Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Hans-Georg Bork]

All,

I'd like to sign the statement as well.

Hans-Georg Bork
- debian user since the early days of hamm -


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Re: misleading use of d-d-a (was Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment")

[Florian Hinzmann]

Good evening!


Sorry for contributing to a side thread this late. This mail slept in my 
drafts folder for several day. Only today I find the time to finish and send it.


On Thu, 26 Oct 2006 21:36:31 +0100
MJ Ray <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> > I think it's uncool to be sending emails to d-d-a with "position statement"
> > in the subject that aren't indicative of a position statement of the
> > project.
> 
> The signatories are clearly named.  It is their position and whatever 
> the position of the project is has little to do with it.

Yes, the signatories were named. But I think the mail made it easy to
misinterpret it while reading it. The first paragraphs started with:

> After a long and ambivalent discussion during the last weeks the project
> "Dunc Tank" (short DT from now on) has recently started.  We consider
> [...]

> While we disagree with DT for the reasons outlined below, we want to
> [...]

> With this mail we would like to summarize our thoughts about the DT

The mail started stating some opinions referring to the
group having this opinions with "we". While I would consider this
ambiguous anyway I think it es particular unfortunate on
debian-devel-announce.

I did wonder who that "we" might be and scrolled to the bottom after
the second or third "we", then continued reading. Some others might
have stopped reading after some percentage of the mail and might still
have a wrong impression.


Trying to sum this up: This was far from being an abuse of d-d-a. But
the mail could have been much clearer with little effort. I would 
beg anyone to consider this when writing position statements which might
be controversial.


  Regards
  Florian


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Russ Allbery]

Blu <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Actually, I followed the thread(s) while the proposal(s) were being
> discussed. I whish I could convince myself of the contrary, but my
> opinion stands.

Okay.  Just so long as you're aware that a lot of those voters, myself
included, were not using the GR to say "Dunc-Tank is great, please
continue!" but instead saying something more nuanced.

I have a lot of positive experience with commercial entities providing
sponsorship and contributions to free software projects without
controlling them.  My experience is that this often results in a
substantial increase in quality with no compromise in principles (and
that's despite my personal antipathy towards commercial entities and my
personal desire to ideally never work for one).  However, I know this
doesn't always happen, and other people have had much more negative
experiences than I have, which is (at least one reason) why there's a
range of beliefs and a range of reactions.

I do think that Dunc-Tank can fail despite accomplishing its nominal goals
if enough people are upset, regardless of whether I agree with why they're
upset.  Communities require compromise and occasionally require doing
something possibly helpful that one is happy with because other people
aren't.  However, I don't think that people expressing upsetness (even
significant upsetness) is in and of itself a reason to call something a
failure.  There's a path in-between that and ignoring any opinions one
doesn't agree with, and I don't think there's an all-fired hurry to come
to a final conclusion.

-- 
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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Blu]

On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 05:28:04PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote:
> Blu <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> > Well, in http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_006 the winner is option 1
> > "Re-affirm DPL, wish success to unofficial Dunc Tank".
> 
> > That doesn't look very neutral to me considering that there was an option
> > 2 "Re-affirm DPL, do not endorse nor support his other projects".
> 
> Please do read the entirety of each proposal.  The summary of the one that
> passed (which I also voted for) sounds less neutral than the proposal
> actually was.
[...]

Actually, I followed the thread(s) while the proposal(s) were being
discussed. I whish I could convince myself of the contrary, but my opinion
stands.

-- 
Blu.


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Russ Allbery]

Blu <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Well, in http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_006 the winner is option 1
> "Re-affirm DPL, wish success to unofficial Dunc Tank".

> That doesn't look very neutral to me considering that there was an option
> 2 "Re-affirm DPL, do not endorse nor support his other projects".

Please do read the entirety of each proposal.  The summary of the one that
passed (which I also voted for) sounds less neutral than the proposal
actually was.

I wish success to *all* efforts to help improve Debian, including Debian's
release cycle.  Part of wishing success is wishing them success in not
alienating Debian Developers or making the overall situation worse.  That
I wish Dunc-Tank, and any similar project, success is *not* the same as
saying that I think it's succeeding.  I think that's still very much
undecided.

-- 
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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Don Armstrong]

On Fri, 03 Nov 2006, Blu wrote:
> Well, in http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_006 the winner is
> option 1 "Re-affirm DPL, wish success to unofficial Dunc Tank".
> 
> That doesn't look very neutral to me considering that there was an option
> 2 "Re-affirm DPL, do not endorse nor support his other projects".

These options are slightly more nuanced than that; using the one line
ballot lines to describe them is like describing politicians using
only their name:

 The Debian Project does not object to the experiment named
"Dunc-Tank", lead by Anthony Towns, the current DPL, and Steve
McIntyre, the Second in Charge. However, this particular
experiment is not the result of a decision of the Debian Project.

The Debian Project wishes success to projects funding Debian or
helping towards the release of Etch.

Please, lets not descend into the great American pastime of setting up
strawmen and shooting them with large caliber weapons.


Don Armstrong

-- 
My spelling ability, or rather the lack thereof, is one of the wonders
of the modern world.

http://www.donarmstrong.com  http://rzlab.ucr.edu


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Sven Luther]

On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 03:59:48PM -0300, Blu wrote:
> On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 07:15:16PM +0100, Sven Luther wrote:
> > On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 01:44:40PM -0300, Blu wrote:
> > > On Thu, Nov 02, 2006 at 09:35:31PM -0300, calvesmit wrote:
> > > > My name is Carlos Alberto, I come from Brazil, I'm just a Debian 
> > > > user, not developer. I had used other linux distributions before until 
> > > > found 
> > > > Debian. When other distribuition companies begins to 
> > > > put money in first place, I choosen Debian because its beautiful 
> > > > volunteer 
> > > > development model. It's seems to me the same it's happening in 
> > > > Debian,or at 
> > > > least, seeds are launched. 
> > > > 
> > > > Sorry for those who are being payd, but to me here outside Debian, 
> > > > I see peaple over there trying to find a way to make money with 
> > > > Debian; just doing it, nothing more! Debian always had a long release 
> > > > cycle 
> > > > and this never had being a problem for its community. 
> > > > What's happing today is completly against ideas lanched by Ian Murdock 
> > > > in 
> > > > early days of Debian. So, sounds very strange someone to argue start 
> > > > such 
> > > > project Dunk Tank in favor (supposed) to acelerate release cycle. 
> > > [...]
> > > 
> > > Exactly my feelings. Another simple user.
> > > 
> > > > Debian is more important than individuals interest and money! All you 
> > > > have 
> > > > to do is a new DPL election and let Debian shine. 
> > > 
> > > Maybe you don't know, but there are a few GR which seems to indicate that
> > > the majority of DDs supports the current trend of things and the actions
> > > of the current DPL.
> > 
> > Now, there is a majority of people who think we didn't want to recall the 
> > DPL,
> > for a variety of reasons.
> > 
> > This has nothing whatsoever to do with aproving of dunk-tank, or a blind
> > promise to re-elect Anthony as DPL next year.
> 
> Well, in http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_006 the winner is option 1
> "Re-affirm DPL, wish success to unofficial Dunc Tank".

Well, it has often be claimed that a more nuanced choice would have been
better.

> That doesn't look very neutral to me considering that there was an option
> 2 "Re-affirm DPL, do not endorse nor support his other projects".

Yeah, but then there are all those who didn't vote too.

And then there are those who wish to see how the experiment went.

Friendly,

Sven Luther


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Blu]

On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 07:15:16PM +0100, Sven Luther wrote:
> On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 01:44:40PM -0300, Blu wrote:
> > On Thu, Nov 02, 2006 at 09:35:31PM -0300, calvesmit wrote:
> > > My name is Carlos Alberto, I come from Brazil, I'm just a Debian 
> > > user, not developer. I had used other linux distributions before until 
> > > found 
> > > Debian. When other distribuition companies begins to 
> > > put money in first place, I choosen Debian because its beautiful 
> > > volunteer 
> > > development model. It's seems to me the same it's happening in Debian,or 
> > > at 
> > > least, seeds are launched. 
> > > 
> > > Sorry for those who are being payd, but to me here outside Debian, 
> > > I see peaple over there trying to find a way to make money with 
> > > Debian; just doing it, nothing more! Debian always had a long release 
> > > cycle 
> > > and this never had being a problem for its community. 
> > > What's happing today is completly against ideas lanched by Ian Murdock in 
> > > early days of Debian. So, sounds very strange someone to argue start such 
> > > project Dunk Tank in favor (supposed) to acelerate release cycle. 
> > [...]
> > 
> > Exactly my feelings. Another simple user.
> > 
> > > Debian is more important than individuals interest and money! All you 
> > > have 
> > > to do is a new DPL election and let Debian shine. 
> > 
> > Maybe you don't know, but there are a few GR which seems to indicate that
> > the majority of DDs supports the current trend of things and the actions
> > of the current DPL.
> 
> Now, there is a majority of people who think we didn't want to recall the DPL,
> for a variety of reasons.
> 
> This has nothing whatsoever to do with aproving of dunk-tank, or a blind
> promise to re-elect Anthony as DPL next year.

Well, in http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_006 the winner is option 1
"Re-affirm DPL, wish success to unofficial Dunc Tank".

That doesn't look very neutral to me considering that there was an option
2 "Re-affirm DPL, do not endorse nor support his other projects".

-- 
Blu.


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Sven Luther]

On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 01:44:40PM -0300, Blu wrote:
> On Thu, Nov 02, 2006 at 09:35:31PM -0300, calvesmit wrote:
> > My name is Carlos Alberto, I come from Brazil, I'm just a Debian 
> > user, not developer. I had used other linux distributions before until 
> > found 
> > Debian. When other distribuition companies begins to 
> > put money in first place, I choosen Debian because its beautiful volunteer 
> > development model. It's seems to me the same it's happening in Debian,or at 
> > least, seeds are launched. 
> > 
> > Sorry for those who are being payd, but to me here outside Debian, 
> > I see peaple over there trying to find a way to make money with 
> > Debian; just doing it, nothing more! Debian always had a long release cycle 
> > and this never had being a problem for its community. 
> > What's happing today is completly against ideas lanched by Ian Murdock in 
> > early days of Debian. So, sounds very strange someone to argue start such 
> > project Dunk Tank in favor (supposed) to acelerate release cycle. 
> [...]
> 
> Exactly my feelings. Another simple user.
> 
> > Debian is more important than individuals interest and money! All you have 
> > to do is a new DPL election and let Debian shine. 
> 
> Maybe you don't know, but there are a few GR which seems to indicate that
> the majority of DDs supports the current trend of things and the actions
> of the current DPL.

Now, there is a majority of people who think we didn't want to recall the DPL,
for a variety of reasons.

This has nothing whatsoever to do with aproving of dunk-tank, or a blind
promise to re-elect Anthony as DPL next year.

Something similar goes for the other votes.

Friendly,

Sven Luther


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Blu]

On Thu, Nov 02, 2006 at 09:35:31PM -0300, calvesmit wrote:
> My name is Carlos Alberto, I come from Brazil, I'm just a Debian 
> user, not developer. I had used other linux distributions before until found 
> Debian. When other distribuition companies begins to 
> put money in first place, I choosen Debian because its beautiful volunteer 
> development model. It's seems to me the same it's happening in Debian,or at 
> least, seeds are launched. 
> 
> Sorry for those who are being payd, but to me here outside Debian, 
> I see peaple over there trying to find a way to make money with 
> Debian; just doing it, nothing more! Debian always had a long release cycle 
> and this never had being a problem for its community. 
> What's happing today is completly against ideas lanched by Ian Murdock in 
> early days of Debian. So, sounds very strange someone to argue start such 
> project Dunk Tank in favor (supposed) to acelerate release cycle. 
[...]

Exactly my feelings. Another simple user.

> Debian is more important than individuals interest and money! All you have 
> to do is a new DPL election and let Debian shine. 

Maybe you don't know, but there are a few GR which seems to indicate that
the majority of DDs supports the current trend of things and the actions
of the current DPL.

I'm already looking for somewhere to migrate.

-- 
Blu.


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Sven Luther]

On Fri, Nov 03, 2006 at 09:40:04AM +0100, Marc Haber wrote:
> On Thu, Nov 02, 2006 at 09:35:31PM -0300, calvesmit wrote:
> > Marc Haber, there's no need for special privileges in Debian. Nobody 
> > is or does jobs better than others. 
> 
> I was talking about technical privileges, which are of course needed.

BTW, the long standing half-jokes about the cabal, as well as positions of
various folks with important positions in debian right now, clearly demostrate
that your assertions about "nobody doing a better job than others" and the
idea of all developpers being equal, is clearly not shared by a part of DDs,
and maybe this is the cause of all problems debian is passing through.

There are no some sort of self-selected hierarchy, and some of those who
managed to draw themselves up on the top rows of it, clearly let it go to
their heads, and look down on others, who have less time to give to debian, or
are less power-hungry, or whatever.

Friendly,

Sven Luther


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Marc Haber]

On Thu, Nov 02, 2006 at 09:35:31PM -0300, calvesmit wrote:
> Marc Haber, there's no need for special privileges in Debian. Nobody 
> is or does jobs better than others. 

I was talking about technical privileges, which are of course needed.

Greetings
Marc

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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Russ Allbery]

Marc Haber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> I, personally, do not, however, find that amount unreasonable for a
> one-month engagement as a contractor.

If anything, it's unreasonably *low*.  That's a fourth of the fair market
wage for a contractor with those qualifications in the United States (and
before someone points out that one could hire someone for a lower wage in
a different market, please look at what country dunc-tank has funds in and
look at what the feasibility would be of moving them between national
jurisdictions; that sort of thing is frequently extremely complex).

To compare to other free software projects, the value cited is comparable
to what the FSF was offering for *salary* (which is generally lower than
contractor pay due to benefit issues and social security taxes) for a
sysadmin, which is a less skilled position.

In other words, just as originally said, it's a wage that some people will
think is way too low and some people will think is way too high.

-- 
Russ Allbery ([EMAIL PROTECTED])   


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[പ്രവീണ്‍‌|Praveen]

2006/10/27, Marc Haber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:48:16PM +0200, Tshepang Lekhonkhobe wrote:
Maybe not pay a DD to do Debian work, but pay a DD to work on the
competing product.  If that DD holds a job in Debian that requires
special privileges, and that job is neglected without the DD in
question resigning or allowing other people to do the work that he is
neglecting, a loyality issue arises.

> Is this by any chance related to Ubuntu?

Probably.


I thought all Free Software projects are partners of Debian and only
Proprietary software is a competitor.

Regards
Praveen
--
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`Don't bother us with politics', respond those who don't want to learn."
-- Richard Stallman
Me scribbles at http://www.pravi.co.nr


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Marco d'Itri]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

>night.  Did I get demotivated because certain lucky folks earned
>bazillions and were able to buy mansions in Lake Tahoe and Chicago?
>No, because I know that life isn't fair, and that money wasn't why I
>got involved in Linux and Debian in the first place.
>
>Folks who are claiming that they are demotivated because two people
>have volunteered to give up a full month of their time to take on a
>job where they giving up something like 75% of their normal income ---
>and the problem is that they gave up only 75% instead of 100% ---
>those people who are kvetching should take a very deep look into their
>hearts and motivations.
>
>If that's what it's all about for those folks, maybe those people who
>have left Debian are really doing themselves (and the project) a
>favor...
Thank you for expressing this so clearly, I fully agree.

-- 
ciao,
Marco


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Martin Schulze]

Theodore Tso wrote:
> Folks who are claiming that they are demotivated because two people
> have volunteered to give up a full month of their time to take on a
> job where they giving up something like 75% of their normal income ---
> and the problem is that they gave up only 75% instead of 100% ---
> those people who are kvetching should take a very deep look into their
> hearts and motivations.
> 
> If that's what it's all about for those folks, maybe those people who
> have left Debian are really doing themselves (and the project) a
> favor...

Thank you Ted.  More slaps into the face really help.

-- 
No question is too silly to ask, but, of course, some are too silly
to answer.   -- Perl book


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Mike Hommey]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 07:46:00PM +0200, Joerg Jaspert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
wrote:
> Signed by:
> Jörg Jaspert, ftp-master assistant, DAM, DebConf Organizer
> Alexander Schmehl, Debian Developer, press, event manager, DebConf Organizer
> Alexander Wirt, Debian Developer
> Daniel Priem, New Maintainer
> Martin Würtele, Debian Developer
> Gerfried Fuchs, Debian Developer
> Patrick Jäger, User
> Otavio Salvador, Debian Developer
> Joey Schulze, Debian Developer, Security, DWN, DSA, press, promoter
> Felipe Augusto van de Wiel, New Maintainer
> Sam Hocevar, Debian Developer
> Pierre Habouzit, Debian Developer
> Julien Danjou, Debian Developer, Stable Release Manager
> Peter Palfrader, Debian Developer
> Julien Blache, Debian Developer, promoter
> Christoph Berg, Debian Developer, QA, NM front-desk
> Holger Levsen, New Maintainer, DebConf Organizer

If I'd have been aware of this letter before, I'd have asked to be in
that list. I fully agree with what Jörg wrote.

Mike Hommey, Debian Developer, Mozilla® hater.


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Sven Luther]

On Fri, Oct 27, 2006 at 09:40:24AM +0200, Thomas Viehmann wrote:
> Anthony Towns wrote:
> > For the record, I haven't seen any such offers, and I've been looking
> > for them since May or so. (Proviso: offers should be accompanied by
> > some direct evidence that whoever's offering has the time and ability
> > to actually do stuff)
> 
> If at least any NEW queue package information was accessible, people
> could take an interest. If there's a problem with allowing access to the
> new packages themselves, cool, but there used to be at least some
> information on merkel.d.o's mirror of ftp.d.o (disabled for load
> problems for over a year[1]) and more, e.g. the .katie files if not also
> the whole .diff.gz and .changes - leave the orig.tar.gz and the .debs if
> these are problematic, could likely be made available for inspection at
> least for DDs.
> Letting people make suggestions for rejecting packages that they've
> found mistakes should be not very dangerous to the archive.

BTW, maybe one cool solution would be to make all NEW packages available, not
to the outside world, but behind some DD-access only area of some kind.

Friendly,

Sven Luther


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Sam Hocevar]

On Sat, Oct 28, 2006, Drew Parsons wrote:

> I appreciate that I have simplified the grey nuances for the sake of
> establishing my point about the results of the experiment, but please be
> advised it is in no way a straw-man characterisation [1].
> 
> [1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/10/msg00084.html

   Please be advised that it is irrefutably a straw-man characterisation
of my opinions as an individual who is part of the minority of Dunc-Tank
opponents you mention. Please don't put words in my mouth.

-- 
Sam.


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Drew Parsons]

Ian wrote:
> Drew Parsons writes ("Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment""):
> > The first group, the minority, believes that any use of money to
> > increase the time developers spend on Debian is always intrinsically a
> > bad idea.
> 
> This an oft-repeated straw-man characterisation of dunc-tank's
> opponents.

I appreciate that I have simplified the grey nuances for the sake of
establishing my point about the results of the experiment, but please be
advised it is in no way a straw-man characterisation [1].

Drew

[1] http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/10/msg00084.html


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Theodore Tso]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 01:42:46PM -0700, Chris Waters wrote:
> This is completely and blatantly false!  The only thing that's
> different this time is the prominence of the developers involved
> relative to the prominence of the institution, and the amount of
> publicity that has ensued.  (And, unlike _some_, but not all, previous
> cases, the initial goal of the institution is to improve Debian rather
> than to fork it.  And in at least one earlier case, the goal changed
> from forking to improving after the initial fork proved unsuccessful.)

And I don't think it's even been true that the difference is the
prominence of the developers that were involved.

For example, when Bdale was DPL, he was also the CTO of Linux at
Hewlett Packard, and in such a role he certainly had a lot of
influence over what HP would fund its employees to do --- and HP, to
its credit, has hired/supported quite a few DD's.  So while this isn't
exactly the same as AJ and Dunc-Tank, it's pretty close.  

As another example, some of the other commercial Debian efforts where
headed by Debian developers which were "high profile" (such as the the
original founder of our project!) and they hired/funded DD's --- and
the world didn't end.

I think the biggest difference is that there are a few (and thanks to
the GR we know they are definitely in the minority) very vocal people
whining very loudly that this is somehow unprecedented and that the
Death of the Project has been predicted.  (News at 11 :-)

On Fri, Oct 27, 2006 at 09:08:31AM +0200, Michael Meskes wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 10:16:19PM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> > I, personally, do not, however, find that amount unreasonable for a
> > one-month engagement as a contractor.
> 
> But then it should be described that way too.

It always was described that way; go back and check some of the
original e-mails.

In fact, when discussions of how much the RM's would be paid, it was
Bdale who argued that while it shouldn't be a princely salary, that we
shouldn't take advantage of someone just because of their dedication
to Debian.  And as some people have already pointed out, once you
include taxes, business expenses, medical care (which as an employee
your company is footting the bill, but as a contractor, you have to
pay for it), time between engagements, retirement (another thing which
your employer pays but as a contractor you are responsible for
paying), the amount under discussion is not at all unreasonable.

One of ther reasons why the exact amount wasn't disclosed originally
was because it would lead to these kinds of ratholes.  In Bangalore,
the average salary of an I/T profession is one sixth what it is in the
US --- and even with that proportionally much smaller salary, an I/T
profession in Bangalore is earning so much money compared to everyone
else that they can afford private chaffeurs and maids/butlers (and
given how bad the roads are in Bangalore, many of them will hire
drivers so can get something useful done during the two-hour drive to
their apartment).

And really, why *should* it matter how much people are getting paid.
You do the work that you do because you love it, right?  What other
people are getting paid should be irrelevant to whether or not *you*
are happy doing something as a volunteer.  I may have been the first
North American kernel developer, but the amount of money I got from
the IPO's was negligible --- especially compared to one of the Red Hat
founder who did relatively little development work at all, but
happened to have a right-sized check book at the right time.  He's now
comfortably retired with millions and millions, and I'm still a
working stiff.  But hey, I consider myself incredibly blessed, and I
do a lot of work that is completely uncompensated, very late into the
night.  Did I get demotivated because certain lucky folks earned
bazillions and were able to buy mansions in Lake Tahoe and Chicago?
No, because I know that life isn't fair, and that money wasn't why I
got involved in Linux and Debian in the first place.

Folks who are claiming that they are demotivated because two people
have volunteered to give up a full month of their time to take on a
job where they giving up something like 75% of their normal income ---
and the problem is that they gave up only 75% instead of 100% ---
those people who are kvetching should take a very deep look into their
hearts and motivations.

If that's what it's all about for those folks, maybe those people who
have left Debian are really doing themselves (and the project) a
favor...

- Ted


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Anthony Towns]

On Fri, Oct 27, 2006 at 10:26:43AM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> > For the record, I haven't seen any such offers, and I've been looking
> > for them since May or so.
> For the record, I haven't seen a request for help issued by ftpmaster,

http://lists.debian.org/debian-project/2006/06/msg00019.html

I'm pretty sure I wrote something that went into a bit more detail about
how Jeroen and Joerg demonstrated their competence prior to joining too,
but I can't recall where.

> and ftpmaster didn't even say that the amount of time spent would be
> reduced by dunc tank until the position statement yesterday.

That position statement is Joerg's personal opinion. Jeroen has been
spending more time doing NEW processing over the past few months, eg.

Cheers,
aj



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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Ian Jackson]

Drew Parsons writes ("Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment""):
> The first group, the minority, believes that any use of money to
> increase the time developers spend on Debian is always intrinsically a
> bad idea.

This an oft-repeated straw-man characterisation of dunc-tank's
opponents.  It's completely unsupportable; if you read Joerg's
statement, it explains what the signatories feel is different about
dunc-tank.  Would everybody please stop repeating the straw man.

(My name isn't at the bottom of the position statement, even though I
agree with it, because I was too slow to respond and also because I
wasn't convinced that prolonging the discussion was the right thing to
do given that the nay-sayers seem to have been comprehensively
outvoted.  However, I cannot let this persistent mischaracterisation
of our views go unchallenged.)

Ian.


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Thibaut VARENE]

Hi,

I'd like to thank you for putting up this email which summarize
extremely well my feelings about what's happening, feelings I haven't
been able to elaborate on in an email, out of disgust, despair and
outrage.

I'd add that the harm done by this "experiment" is already so huge
that there's unfortunately no turning back, and it seems quite obvious
that Debian will never be again what it was before, and that is very
sad.

I'm not very keen on "plot" theories, but I'd say that "had somebody
wanted to kill (or inflict maximum damage) to the project, he couldn't
have done any better than the current DPL". This being blattant
unconsciousness and irresponsability or the result of a deliberate
conscious will to harm is almost the same: it is totally unacceptable.

Note: this is not a personal attack. I don't know Anthony and bear no
particular opinion about the guy. But I do bear special and strong
opinions about what he /did/, hence the comment.

On 10/26/06, Joerg Jaspert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
[...]

So, to summarize DTs effects on Debian: It has demotivated a lot of
people who now either resigned, simply stopped doing (parts of their)
Debian work or are doing a lot less than they did before DT was
started.


I'm part of those.


The freeze got delayed and getting the release out on schedule
has become nearly impossible. We are unable to see any good virtue in
this "experiment".


Neither do I.


Having said all this and also risking yet another flamewar, let us make
a last request for now: Please have a healthy discussion, let the DT
people answer these questions, tell them (or us) if they (or we) made wrong
assumptions or something, but please do not flame.


Agreed. The above comments I made in this email are not intended to
start a flame. They are mere expressions of my current thoughts, and
such strong thoughts can only be expressed with strong words.


Signed by:
Jörg Jaspert, ftp-master assistant, DAM, DebConf Organizer
Alexander Schmehl, Debian Developer, press, event manager, DebConf Organizer
Alexander Wirt, Debian Developer
Daniel Priem, New Maintainer
Martin Würtele, Debian Developer
Gerfried Fuchs, Debian Developer
Patrick Jäger, User
Otavio Salvador, Debian Developer
Joey Schulze, Debian Developer, Security, DWN, DSA, press, promoter
Felipe Augusto van de Wiel, New Maintainer
Sam Hocevar, Debian Developer
Pierre Habouzit, Debian Developer
Julien Danjou, Debian Developer, Stable Release Manager
Peter Palfrader, Debian Developer
Julien Blache, Debian Developer, promoter
Christoph Berg, Debian Developer, QA, NM front-desk
Holger Levsen, New Maintainer, DebConf Organizer


I would totally have signed this letter too had I known about it
earlier. I endorse everything it says.

T-Bone

PS: people willing to constructively interract with me can CC me on
replies, as I'm not subscribed to the d-project m-l.

--
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http://www.parisc-linux.org/~varenet/

Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Anthony Towns]

On Fri, Oct 27, 2006 at 09:40:24AM +0200, Thomas Viehmann wrote:
> If at least any NEW queue package information was accessible, people
> could take an interest. If there's a problem with allowing access to the
> new packages themselves, cool, but there used to be at least some
> information on merkel.d.o's mirror of ftp.d.o 

The packages themselves can't be made available until they've left the
NEW queue. Whether on spohr or merkel, doesn't make a difference. What
seems like it should be possible would be automatically running the "dak
examine-package" tool and providing that output on a public webpage for
other people to review. That currently uses neat markup that colourises
things for less, so presumably isn't tremendously compatible with the
web though. Presumably someone could change that if they were so enthused.

(Personally, I'd consider a patch that gives examine-package a
--html-output option pretty good evidence that someone's got enough m4d
skillz to be made an ftpassistant, others mileage may vary)

Cheers,
aj



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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Marc Haber]

On Fri, Oct 27, 2006 at 02:44:20PM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:37:43PM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> > Just let me pick the NEW queue: Has it been stated publicly that
> > ftpmaster is going to reduce work spent on NEW due to dunc tank? Have
> > ftpmaster considered to accept offers to take over some of the work
> > load they are not motivated to do any more because they're not being
> > paid?
> 
> For the record, I haven't seen any such offers, and I've been looking
> for them since May or so.

For the record, I haven't seen a request for help issued by ftpmaster,
and ftpmaster didn't even say that the amount of time spent would be
reduced by dunc tank until the position statement yesterday.

Greetings
Marc

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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Drew Parsons]

First I will state my personal position.  I think the original intent
and idea of the DPL - to leverage available funds to assist the process
of finishing a stable release - is a great one.  Money is a tool to be
used, there's no sense letting it lie around just gathering interest.
The fact that one or two others might happen to be getting paid to do
their Debian work does not in anyway affect my own work, it does not
make me "second class".  My reasons for supporting Debian and free
software have nothing to do with money or paid work, and they remain the
same whether or not anyone else is getting paid for it.  If anything I
find the idea of someone else getting paid makes me more motivated,
because it makes me think "good, we'll be able to get more done then".


On Thu, 2006-10-26 at 19:46 +0200, Joerg Jaspert wrote:
> 
> So, to summarize DTs effects on Debian: It has demotivated a lot of
> people who now either resigned, simply stopped doing (parts of their)
> Debian work or are doing a lot less than they did before DT was
> started. The freeze got delayed and getting the release out on schedule
> has become nearly impossible. We are unable to see any good virtue in
> this "experiment".
> 

Now despite my support for the experiment, I agree with this summary of
the results of the experiment.  

It seems to me that the result of the experiment is that it has revealed
a profound cultural divide within the Debian project.  There are two
groups, and the views of the two groups in regards to the significance
of money are wholly alien and antagonistic to one another.

The first group, the minority, believes that any use of money to
increase the time developers spend on Debian is always intrinsically a
bad idea.

The second group, the majority, sees, like me, that money is a tool
which when available can be used to help things happen more quickly.
They are not threatened by the notion of using money to increase the
concentration of time that people can spend on Debian.

I think the result of the experiment is that the first group has had to
face just how unperturbed the second group is at the idea of using money
to increase developer time, and that the second group has had to face
just how antagonised the first group is over the same idea.

Following from these results, my conclusion from this experiment is
that, as long as the first group still exists within Debian, this kind
of funding idea ought not to be repeated in the future, not in the same
way.  I do not believe the project gains any advantage by deliberately
driving out the contributors from the first group.  (There was none such
deliberation in this instance, that is why is it was an "experiment", to
reach these conclusions.)  

Perhaps it is yet possible to arrive at a different funding model in the
future in consensus with the first group?

Drew 


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Thomas Viehmann]

Anthony Towns wrote:
> For the record, I haven't seen any such offers, and I've been looking
> for them since May or so. (Proviso: offers should be accompanied by
> some direct evidence that whoever's offering has the time and ability
> to actually do stuff)

If at least any NEW queue package information was accessible, people
could take an interest. If there's a problem with allowing access to the
new packages themselves, cool, but there used to be at least some
information on merkel.d.o's mirror of ftp.d.o (disabled for load
problems for over a year[1]) and more, e.g. the .katie files if not also
the whole .diff.gz and .changes - leave the orig.tar.gz and the .debs if
these are problematic, could likely be made available for inspection at
least for DDs.
Letting people make suggestions for rejecting packages that they've
found mistakes should be not very dangerous to the archive.

Kind regards

T.

1. I freely admit that I've not asked for it recently.
-- 
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Re: d-d-a abuse, was Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Andreas Tille]

On Thu, 26 Oct 2006, [iso-8859-2] Miros?aw Baran wrote:


Please stop abusing the debian-devel-announce, this is not acceptable.


I can not see any abuse of d-d-a.  The mail is well thought, written
in a style that is by far less offending than todays standard and has
a major point concerning Debian development.


If you just cannot stand the fact that the majority of the developers that
happen to be interested in voting just out-voted you in regard of the
Dunc-Tank, fine.


Even if I'm continue to be in favour of paying DDs in "critical times"
I'm not blind about the harm the whole affair did to Debian and I want
to thank these people that they asked for kind of a journal as it is
done in experiments to enable us to learn from it.  My  personal opinion
is that the experiment is close to fail the goal of making Debian's
cycle more predictable.  So I'm keen on hearing an hopefully objective
report from the experimentators.  I admit I have underestimated the
effect of a suggestion that I regarded reasonable and straightforeward
in my eyes.

So please stop flaming and I hope that Debian as a project is strong
enough to go strengthened through this time.

Kind regards

 Andreas.

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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Sven Luther]

On Fri, Oct 27, 2006 at 02:44:20PM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:37:43PM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> > Just let me pick the NEW queue: Has it been stated publicly that
> > ftpmaster is going to reduce work spent on NEW due to dunc tank? Have
> > ftpmaster considered to accept offers to take over some of the work
> > load they are not motivated to do any more because they're not being
> > paid?
> 
> For the record, I haven't seen any such offers, and I've been looking
> for them since May or so. (Proviso: offers should be accompanied by
> some direct evidence that whoever's offering has the time and ability
> to actually do stuff)

I have proposed myself at some point this past year, to help the ftp-masters
in the task of handling NEW, especially for some packages which are highly
repetitive, like the kernels (for which i am as qualified as anyone else to
know what to do), and other such just-rename packages, as soname changing
library, which mostly only need to be in close contact with the RMs.

Sure, this is small work, but it has a huge impact on the perception of NEW,
and may free the more experienced ftp-masters to do the more demanding work,
but this was flatly rejected, and you perfectly know about it.

Friendly,

Sven Luther


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Michael Meskes]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 10:16:19PM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> I, personally, do not, however, find that amount unreasonable for a
> one-month engagement as a contractor.

But then it should be described that way too.

Michael
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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Michael Meskes]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:37:43PM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> US$ 6000 is like 4.800 EUR. That's like a dayly rate of 220 EUR. Like
> a fourth of what a contractor of Andi's and Steve's expertise would
> cash in on the free market.

You're kidding, right? Others already pointed out that the original text
talked about taking care of their living expenses, not contracting them.
The only way for you to argue that 880 EUR would be a fair amount of
money is if you consider that they are paid to do work that only these
two can do. Of course in a situation like this you can write your pay
check yourself, at least almost. Given a market situation with some
competition the number simply is ridiculous.

Michael
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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Anthony Towns]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:37:43PM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> Just let me pick the NEW queue: Has it been stated publicly that
> ftpmaster is going to reduce work spent on NEW due to dunc tank? Have
> ftpmaster considered to accept offers to take over some of the work
> load they are not motivated to do any more because they're not being
> paid?

For the record, I haven't seen any such offers, and I've been looking
for them since May or so. (Proviso: offers should be accompanied by
some direct evidence that whoever's offering has the time and ability
to actually do stuff)

Cheers,
aj


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Chris Waters]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:48:16PM +0200, Tshepang Lekhonkhobe wrote:
> On 10/26/06, Marc Haber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >If people need to be paid, I'd like them
> >  (1) to be paid by the project
> >  (2) to be paid by something friendly to the project
> >  (3) to be paid by a competitor
> >
> >I know of more DDs that (3) applies than of DDs that (2) applies. And
> >unfortunately, no DD that (1) applies to.
> 
> What does this imply? Why would a competitor pay a DD to do Debian
> work? Is this by any chance related to Ubuntu?

I don't know exactly what he had in mind, but we've had DDs working
for Red hat, Suse, Prodigy, Ubuntu, and doubtless many others that I'm
forgetting.  Of course, one of the nice things about free software is
that classes two and three are not disjunct sets.  In fact, they have
massive overlap.

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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Chris Waters]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 07:46:00PM +0200, Joerg Jaspert wrote:

> that to be a major change to the Debian project culture: For the first
> time Debian Developers are paid for their work on Debian by a
> institution so near to the project itself.

This is completely and blatantly false!  The only thing that's
different this time is the prominence of the developers involved
relative to the prominence of the institution, and the amount of
publicity that has ensued.  (And, unlike _some_, but not all, previous
cases, the initial goal of the institution is to improve Debian rather
than to fork it.  And in at least one earlier case, the goal changed
from forking to improving after the initial fork proved unsuccessful.)

Unless you want to try to audit every Debian developer, you simply
cannot make blanket statements about how and when developers are paid
to work on Debian, and by whom.  (And such an audit would be illegal
and unethical in any country I know of, and might not yield the
relevant details in any case.)

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Re: misleading use of d-d-a (was Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment")

[MJ Ray]

Andrew Pollock <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> [lengthy whinge snipped]

Funny.  Looks to me like some valid unanswered questions were snipped, 
some of which were asked right back near when this effort was first 
mentioned.

> I think it's uncool to be sending emails to d-d-a with "position statement"
> in the subject that aren't indicative of a position statement of the
> project.

The signatories are clearly named.  It is their position and whatever 
the position of the project is has little to do with it.

> We've had not one, but two GRs recently, which came out supporting what aj's
> doing. If anything, one could draw from these results that the "position
> statement" of the project is exact opposite to what you've put forward on
> d-d-a. 

Options in the two GRs were split between ballots and some options were 
missing, making it a sequence of black-white fights instead of a 
resolution process, but I also doubt the majority would support the 
recently-posted position.

> Way to send conflicting messages to the public.

The developers have conflicting views.  Anyone expecting this to look 
neat to the public when "we will not hide problems" is a key general aim 
should take a reality check.

[...]
> For the record, the constant bitching and moaning is demotivating me more
> than anything else.

So stop bitching and moaning at the developers who have posted their 
views and try to resolve this problem!

> If you don't like what's going on, remember it's only an experiment, and
> after the experiment is done, raise whatever GRs are necessary to make sure
> it can never happen again.

How?  This is for real, not an experiment - we can't turn back the clock 
if it breaks the project.  It trades on debian's goodwill, yet is 
outside our agreements.  The only GRs which can be raised to make sure 
it can never happen again are so harsh (like making some non-debian 
actions incompatible with being DPL) that they seem unlikely to pass.

So, as there seems no hope of making progress through the usual 
channels, I fully support these direct action tactics currently being 
used, even if I don't share all of the concerns.  The Dunc-Tank board 
should start negotiating (as they should have done much earlier), but at 
least two of them have a history of troublesome inertia.

Hope that explains,
-- 
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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Marc Haber]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 10:12:09PM +0200, Florian Weimer wrote:
> * Marc Haber:
> > Please note that this is not a salary which can be relied on coming in
> > month after months. Freelance people which high qualifications have to
> > calculate differently. I am actually surprised that people on this
> > list are not aware of these differences.
> 
> You make this sound as if the RMs had come up with the $6,000 figure,
> which isn't true AFAIK.

Sorry, that was not my intention. I do not know where that figure
originated.

I, personally, do not, however, find that amount unreasonable for a
one-month engagement as a contractor.

Greetings
Marc


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[Editorial Comment] Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Chad Walstrom]

Joerg, et. al. wrote:
> We consider... 

[Editorial comment]

"We" isn't qualified in either the Subject or the beginning of the
post.  You need to go to the end of the lengthy message to see that
the "Position Statement" is from a collection of Developers, rather
than Debian as a whole.  "Un-official Position Statement" might be
appropriate, though "A Developer Position Statement" might be better.
Regardless, "we" should be clarified and quantified at the beginning
of the post.

The side-affect of this is that some over-zealous reporter is going to
use the subject of the post to imply that all of Debian disapproves of
Dunc-Tanc.  This is obviously not true, as the results of the recent
GR supports.

Vague statements implying that "many developers" have left Debian
because of Dunc-Tank is unvalidated.  Footnotes to Message-Id's or
URI's of digitally signed messages would carry more weight to this
argument.  As it is, the author of this statement requires the reader
to do his or her own research to validate the statement.  Not
acceptable.



-- 
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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Florian Weimer]

* Marc Haber:

> Please note that this is not a salary which can be relied on coming in
> month after months. Freelance people which high qualifications have to
> calculate differently. I am actually surprised that people on this
> list are not aware of these differences.

You make this sound as if the RMs had come up with the $6,000 figure,
which isn't true AFAIK.


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Marc Haber]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 01:45:11PM -0500, Adam Majer wrote:
> Thus at $6000 and assuming my calculation is correct, this is 60% more
> than the average salary in the US hence not "below average" or just
> "living costs". Speaking naively (since the average doesn't follow the
> standard distribution, but let's assume it does), 50% of the people live
> in the US on *less* than $3741/mo/person.

Please note that this is not a salary which can be relied on coming in
month after months. Freelance people which high qualifications have to
calculate differently. I am actually surprised that people on this
list are not aware of these differences.

Greetings
Marc

-- 
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Mannheim, Germany  |  lose things."Winona Ryder | Fon: *49 621 72739834
Nordisch by Nature |  How to make an American Quilt | Fax: *49 621 72739835


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Pierre Habouzit]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:37:43PM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> This is going to be a personal reply, containing my personal opinion
> only.
> 
> On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 07:46:00PM +0200, Joerg Jaspert wrote:
> >   Especially since it is clear now that we
> >   currently can not keep the scheduled release date, even with DT paying
> >   our RMs.
> 
> Is that clear?

  based on [1] I'd say that yes it is. Even if we consider that the
people we are now work twice as fast (because twice as many) as for
sarge, we have right noe 260 RC bugs, sarge was at 125 6 months before
it was released. and at 250+ 1 year before its release.


> > - During the discussion before the experiment it was said that the
> >   living costs of the release managers are to be paid. Additionally it
> >   was said that it is "providing a reasonable amount of money to cover
> >   living expenses" and later on, that this is "below the average" they
> >   could get elsewhere. However, the official donation site[1]
> >   mentions US$ 6000.00 for each release manager. We do consider this to
> >   be neither just "living costs" nor "below average", not even by
> >   applying common taxes and insurances one has to pay. On what grounds
> >   has this amount been calculated?
> 
> US$ 6000 is like 4.800 EUR. That's like a dayly rate of 220 EUR. Like
> a fourth of what a contractor of Andi's and Steve's expertise would
> cash in on the free market.

  but that's was not a salary, at least, it was what has been promised
to us. That's supposed to pay their living expenses, and please, do me a
favor, I earn *really* less than that, and I'm able to pay a mortgage
and live well.


> > So, to summarize DTs effects on Debian: It has demotivated a lot of
> > people who now either resigned, simply stopped doing (parts of their)
> > Debian work or are doing a lot less than they did before DT was
> > started.
> 
> At this place, one of our worst problems surfaces again: People stop
> working _silently_ so that nobody can step in for them. And, even
> worse, people in key positions (that need special privileges do work)
> reduce their committment without stepping down, actively _prevent_
> other people from doing their work. _THIS_ is doing _BIG_ harm to the
> project.

  I'm not aware of any key role beeing held hostage because of people
that are fed up with DT. But I may be mistaken. Please enlight me.

  What happens though, is that key people that have unvaluable
knowledges and skills have left. We lost a valuable libpng maintainer,
we lost a guy that understood how timezones worked, how xkb worked, and
a valuable l10n team member, a weekly DWN, etc…  Some of those places
are vacant because there is simply nobody else to fill the gaps.


  [1] http://bugs.debian.org/release-critical/
-- 
·O·  Pierre Habouzit
··O[EMAIL PROTECTED]
OOOhttp://www.madism.org


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d-d-a abuse, was Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Mirosław Baran]

[Joerg Jaspert pisze na temat "Position Statement to the 
Dunc-Tanc "experiment""]:

Dear authors of the <> (whoever position it states),

Please stop abusing the debian-devel-announce, this is not acceptable.

If you just cannot stand the fact that the majority of the developers that 
happen to be interested in voting just out-voted you in regard of the 
Dunc-Tank, fine.

There are various places that can be used for discussion in Debian.

DEBIAN-DEVEL-ANNOUNCE, HOWEVER, IS NOT ONE OF THEM. PLEASE REFRAIN FROM 
ABUSING THE DEBIAN-DEVEL-ANNOUNCE MAILING LIST. (And a ftpmaster and an AM 
should know better, really).

On a side note, the author of this mail, slightly misquoting one Texan 
judge, simply wants to scream to authors of the 'position statement', "Get 
a life" or "Do you have any other problems?" or "When is the last time you 
registered for anger management classes?"

Sincerely yours
Miroslaw Baran (Jubal)

-- 
[ Miros/law L Baran, baran-at-knm-org-pl, neg IQ, cert AI ] [ 0101010 is ]
[ BOF2510053411, http://hell.pl/baran/tek/, alchemy pany! ] [ The Answer ] 

  Half Moon tonight. (At least it's better than no Moon at all.)


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Adam Majer]

Joerg Jaspert wrote:
> - During the discussion before the experiment it was said that the
>   living costs of the release managers are to be paid. Additionally it
>   was said that it is "providing a reasonable amount of money to cover
>   living expenses" and later on, that this is "below the average" they
>   could get elsewhere. However, the official donation site[1]
>   mentions US$ 6000.00 for each release manager. We do consider this to
>   be neither just "living costs" nor "below average", not even by
>   applying common taxes and insurances one has to pay. On what grounds
>   has this amount been calculated?
> 
>   [1] https://www.pubsoft.org/pubsoft.py/project?proj=Dunc-Tank-etch-rm

Hi all,

I agree, this is not "below average" or otherwise. Average is calculated
on a GDP per capita. For US [1][2], that is (in millions)
$13,469,000/300 => $44896 per capita => $3741.39/month per person. This
is roughly in agreement with government statistics [3], and I quote,

"Real median household income remained unchanged between 2002 and 2003
in three of the four census regions — Northeast ($46,742), Midwest
($44,732) and West ($46,820). The exception was the South, where income
declined 1.5 percent. The South continued to have the lowest median
household income of all four regions ($39,823)"

True, one has to adjust for inflation, but inflation in the US is < 2%
so the numbers are relatively correct. I think the mean is something
about $50k now so ~$4000/mo/person in the *rich* areas.

Thus at $6000 and assuming my calculation is correct, this is 60% more
than the average salary in the US hence not "below average" or just
"living costs". Speaking naively (since the average doesn't follow the
standard distribution, but let's assume it does), 50% of the people live
in the US on *less* than $3741/mo/person.


Now, my numbers may be wrong a little bit, although in the ballpark and
they do agree with the notion that $6000/mo/person is 'neither just
"living costs" nor "below average"'.

Yes, I know that wages depend on location. And they do fluctuate from
place to place, but the mean wage is about the same within +-10k. Yes,
even in NY $72000/year is more than just getting by or below average.

- Adam

PS. To myself, the experiment has failed as more than a few DDs are not
happy with it and some have quit. There is *no way* that one or two
people, paid or not, can replace that manpower. Therefore the experiment
has failed as it will result in less work per unit time being done.

ref:
  [1] - http://www.forecasts.org/gdp.htm for Nov 2006.
  [2] - population at 300 million (see all recent news, etc..)
  [3] -
http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/income_wealth/002484.html
  [4] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Beta_distribution_pdf.png


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Marc Haber]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 08:48:16PM +0200, Tshepang Lekhonkhobe wrote:
> On 10/26/06, Marc Haber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >If people need to be paid, I'd like them
> >  (1) to be paid by the project
> >  (2) to be paid by something friendly to the project
> >  (3) to be paid by a competitor
> >
> >I know of more DDs that (3) applies than of DDs that (2) applies. And
> >unfortunately, no DD that (1) applies to.
> 
> What does this imply? Why would a competitor pay a DD to do Debian
> work?

Maybe not pay a DD to do Debian work, but pay a DD to work on the
competing product.  If that DD holds a job in Debian that requires
special privileges, and that job is neglected without the DD in
question resigning or allowing other people to do the work that he is
neglecting, a loyality issue arises.

> Is this by any chance related to Ubuntu?

Probably.

Greetings
Marc

-- 
-
Marc Haber | "I don't trust Computers. They | Mailadresse im Header
Mannheim, Germany  |  lose things."Winona Ryder | Fon: *49 621 72739834
Nordisch by Nature |  How to make an American Quilt | Fax: *49 621 72739835


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Thomas Hood]

Joerg Jaspert  debian.org> writes:
> With this mail we would like to summarize our thoughts about the DT
> project and the idea behind it. We also want to raise some questions we
> still consider unanswered and open:


I don't mind you carrying on this discussion, but please keep it out
of debian-devel-announce.
-- 
Thomas Hood


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Tshepang Lekhonkhobe]

On 10/26/06, Marc Haber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

If people need to be paid, I'd like them
  (1) to be paid by the project
  (2) to be paid by something friendly to the project
  (3) to be paid by a competitor

I know of more DDs that (3) applies than of DDs that (2) applies. And
unfortunately, no DD that (1) applies to.


What does this imply? Why would a competitor pay a DD to do Debian
work? Is this by any chance related to Ubuntu?


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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Tshepang Lekhonkhobe]

Thanks for the mail-in-depth

On 10/26/06, Joerg Jaspert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
[ snip ]

Joey Schulze:   [5] Debian is a failure


This is misrepresentation don't you think? Joey didn't say that Debian
is a failure. That's just the title of the blog.


[5] http://www.infodrom.org/~joey/log/?200609210757



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Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Marc Haber]

This is going to be a personal reply, containing my personal opinion
only.

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 07:46:00PM +0200, Joerg Jaspert wrote:
>   Especially since it is clear now that we
>   currently can not keep the scheduled release date, even with DT paying
>   our RMs.

Is that clear?

> - During the discussion before the experiment it was said that the
>   living costs of the release managers are to be paid. Additionally it
>   was said that it is "providing a reasonable amount of money to cover
>   living expenses" and later on, that this is "below the average" they
>   could get elsewhere. However, the official donation site[1]
>   mentions US$ 6000.00 for each release manager. We do consider this to
>   be neither just "living costs" nor "below average", not even by
>   applying common taxes and insurances one has to pay. On what grounds
>   has this amount been calculated?

US$ 6000 is like 4.800 EUR. That's like a dayly rate of 220 EUR. Like
a fourth of what a contractor of Andi's and Steve's expertise would
cash in on the free market.

> People left the project, others
> are orphaning packages, the NEW queue is rising, system administration
> and security work is reduced, DWN is no longer released weekly and a lot
> of otherwise silent maintainers simply put off Debian work and work on
> something else. While some of these actions simply tend to happen, all
> the listed points are explicitly due to DT.

Just let me pick the NEW queue: Has it been stated publicly that
ftpmaster is going to reduce work spent on NEW due to dunc tank? Have
ftpmaster considered to accept offers to take over some of the work
load they are not motivated to do any more because they're not being
paid?

> Another bad feeling introduced by DT is that of a two-class
> project. Until DT, Debian has been a completely volunteer-based
> project. Today there are two paid Release Managers, opposed to all other
> project members. This creates a set of two "uber-DDs", in contrast to
> all the other nearly 1000 Developers and many more maintainers, whose
> work seems to be considered less important for Debian.

Actually, personally, I do feel more threatened by uber-DDs that
happen to be in power of ftp, system administration and other key
positions in Debian. Especially by the uber-DDs that are being paid by
a direct competitor.

If people need to be paid, I'd like them
  (1) to be paid by the project
  (2) to be paid by something friendly to the project
  (3) to be paid by a competitor

I know of more DDs that (3) applies than of DDs that (2) applies. And
unfortunately, no DD that (1) applies to.

> Another statement we heard repeatedly from DT supporters is that "DT is
> a separate project and not Debian". We do think that this is, at best, a
> joke. The DT board consists solely of the current Debian Project Leader,
> his assistant and other high-profile Debian Developers, working on a
> Debian related project. This simply can't be seen as something separated
> From Debian and the public has already proven that it doesn't consider
> it a totally separate project.

I fully agree here.

> So, to summarize DTs effects on Debian: It has demotivated a lot of
> people who now either resigned, simply stopped doing (parts of their)
> Debian work or are doing a lot less than they did before DT was
> started.

At this place, one of our worst problems surfaces again: People stop
working _silently_ so that nobody can step in for them. And, even
worse, people in key positions (that need special privileges do work)
reduce their committment without stepping down, actively _prevent_
other people from doing their work. _THIS_ is doing _BIG_ harm to the
project.


> Jörg Jaspert, ftp-master assistant, DAM, DebConf Organizer
> Alexander Schmehl, Debian Developer, press, event manager, DebConf Organizer
> Alexander Wirt, Debian Developer
> Daniel Priem, New Maintainer
> Martin Würtele, Debian Developer
> Gerfried Fuchs, Debian Developer
> Patrick Jäger, User
> Otavio Salvador, Debian Developer
> Joey Schulze, Debian Developer, Security, DWN, DSA, press, promoter
> Felipe Augusto van de Wiel, New Maintainer
> Sam Hocevar, Debian Developer
> Pierre Habouzit, Debian Developer
> Julien Danjou, Debian Developer, Stable Release Manager
> Peter Palfrader, Debian Developer
> Julien Blache, Debian Developer, promoter
> Christoph Berg, Debian Developer, QA, NM front-desk
> Holger Levsen, New Maintainer, DebConf Organizer

I'd like to know if these are the jobs that used to be done, or the
jobs that you guys intend to continue doing. Of course, I am
especially interested in that information for the jobs that need
special privileges, such as release manager, press, DWN, DSA,
Security, ftpmaster and/or DAM.

Greetings
Marc

-- 
-
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Mannheim, Germany  |  lose things."Winona Ryder | Fon: *49 621 72739834
Nordisch b

misleading use of d-d-a (was Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment")

[Andrew Pollock]

On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 07:46:00PM +0200, Joerg Jaspert wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> After a long and ambivalent discussion during the last weeks the project
> "Dunc Tank" (short DT from now on) has recently started.  We consider
> that to be a major change to the Debian project culture: For the first
> time Debian Developers are paid for their work on Debian by a
> institution so near to the project itself.
> 

[lengthy whinge snipped]

You were my AM, and I have a lot of respect for you, but this is no way to
get your point across.

I think it's uncool to be sending emails to d-d-a with "position statement"
in the subject that aren't indicative of a position statement of the
project.

We've had not one, but two GRs recently, which came out supporting what aj's
doing. If anything, one could draw from these results that the "position
statement" of the project is exact opposite to what you've put forward on
d-d-a. 

Way to send conflicting messages to the public.

In fact, your email was less of a position statement and more of a
set of requests from my reading.

For the record, the constant bitching and moaning is demotivating me more
than anything else.

If you don't like what's going on, remember it's only an experiment, and
after the experiment is done, raise whatever GRs are necessary to make sure
it can never happen again.

regards

Andrew


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Description: Digital signature

Re: Position Statement to the Dunc-Tanc "experiment"

[Aurelien Jarno]

Hi!

Thanks a lot for this mail. It clearly explains what I and others feel
about the Dunc-Tanc "experiment". I haven't signed it, but please
consider this mail as a signature.

Bye,
Aurelien Jarno, Debian Developer


On Thu, Oct 26, 2006 at 07:46:00PM +0200, Joerg Jaspert wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> After a long and ambivalent discussion during the last weeks the project
> "Dunc Tank" (short DT from now on) has recently started.  We consider
> that to be a major change to the Debian project culture: For the first
> time Debian Developers are paid for their work on Debian by a
> institution so near to the project itself.
> 
> 
> While we disagree with DT for the reasons outlined below, we want to
> state that this is not against the two people who should now benefit
> From it. We do trust Andreas and Steve that they do the best they can
> and only intend to do something good for Debian.
> 
> 
> With this mail we would like to summarize our thoughts about the DT
> project and the idea behind it. We also want to raise some questions we
> still consider unanswered and open:
> 
> - Why were the release managers (RMs) chosen as beneficiary for this
>   experiment? There are several areas within the Debian project
>   that we consider equally important and full-time work there could
>   benefit the project way more. Especially since it is clear now that we
>   currently can not keep the scheduled release date, even with DT paying
>   our RMs.
> 
> - What exactly are the release managers being paid for? There surely
>   must be more than a simple "Stay at home, work on Debian" in their
>   contract.
> 
> - How does DT want to know whether the release managers stick to their
>   part of the agreement?
> 
> - How is the success of this "experiment" measured? (For the release as
>   well as for the entire project)
> 
> - How do these measurements make sure that the observed consequences are
>   based on the experiment?
> 
> - How is it planned or is it even possible to compare the consequences
>   of the experiment with a state of the project without this experiment?
> 
> - What actions have been taken to ensure that potential negative
>   outcomes of the experiment won't affect the Debian project?
> 
> - Has it taken into account that several developers who have spent large
>   chunks of time on Debian before got demotivated to continue their work?
> 
> - How do these measurements try to compare positive and negative effects
>   on the release as well as the Debian project itself?
> 
> - During the discussion before the experiment it was said that the
>   living costs of the release managers are to be paid. Additionally it
>   was said that it is "providing a reasonable amount of money to cover
>   living expenses" and later on, that this is "below the average" they
>   could get elsewhere. However, the official donation site[1]
>   mentions US$ 6000.00 for each release manager. We do consider this to
>   be neither just "living costs" nor "below average", not even by
>   applying common taxes and insurances one has to pay. On what grounds
>   has this amount been calculated?
> 
>   [1] https://www.pubsoft.org/pubsoft.py/project?proj=Dunc-Tank-etch-rm
> 
> Although DT claims to be separate from Debian, we still feel that we are
> entitled to an answer to our questions, since after all, we are the
> people DT is experimenting with!
> 
> 
> After this set of questions let us comment on DT and present our opinion
> about statements made by DT supporters and board members.
> 
> 
> One claim of the DT people is that this "is only an experiment". Yet
> this whole affair already hurts Debian more than it can ever achieve. It
> already made a lot of people who have contributed a huge amount of time
> and work to Debian reduce their work. People left the project, others
> are orphaning packages, the NEW queue is rising, system administration
> and security work is reduced, DWN is no longer released weekly and a lot
> of otherwise silent maintainers simply put off Debian work and work on
> something else. While some of these actions simply tend to happen, all
> the listed points are explicitly due to DT. Compared to possible
> benefits one may see - e.g. releasing near a time we promised to release
> at - in our opinion this is not worth the trouble DT already got us in.
> 
> 
> Another bad feeling introduced by DT is that of a two-class
> project. Until DT, Debian has been a completely volunteer-based
> project. Today there are two paid Release Managers, opposed to all other
> project members. This creates a set of two "uber-DDs", in contrast to
> all the other nearly 1000 Developers and many more maintainers, whose
> work seems to be considered less important for Debian. It is ridiculous
> to set a deadline and then to create a project to pay those two people
> who set the deadline, but ignore the huge amount of work other people
> put into Debian. It is not as if those two Release Managers are now
> doing all the work that needs to