Sooo... People recovering from last night party hangover as I'm
typing, attending the first talk of the day. And suddenly, an idea
crossed my mind: in order to satisfy Aaron Seigo megalomania, we
should start an "Aaron Seigo's facts" website. Here is my first
contribution to it:
*"Aaron doesn't have a God complex, it is God who has an Aaron complex".*
Hugs everyone!
If anyone out there wonder why
[Aaron Seigo's blog](http://aseigo.blogspot.com) is down, the
reason is pretty simple... Its author got burnt out because of some
of the poisonous people in our project. The story started several
weeks ago (probably even months ago) with constant bashing of some
of the decisions taken in the Plasma project (which is not a one
person project by the way). It culminated last week with very rude
and useless mail threads on kde-devel, and yesterday on the dot
with personal attacks.
That's why Aaron decided to retire from the public and do what he
truely loves: code. No more blogs, minimal involvement on lists and
IRC to ensure coordination with the other developers. That's what
we obtained after those weeks of angry poisonous mobs. You might
think: "well you can ignore them". Really? Could you? Such people
can bring a lot of stop energy. Really a lot of it, and that
worries me. It seems that the project I love is not a nice place to
live in anymore.
When we are able to turn down one of our public face, someone very
active and energetic, we really crossed a line. Of course, we could
shake head, and think "tsss, those poisonous people, they've no
idea what they're doing". That's even probably what we did during
those weeks of bashing... and still we let it happen. I think
that's the most frightening side of the issue: nobody stepped up,
and no actions are taken to make KDE a better place again. Oh, and
don't worry, I have my share of guilt in this story... I didn't
step up either.
Worse than the stop energy carried by poisonous people, there's the
apathy of your peers. I don't want that anymore! We have to end
it!
Of course, I'd like to propose a way out, but I've not much to
propose. Here are my attempts at bringing some improvements
proposing some actions which could be taken (in no particular
order):
- Recruit more editors for the dot, as far as I know they're
overbooked and can hardly moderate it;
- To help the dot editors, we have to improve it's engine with a
real moderation system (how come most news site I know have one but
not the dot?);
- Write a code of conduct (probably something for the e.V.
membership), and publish it as soon as possible;
- Enforce it, especially on mailing lists and on bugzilla,
mediating as necessary, and banning people in the most extreme
cases.
That's definitely not much, but that's a start... More ideas are
welcome, but most of all: acts are needed. We must stop this kind
of behavior.
PS: I'm not linking any thread, bugreport or mails on purpose. I
don't want to point finger. Aaron's reaction is a symptom of
something broken in our community (in the broad sense, all
contributors and users included) it's just an example (and not the
first case). If you want specifics, do your homework and dig our
archives it's all public anyway.
So two weeks ago was my last day in Calgary. Aaron basically
explained a lot of stuff already and he's a much better blogger
than I am. That's why I won't add much... That said, I'll keep a
particular thought from the day trip in
[Banff](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banff_National_Park) which was
truely amazing. The Canadian Rockies are a very specific landscape,
the shape of the mountains looked exotic to me. Such a perfect
day.
Also, to be fair, Aaron told about a particular chipmunk we met
there. No, I don't have fifty pictures or it, and yes I have twenty
pictures of it... So, for the first time, let me introduce in all
his glory, and in FullHD(tm), Bob Chipmunk!
I usually don't write "qotd" posts, but I really had to share this
one!
**
** so yes, now you can just mention ovulation and i'll
come a 'runnin
'nough said... :-)
While discussing some Plasma related stuff with Aaron, I raised
some concerns about the name "plasmoid" used for Plasma applets:
[00:04:54]
well that's just another name for "plasma
applets" ;)
[00:05:05] 'plasmets' :D
[00:05:09] plaslets?
[00:05:10] ahaha
[00:05:23] GET OUT OF MY HEAD! ;)
[00:05:25] stop reading my mind :p
[00:05:30] rofl
[00:05:32] d'oh! :D
So now, I have a proof! Aaron has a mind reading device (possibly a
plasmoid)! Or we simply have a kind of mental connection... scary!
Well, that reminds me that I have a "teleporter plasmoid" on my
TODO...
