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> But a lot of open source projects have a mailing list / Slack / gitter / IRC channel for discussion. I haven’t really figured this out yet because the social

> But a lot of open source projects have a mailing list / Slack / gitter / IRC channel for discussion. I haven’t really figured this out yet because the social norms are kind of unclear to me (there are often hundreds or thousands of people in the Kubernetes Slack channels and I don’t know almost any of them), but it seems like something I should figure out. Glad to know I'm not the only person who is intimidated by talking in a large open source chat room.

anewhnaccount2 9y ago
In my experience, usually the worst that will happen is that you'll get ignored. In that case, you can try making your question simpler or just go back and try and figure it out on your own (possibly coming back with another question later on). Usually, you're not really any worse off than if you don't ask at all.
- acdha 9y ago
  I think people worry that they'll hit one of the rare but bad outlier responses. A good sign of project health are things like codes of conduct and other social cues that this isn't tolerated in that community.
  - chickenfries 9y ago
    I think the thing that really intimidates me is not seeing other people asking beginner level questions. If I see a channel for newbie questions or I see that people are asking newbie questions I feel welcome. If I can't easily see something like that I feel like I'm intruding in a chat for "real" contributors.
pantalaimon 9y ago
Maybe it's because I'm familiar with IRC culture, this never was an issue for me, but when you are writing to an IRC channel you are not bothering anyone. IRC clients don't usually have the habit of notifying you when someone writes in a channel. So when one checks irc, one makes the conscious decision to wanting to talk to someone or see what's going on. Usually not much, so any constructive contribution is welcome. When there is an ongoing discussion, it's of course better to wait for it to come to a conclusion before introducing a new idea, but that's not unique to irc.
deleted 9y ago
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anewhnaccount2 9y ago

In my experience, usually the worst that will happen is that you'll get ignored. In that case, you can try making your question simpler or just go back and try and figure it out on your own (possibly coming back with another question later on). Usually, you're not really any worse off than if you don't ask at all.

acdha 9y ago
I think people worry that they'll hit one of the rare but bad outlier responses. A good sign of project health are things like codes of conduct and other social cues that this isn't tolerated in that community.
- chickenfries 9y ago
  I think the thing that really intimidates me is not seeing other people asking beginner level questions. If I see a channel for newbie questions or I see that people are asking newbie questions I feel welcome. If I can't easily see something like that I feel like I'm intruding in a chat for "real" contributors.

pantalaimon 9y ago

Maybe it's because I'm familiar with IRC culture, this never was an issue for me, but when you are writing to an IRC channel you are not bothering anyone. IRC clients don't usually have the habit of notifying you when someone writes in a channel. So when one checks irc, one makes the conscious decision to wanting to talk to someone or see what's going on. Usually not much, so any constructive contribution is welcome. When there is an ongoing discussion, it's of course better to wait for it to come to a conclusion before introducing a new idea, but that's not unique to irc.

deleted 9y ago

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