On Friday, October 06, 2000 9:16 AM, Simon Cozens [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 06, 2000 at 08:53:30AM -0500, David Grove wrote:
> > 1. The corporation doesn't exist yet except as a draft, and when it
> > does, there is
> > 2. nothing on that site or the links from it that seems to have
> > anything to do with what you're talking about.
>
> Comment 1 implies comment 2. :) When actual documents get put up there,
> then you'll see that it's to do with what I'm talking about. Besides,
> you know what YAPC is, right?
I know about the conference, but politically (or legally) I haven't followed
along closely with the issues. I don't know it's affiliations, but I _seem_ to
recall (such a "seem" that it's about 10% away from a guess) that it's "owned"
by either the independent perl mongers groups or one particular one. (I haven't
gotten into mongers groups because, of all the times they've tried to make a
local one, I was the only one, in the end, actually willing to attend.)
In theory, if I'm understanding it correctly, this proposes to put ownership of
the language in the hands of the user community (or a committee of citizens).
In a perfect world, that sounds like an optimal solution. FreeBSD et al. do
just fine like this, because its members are devoted to FreeBSD, and that
alone.
However, it's not a perfect world, since prominent members of both the user
community and perl citizens can be "bought" by the corporate interests that
we're, in part, defending against, it might put perl in a more dangerous
position than it currently is in. Legally, Larry would no longer have final
say, and there would be no single power to say "Enough is enough". Larry takes
an eagle's eye view from time to time, but when it comes down to the wire, he
does what's best for perl, after he's given us a chance to royally screw up
(referring to 5.6). I trust Larry in this explicitly, in that, even though he's
employed by a company who has a primary interest in the Perl language, isn't
"owned" by them, and has demonstrated that he will not tolerate being
"controlled" by them where Perl is concerned. O'Reilly, to my understanding,
has accepted that, and doesn't challenge it.
What's to say (I'm building on a guess, here) that, if the Perl language was
put into the hands of a committee, corporate interests wouldn't begin buying
out its members, leaving Larry no control except as a figurehead with no
authority to put a halt on nonsense? We already have that kind of setup in the
P5P, except that currently Larry _does_ have authority, and _has_ called for an
end of the nonsense. Had the P5P demonstrated respect for the language and its
people, rather than selling out left and right, I might feel differently. As it
is, however, when the "official" book (Camel, Third Edition) has, it seems, on
every other page, statements to the effect of "this is what it's supposed to
do, but don't do it, because we have no clue what it's actually going to do, so
it's a good thing, we think, or maybe not". (If it requires direct quotes to
point this out, you [the reader of this posting] have either not read the book,
or haven't paid attention. It amazes me that O'Reilly would even publish it,
because it appears to be about as production ready as 5.6, with every other
feature/page half-implemented.) We currently have a mess, and we need to
correct it by not repeating the mistakes previously made.
I believe that applies whether I'm right or wrong about YAPC's setup.
> > Before I comment, what is "bus-proof"?
>
> If a bus hits Larry, Perl is in deep trouble right now.
You want a "next of Kin" clause? That's a very deep, personal decision to be
made by the current owner. We're not talking about software, but property, the
crowning achievement of Larry's life as I know it. It would require 100% trust
from Larry, and 100% faithfulness to that trust by whoever "inherited" it. Who
that person should be I don't think should even be _suggested_ by us. None of
us are close enough to his heart or soul to see through his eyes, or should
have the "cubes" to tell him what he must do with his property that he's worked
so hard on and very likely has extremely deep feelings for. That would be like
our deciding who should be his childrens' godparents.
In June, I was seeing Larry distancing himself, negligently letting the
language go to pot, ignoring crucial issues, or just plain not caring... though
at that time I'd never have said that. (Larry's the one member of the Perl
community I won't challenge, not just because he owns it, but because he's
always appeared to be the wisest of us.) Since July, however, I know better.
What I saw as negligence I know now was patience; and what I saw as Larry
distancing himself I now know as tolerance with a definite limit. In June I
would have agreed with the action we're discussing. Now, I can't. The decisions
on "final authority" and outright ownership have to stay with Larry, and Larry
alone; and I trust him to make them wisely.
