On Wed, Jan 15, 2020 at 10:48:55AM -0000, Aleksandra Fedorova wrote:
First of all, i think this new message looks hostile, especially this part: "The Fedora Project will be a reference for everyone who shares this vision", which reads as "If you share the vision, you must be in Fedora".
Oh! Like Ben, I also hadn't considered this interpretation. To parse it carefully, note "a reference" not "_the_ reference". But I also don't want to have to tell people "no, we don't mean to be hostile -- you need to read more carefully". Obviosuly that's not right. :)
But even it reworded I think the root of this disagreement lies in the perception, what the vision statement supposed to do.
It seems you are trying to make it sound more appealing or exciting. As you see it as a way to invite new people.
Yes, that's true.
But mission statement or vision is different from a marketing talking point. It is not what attracts attention or curiosity, it is what binds us together to do a specific thing.
Well, yes, but the vision statement *should* be an aspirational "binding".
And I don't see that thing in the proposed mission statement.
It is a hand wavy proclamation that says that Fedora Project's ultimate goal is the World Peace and Prosperity. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely support the goal :) But what makes Fedora to be Fedora is the way how exactly we are trying to help to reach this goal.
Well, remember, the vision statement does not stand alone. It goes with the values (our foundations) and the mission statement, as well as our strategic plan and so on down. The Vision statement *isn't* supposed to say how we are reaching our goal -- it *is* the statement of our desired result.
During the council meeting I gave some examples, including one I found when trying to look for the GNOME project mission and vision and then landed on a page selling garden gnomes. Their mission and vision (extracted from a little bit over-wordiness) are:
Our Mission is to create and market garden gnomes that will bring a bit of humor and peace to people’s lives and will inspire deeper political, environmental, and spiritual awareness and reflection.
Our Vision for the future is a world where humans, animals, garden gnomes, and other yard art live together in peace and harmony.
So, yes, World Peace and Prosperity might be in there a little bit. :)
Moreover, I have an alternative proposal [1] which I haven't got a lot of feedback yet.
It maybe worded differently, but in short, I'd like to see the "Integrate First" statement added to our core values, somewhere next to the Upstream First thing.
I'm not convinced that I agree with this as a basic tenant, really. But that's kind of a separate issue.... the vision really _should_ be about change in the world, not about the specifics of what we're building.
And I prefer to see Fedora's mission not to try and take over the world, but to fill in this gap, based on previous successful experience over many years, but also together with finding new ways, new workflows and even new definitions for it.
We also wanted the statement to not be "world domination" — I agree with you on that. Actually, I don't think that what you're saying here is _that_ far off from what we ended up with!