Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: [OT] engineering ethics and rhetoric in the modern age

[Zack Brown]

On Wed, Sep 24, 2003 at 07:55:25PM -0500, Charles Duffy wrote:
> On Wed, 2003-09-24 at 19:34, Zack Brown wrote:
> > I don't know what to say, Tom. A lot of people feel you behave the way I
> > describe. Maybe you should "think harder" about whether you insult and
> > belittle people.
> 
> Zack,
> 
> While not nearly as long as Tom and folks, I've been involved in open
> source development for a while now -- and from where I stand, Tom's
> behaviour is not only entirely within the norms for OSS development but
> consistant with what's generally accepted for guru-level (ie.
> senior-architect type) individuals within closed-source environments as
> well.
> 
> Perhaps you should "think harder" about whether you're a bit excessively
> thin-skinned.

I just see a bunch of people coming to the project offering nice things like
Subversion integration; they talk to Tom for awhile, and then go away never
to return. My motivation has been to try to smooth the prospects of some of
those relationships, especially since Tom himself seems to desire them as
well. There's no *reason* for these people to leave, since both they *and*
Tom desire the relationship. Something about talking to Tom makes them want
to go away. You can say they're too thin-skinned, but that doesn't make
the end result any different. The point isn't that Tom should "be nicer",
the point is that Tom is apparently throwing away things he says he wants
(and that would clearly be good for the project as a whole).

But as I said to you, Tom, and others in private, I'm going to try to stop
berating Tom for this. It's been made clear to me that I'm not helping by
doing it, so there seems no point in continuing.

Be well,
Zack

> 

-- 
Zack Brown