declassification is meant to disprove conspiracy theories?
Not only is that a waste of time (those people don't need facts to believe in
it); it's not working even if they would follow logic! How is "we show you
some of the things that we didn't show you before" in any way proof that we
don't hide evil things? There are still parts of -private that are not
published, and aside from that, what's stopping us from using a secret
list for our evil schemes? Or claiming that we publish all without actually
doing it? Also, don't you think the evil people wouldn't just say "none of my
posts may ever be declassified"?
The only way to actually demonstrate that is by denying every Debian
contributor all privacy. I don't think anybody would advocate for that, so if
that's the whole point, let's forget about it...
Thanks,
Bas
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1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=7n/w
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Reply to: