[fab] Re: [Famsco-list] New project formation is out of control

Alex Maier lxmaier at gmail.com
Tue Jun 6 19:14:14 UTC 2006


I have to agree with most of this message--we do need some sort of
peer review and minimal number of supporters to give the project an
official blessing and to let them use the words "Fedora" and/or
"Ambassadors" in the project name.

Patrick, want to take a stab at a short and snappy set of rules?
Famsco can then vote.

thanks,
a

On 6/5/06, Patrick W. Barnes <nman64 at n-man.com> wrote:
> I'm a little concerned by a recent chain of events.  Damien Durand recently
> decided that running interviews of Fedora contributors was a worthy project
> and began working, without support, to make it a reality.  This, in itself,
> is good.  We need people who take initiative.  The problem is the subsequent
> announcement and adoption without review, and this is just a symptom of a
> larger, standing issue.
>
> As soon as Damien put up a page and interviewed Chitlesh Goorah, he sent an
> announcement to fedora-marketing-list and made a post in his blog.  Then,
> Thomas included the announcement in the Fedora Weekly News report.  The
> problem is that this program has had no peer review and doesn't have any
> support within the Fedora Project.  I had instructed Damien to make a post to
> fedora-marketing-list to let the Marketing team know what he was working on
> and to ask for feedback, not to provide a formal announcement.
>
> My concern with this particular project is that it is doing something that is
> already being done and for which a new venue is not needed.  RHM already has
> a column that features contributor interviews, and assorted other sources
> already allow contributors to be introduced to the community.  Without the
> interest and resources going into Fedora Interview, I'm not sure it can
> really succeed.  If the Marketing team adopted the idea and decided to
> support it, then we could have given more consideration into what we would
> throw behind the program.  Another issue is the fact that Damien has not had
> the time to correct the issues that have already been pointed out.  Moving to
> a public announcement was premature.
>
> This really only highlights and underlying problem.  We have a number of new
> or inexperienced contributors who are in a hurry to start up their own
> initiatives.  We already have a significant number of projects that need more
> attention, not separation.  These new contributors take advantage of the
> freedom they are given to stake out grounds without peer support.  This is
> fracturing our community and leaving all kinds of loose and dead ends.
>
> Another fine example of this issue is Clair Shaw's Word of Mouth program.
> Many of these initiatives are popping up under Ambassadors and Marketing,
> simply because the Ambassadors have an immediate sense of involvement and
> power, but this problem spreads well beyond those projects.  We need to be
> flexible in allowing the formation of new programs, but allowing the creation
> and branding of new programs without any controls in place will soon dilute
> the standings of existing projects and will introduce confusion.
>
> With these small, unsupported programs popping up everywhere, projects are
> fracturing and initiatives are failing.  We need to work on tightening
> controls and focusing the contributor energy where it is needed.  It's time
> to consider establishing policies and practices for the formation of new
> projects and programs.  This needs to happen at two levels.  We need policies
> for the creation or promotion of projects at the top level, and individual
> projects need policies for the formation of sub-projects.  If we don't exert
> control now, we'll have a hard time regaining it in the future.
>
> http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Marketing/Interview
> http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Marketing/WordOfMouth
>
> --
> Patrick "The N-Man" Barnes
> nman64 at n-man.com
>
> http://www.n-man.com/
>
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