Quoting info at smallinnovations dot nl (i...@smallinnovations.nl): > <cut> > > This is really too childish to be true.
No, Nick, it's human. Daniel, I completely empathise with everything you just posted, and appreciate your care and thoughtfulness. Having gotten to know you along with Enzo/KatolaZ and Denis/Jaromil, I can say absolutely seriously that you _also_ have my full and unreserved confidence. There's something relevant one eventually learns from decades of involvement in technical projects, especially ones that are geographically dispersed: E-mail and mailing lists are very difficult places to fruitfully discuss anything contentious. The coldness of text, its lack of personal expression, and a certain perceived irrevocability of the written word tends to dramatically worsen interpersonal conflict in a way that would not have happened if telephone or video conferencing or in-person discussion had been used at critical points, instead. I've seen the sort of e-mail mediated conflict and (conseequent) great loss happen, again and again. I was just reading, a few nights ago, about a fateful pre-Internet example (a disaster caused by use of written text rather than interactive discussion) that happened when I was a young lad. Shortly after my family moved to British Hong Kong, the Cultural Revolution happened just across the border in mainland China, a frightening time for everyone. What I didn't know until a few days ago was about a triggering event in that complex story, one that happened seven years earlier at the Party's Lushan Conference in 1959, which convened to try to deal with Mao's faltering and badly planned Great Leap Forward economic scheme. China's blunt and plainspoken Defence Minister, Marshal Peng Dehuai, after getting consensus from many of his peers about the failures of the Great Leap Forward, went to visit Mao's quarters on the night of July 13, 1959, to discuss those problems, but fatefully found Mao asleep and, rather than disturb him, wrote and dropped off a 'letter of opinion' summarising his thoughts. Mao didn't read that letter for four days, but interpreted it as a frontal personal attack, which was not Peng's intention at all. Mao circulated Peng's private written thoughts widely, and drove the conference and Party to a radical doubling-down on Mao's direction of leadership, ending Peng's military career and setting the stage for the further escalation labelled the Cultural Revolution, wrecking the lives of millions, a few years later. And all of that _might_ not have happened if Marshal Peng had waited to have a quiet chat directly with Mao over breakfast -- rather than leaving a letter. I'm willing to host and cook an absolutely delicious breakfast for all parties concerned, here, one that would be highly likely to encourage amity and constructive action, but fear that the airfare required to reach my house near Stanford University would be brutal. Short of that, tantalising but sadly impractical idea, I would point frantically at Devuan Project's Jitsi instance. (Hint, hint.) Now, please excuse me, but I have fresh-baked sourdough bread to remove from the oven and a second cup of really strong Scandinavian coffee to make -- the time-honoured methods for keeping everyone happy (and caffeinated), Chez Moen. -- Cheers, "I am a member of a civilization (IAAMOAC). Step back Rick Moen from anger. Study how awful our ancestors had it, yet r...@linuxmafia.com they struggled to get you here. Repay them by appreciating McQ! (4x80) the civilization you inherited." -- David Brin _______________________________________________ Dng mailing list Dng@lists.dyne.org https://mailinglists.dyne.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/dng