Hi Tim,
I replied to another list as my comment is not related to the Last-Call.
At 11:54 AM 02-10-2022, Tim Bray wrote:
Just want to point out that the IETF is not alone. For the first few
decades of life online, it was generally considered OK to be an
[removed] in community discourse. Disclosure: I have been such an
[removed]. In recent years, in many online communities, a consensus
has grown that things work better when that kind of behavior is
actively discouraged. Another obvious example would be the Linux
kernel community, and I've seen this happen in Apache-land too. Many
(most?) high-visibilty GitHub projects now have a code of conduct.
These days, when you're setting up a new GitHub project that expects
to have a lot of people, the conversation is usually along the lines
of "We should have a CoC, right?" "Right. Let's copy the one from
${Other-Project}."
That's a good description, in my opinion, of what has been happening
over the last decade.
In many of these communities, there has been vigorous resistance to
the cleanup efforts, with people making (to me, tired old) arguments
about how their right to be rude is sacred, and that their input is
being suppressed because of technical prejudice against their
opinions from Those In Power.
I doubt that the first argument about the "right" would be viewed as
convincing in high-visibility communities. As for the second
argument, I would ask for a reference to the technical input and the
decision taken.
Things which were okay in the first few decades of life online might
not be viewed as okay nowadays because social norms have changed.
Regards,
S. Moonesamy
