On Tue, Sep 23, 2014 at 05:18:57PM -0500, Dave Ihnat wrote: > Let's decide that before we argue any more on the merits--or lack > thereof--of systemd itself. If it's not going to change Red Hat's decision, > then all we can meaningfully discuss here are discovered issues and any > resolutions of same with the current implementation of systemd. I'm breaking this into a new thread because, as you say, it's a separate topic, and because it deserves a fresh start of its own. Dave, thank you for your thoughtful response. If every thread about systemd were at this level of civility, we wouldn't have a problem. But, clearly, that's not what happens. In fact, these threads continually and quickly devolve into personal attacks, name calling, and all manner of nastiness. This is harmful to Fedora. It makes this list a bad place to get help with real issues. It makes it a scary place for new users. It makes it a miserable place for active developers and contributors. It doesn't just increase the noise: over time, it reduces the signal. And, it's not just by driving away helpful people. When the thread has been reduced to a mud-fight, it means that I can't use it as meaningful evidence. That's part of my job inside of Red Hat. I _want_ to be able to say "Fedora users are really indicating that we're going to have a problem with this direction. Take a look — we need to put resources into fixing this." But, if someone does look, they'll see that we're mostly busy calling each other fascists, proposing outlandish theories about GPL violation, willfully misunderstanding each other in order to score Internet argument points, and so on. That does not carry any weight. In fact, if I were to try that, I would soon find my own ability to convince anyone to listen to anything in Fedora vanish. And that's not me just talking to Red Hat — it's the same thing talking to basically _anyone_ who has any ability to do anything. Let's help ourselves be heard by keeping the discourse at a constructive level. It doesn't have to be all about technical issues. We can talk about more than just code. But, for code and everything else, let's not go in circles. Repetition might work for propaganda, but it's not going to change Fedora decision-making. There's actually very little here that isn't well-understood all throughout Fedora engineering leadership — and, really, I don't feel out of line in saying that I'm sure Red Hat leadership understands the picture very well too. (Nothing's perfect; you make the best decisions you can.) When there's something important that we can say that _isn't_ understood or is otherwise urgent, I want that to stand out — not to be piled under eight tons of muck. Someone may be about to argue that those tons of muck must indicate that people are unhappy, and therefore should be listened to. I've heard that before. Let me ask: is it working? I assure you, it's not — and _more muck_ isn't going to help. I'm not interested in stopping discussion of systemd. In fact, we'll need to talk about it a lot more, because it is (and always was) an enabling technology, not a simple replacement for init. But please, please, please, let's do it like a community actually working together to make cool stuff. If we don't, all that will happen is that this list will become completely irrelevant. I don't want that to happen, and that's why I'm taking a stronger stance on this. -- Matthew Miller <mattdm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Fedora Project Leader -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Fedora Code of Conduct: http://fedoraproject.org/code-of-conduct Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines Have a question? Ask away: http://ask.fedoraproject.org
