fedora community working group

[Karsten Wade]

On Thu, Jul 01, 2010 at 03:57:56PM -0500, Rex Dieter wrote:
> On the open question of how to discourage/prevent poisonous <foo>, I 
> suggest doing something similar as was done in the kde project a couple 
> of years ago to help deal with similar issues.  I propose creating 
> something in fedora akin to the 'kde community working group',
> http://ev.kde.org/workinggroups/cwg.php
> 
> I consider it vitally important that everyone in the fedora community 
> feel safe, know fedora supports them, and that there be a clear contact 
> person/group to go to in cases where they experience any non-excellent 
> behavior.

This has been lost in the discussion and I want to come back to it.

+1 to forming a community working group along the lines of the KDE
CWG.

It seems premature to predict what that CWG is going to decide.  They
haven't even been formed and decided if we need to build a bikeshed
before we're debating its color.

I.e., working group first, let that group tackle the "what document do
we ask people to read and understand" question.

This also means a CWG needs to have a fairly light mission to start.
For example, the KDE CWG has a lot of specific duties around the code
of conduct.  Let the CWG rewrite and add to its purposes to form a
what-is-needed team instead of a what-we-expected.

> Now, being excellent has taken us quite a ways, but I think it's time to 
> consider doing better, so...
> 
> After speaking with several current members of kde's cwg, they expressed 
> that it was very important to have a clear code of conduct(coc).  Such a 
> coc should focus entirely on what is good and expected, and stay away 
> from what is bad and discouraged.  Another good reference,
> http://www.kde.org/code-of-conduct/

I respectfully take that advice, but if I were on the CWG I'd want to
do my own research first.  Even the KDE and GNOME are different on the
enforcement side.  I'd want to know what current research on *this*
community is showing us.[0]

My first reaction, fwiw, is that "code of conduct" is a loaded term
that comes with expectations.  Note immediate reactions of "Yes!",
"No!" on this list.

Let's form a working group to look at this.  Let them do the work with
transparency and high levels of input.  Whatever they come up with
will have more supporters (regardless of what it's called) as an end
result of that.

No need for it to take long, we could self-organize and have a lot of
work done by September.  Just researching and working on the issues
openly will raise morale, draw attention to problem areas, resolve
problems, etc.

This whole area of "what to do with poisonous people" is full of
soundbites and clever presentations.  It would behoove us to have a
focus group take care of beginning and ongoing research, and acting as
an intermediary/mediator, etc.  Work could happen on this mailing
list, at least to start.

You may have heard that folks are taking Bhutan's lead in tracking
"Gross National Happiness"[1].  A community working group could find
ways to track and reveal the satisfaction/happiness level of
contributors to some breadth and depth (over time.)

- Karsten

[0] http://www.cyber-anthro.com/
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_national_happiness
-- 
name:  Karsten 'quaid' Wade, Sr. Community Gardener
team:                Red Hat Community Architecture 
uri:               http://TheOpenSourceWay.org/wiki
gpg:                                       AD0E0C41
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