Thanks for the elaboration, Ben, it's much appreciated. I think the clarification that the Fedora Council already has the ability to withdraw funding and forbid the use of Fedora trademarks does help put this into some perspective, but, despite the good intent I am still genuinely dubious of how this one will be used; I'll try to expand on why that is. First, I think we may be in some agreement that the vagueness of the wording on this is frustrating. Whether the relationship is severed for kupper picking or cat juggling, I think while well intended, without explicit guidelines on how these determinations are made, at the peak of the cancel culture era, this can only harm. Who will determine whether said keynote speaker actually picked kuppies or juggled cats? What if they didn't and you announce why you severed and it was a rumour from a jealous competitor or career rival? How would that impact that person's career? What about their mental health? I can't tell you how many times I've had to read emails about people I work with, or people I collaborate with who are being targeted in this way. People are vicious to each other in the tech scene sometimes. I'll say it again. We're at the peak of the cancel culture era. Cancel culture is misguided (we're sorry, RMS). This type gathering is especially targeted by social engineering campaigns, often with activist intent, and it often destroys peoples' careers and personal lives unnecessarily. Why open yourselves up to having this mechanism be used as a lever to pull like that? People targeted by these kinds of campaigns are assessed for vulnerable connections. This would be one of them. There's a resource assessment. This is a resource. In that instance, I think we can confidently agree this needs more design around it to ensure it is executed with empathy, compassion, and even a minimal assurance of truth to avoid the kinds of problems the PSF has to deal with. I think we can visit how this is intended to be used quite a bit, but when defining organizational policy, it has to be designed to avoid abuse as well -- or it will be abused and it will be an external party that is abused. Ethics aside, how do we ensure that we don't violate the usc's commerce clause, contractual obligations, or even libel law? Posting the reason for the severance could be the difference between grounds for recourse or not by injured parties. From that angle this could actually open up the Fedora Project to liability. What if Bob wasn't really juggling cats but a contributor who didn't like what Bob said on IRC finally found an opening worth taking and decided to rally up the council and spoke convincingly? If we're determining whether to announce why we sever, I only see either it being abused, it accidentally damaging people due to a misunderstanding, or other general harm that outweighs any good it could cause. But let me go back to the compassion angle. What if Bob *did* juggle cats. What if he got caught red handed and just hadn't realized, and grew to be a better person in a few years. Well, he can't, he's homeless because that publication destroyed his life. Cancel culture is sick. It destroys. It does not help. It doesn't feel that way to people who participate in it. This is an angle needed to foster a community. Not the IBM community. The Fedora Community. You've built a wonderful thing, here. It is different, and it needs to stay different. If IBM's culture were what Fedora needed, it wouldn't have needed to be purchased by it. I think we all know that. Preserve the Fedora culture. And don't damage people for a cause. Believe me, it's hard sometimes. I understand this desire more than you might be aware of. -C Who is going to decide whether this person kicked a puppy On Mon, 2020-06-15 at 14:16 -0400, Ben Cotton wrote: > Some feedback comments inline. I didn't reply explicitly to every > message, but used the messages below to provide some context for my > comments. > > Two more broad comments first. > > 1. To be clear, as the stewards of the budget and trademarks, the > Council implicitly has the authority to withdraw funding and the use > of Fedora trademarks. This proposal does not add or remove from that > implicit authority, it just makes it explicit. What it does add is > specific requirements for how any decisions made under that authority > are communicated. > > 2. I admit the "in the interests of the Fedora Project" part is > frustratingly vague. I wanted to make it clear that we wouldn't > choose > to withdraw support on a whim, which is why that phrasing is in there > instead of just "The Fedora Council may choose to withdraw Fedora's > support from events or other activities that involve fiscal > sponsorship or use of Fedora trademark." This should be a pretty high > bar to clear and happen rarely. On the other hand, trying to make it > less vague rapidly becomes a long document in itself. If there are > suggestions of 1-2 sentences that could be used instead of this > phrasing, I'd love to hear them. > > On Fri, Jun 12, 2020 at 3:40 PM Michael Scherer <misc@xxxxxxxx> > wrote: > > I do think that fictional examples would make clearer the kind of > > issues > > this is supposed to cover, since it might help people to dispell > > some > > misunderstanding due to unspoken assumptions. > > > Example of what the policy is intended to cover: > The Mindshare Committee approves a booth at Totally Normal Open > Source > Conference (TNOSC). Subsequent to Mindshare's approval, TNSOC > announces that the keynote speaker will be someone who has openly > advocated kicking puppies. The Fedora Council decides that puppy > kicking is so egregiously beyond the realm of acceptable behavior > that > we cannot associate with this. (After all it, is very un-Friends-ly > to > the good dogs.) > Result: The Fedora Council withdraws support from the event under the > proposed policy. > > Example of what the policy is not intended to cover: > The Mindshare Committee approves a booth at Some Other Tech > Conference > (SOTC). SOTC is run by Computron Ltd. Computron Ltd. competes with > IBM > in certain key markets and one day the CEOs fight over the arm rest > on > the airplane. After that both IBM and Computron Ltd. devote their > entire marketing budget to calling each other names. > Result: The Fedora Council says "wow, this is ridiculous". Fedora's > participation in the event goes on as planned. > > On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 3:33 AM Florian Weimer <fweimer@xxxxxxxxxx> > wrote: > > What does withdrawing support mean, exactly? Request for a return > > of > > funding, and removal of all Fedora trademarks from an upcoming > > event? > > Or does this apply to future events only? > > > That's going to depend to some degree on the timing, the sponsorship > agreement (if any), etc. So for example, if it's six months out, we > may request a return of funding and removal of all trademarks. If the > sponsorship/exhibition agreement does not permit that, we may just > request the removal of trademarks (e.g. from the sponsor listings). > Obviously, if there are printed materials, it may be too late for > that. > > > If this ambiguity is deliberate, how can event organizers achieve > > some > > planning certainty if they choose to accept Fedora support? > > > The same way they do now: with reputations and legal agreements. > Sponsors and exhibitors pull out of events for a variety of reasons. > This proposal is more about defining how the Council communicates the > decision. > > On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 8:27 AM Till Maas <opensource@xxxxxxxxx> > wrote: > > I would not limit this to "fiscal sponsorship" or "Fedora > > trademarks". > > There might also be non-fiscal sponsorship and the Council should > > still > > have veto power. I am not sure but this might for example affect > > content > > on pagure.io, if there would be something inappropriate but it > > would not > > involve the Fedora trademark. > > I see your point, but I don't think that's necessary. This example > and > other cases like it are covered by the Code of Conduct and legal > policies on permissible content. > > > -- > Ben Cotton > He / Him / His > Senior Program Manager, Fedora & CentOS Stream > Red Hat > TZ=America/Indiana/Indianapolis > _______________________________________________ > council-discuss mailing list -- > council-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx > To unsubscribe send an email to > council-discuss-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx > Fedora Code of Conduct: > https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/project/code-of-conduct/ > List Guidelines: > https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines > List Archives: > https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/council-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx _______________________________________________ council-discuss mailing list -- council-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe send an email to council-discuss-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Fedora Code of Conduct: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/project/code-of-conduct/ List Guidelines: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines List Archives: https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/council-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
