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#GatersGonnaGate On a more serious tone: this level of "I'm offended by []" is actually becoming counter productive. It's pushing talented, good people, with c

by pmlnr 7y ago

#GatersGonnaGate On a more serious tone: this level of "I'm offended by []" is actually becoming counter productive. It's pushing talented, good people, with controversial lifestyle/opinion out of open source, out of the very thing that, in theory, should welcome contributions from anyone as long as it's technically sound and clear. (Related read I found this morning: https://mikkel.hoegh.org/2017/04/18/why-i-care-about-drupal-drama https://mikkel.hoegh.org/2017/04/18/why-i-care-about-drupal-... ) Can we please go back to the nobody knows you're a dog times with pseudonyms and everything? EDIT: "nobody knows you're a dog" requires the one behind the pseudonym to stay faceless and the community accept that anyone can be behind a pseudonym and approach the contribution/work/etc without assumptions. It's hard. It's never been properly done, but maybe it's time for this.

algesten 7y ago
It's not a simple as that. Good open source collaboration often requires team work. Peoples' beliefs manifest in how they interact with other people. The code of conduct moderate that interaction. It's not uncommon to see arguments that start in disagreement around technical details escalate into full blown ad hominem attacks. This happened also in the olden days (linux kernel dev comes to mind), and it was never ok.
0xB31B1B 7y ago
The problem isn’t pseudonyms, it’s assholes. People have worse behavior with pseudonymous accounts. Part of the problem with open source, or any large project or group, is that toxic personalities can “poison” the project and reduce overall output even if the toxic person is high performing.
koolba 7y ago
It’s difficult to parlay work done under a pseudonym into a paying gig. Personal branding becomes particularly difficult as getting paid becomes two steps short of a money laundering operation.
- pmlnr 7y ago
  pseudonym != anonymity It's like a stage name, a face, a persona, for a specific purpose. Under that persona one should keep focused on the topic, within the guidelines, etc. but outside they could be their own person. Simple example: if the current trend continues, soon listening to certain music will become a problem. If someone listens to nordic black metal in their free time, outside of work communities, including online ones, so be it, because it has nothing to do with work communities. This would require communities to respect and realize the need for this.
  - goatinaboat 7y ago
    soon listening to certain music will become a problem Most rap is violently misogynistic and homophobic, that’s another example. I don’t know if anyone was ever ostracised from a tech conference for listening to Eminem though.
human20190310 7y ago
Pseudonyms should be allowed if that's what people want for themselves, but that doesn't solve the problem of people who want to use their real identity but might be targeted for harassment as a result. Pseudonymity by expectation is akin to requiring everyone to be "in the closet", even if they feel it's important for them not to be.
timw4mail 7y ago
Anonymity also avoids unproductive and abusive viewpoint and history shaming. What political party I belong to (or don't), or what position I hold on a controversial issue will almost never have any bearing on how well I can accomplish a programming task.
- maxerickson 7y ago
  Of course, collaboration is not just a series of programming tasks.
rimunroe 7y ago
> It's pushing talented, good people, with controversial lifestyle/opinion out of open source, out of the very thing that, in theory, should welcome contributions from anyone as long as it's technically sound and clear. What if the people who are being pushed out have been pushing other people out this whole time? People complain a lot about losing talented/high-profile developers because they made parts of the community uncomfortable, but then seem to ignore/minimize the way that person was driving other talented people--often from underrepresented/marginalized groups--away.
- pmlnr 7y ago
  It may have been when these scandals started many moons ago and there are always exceptions to anything, but from what I've been reading for the past ~2 years, this is not the case any more. People being pushed out are, in many if not most cases those who have a personal life, with personal view on life, which other can't accept, despite the fact that those views and their work are usually well separated from each other.
  - 0xB31B1B 7y ago
    I don’t think they write articles/scandals on the huge amount of harassment people receive just for being a woman on the internet, or black on the internet. The reality is that (1) everyone gets harassed online (2) black people get harassed more than white people (3) women get harassed much much more than men. If all you’re reading is articles about “gates” then of course it seems like there is an assault on a specific type of person, but you need to adjust your priors to understand that many women receive that volume of abuse much more frequently and no one is writing articles on it. There might be acute attacks on individuals in scandals, but there is a constant mid to high level harassment on some individuals.
    - pmlnr 7y ago
      I've not challenged or questioned your points. The scandals, CoC, []Gate, on the other hand, doesn't really seems to be working, because they keep popping up. Hence the thought of pseudonyms.

by pmlnr 7y ago

algesten 7y ago

It's not a simple as that. Good open source collaboration often requires team work. Peoples' beliefs manifest in how they interact with other people. The code of conduct moderate that interaction. It's not uncommon to see arguments that start in disagreement around technical details escalate into full blown ad hominem attacks. This happened also in the olden days (linux kernel dev comes to mind), and it was never ok.

0xB31B1B 7y ago

The problem isn’t pseudonyms, it’s assholes. People have worse behavior with pseudonymous accounts. Part of the problem with open source, or any large project or group, is that toxic personalities can “poison” the project and reduce overall output even if the toxic person is high performing.

koolba 7y ago

It’s difficult to parlay work done under a pseudonym into a paying gig. Personal branding becomes particularly difficult as getting paid becomes two steps short of a money laundering operation.

pmlnr 7y ago
pseudonym != anonymity It's like a stage name, a face, a persona, for a specific purpose. Under that persona one should keep focused on the topic, within the guidelines, etc. but outside they could be their own person. Simple example: if the current trend continues, soon listening to certain music will become a problem. If someone listens to nordic black metal in their free time, outside of work communities, including online ones, so be it, because it has nothing to do with work communities. This would require communities to respect and realize the need for this.
- goatinaboat 7y ago
  soon listening to certain music will become a problem Most rap is violently misogynistic and homophobic, that’s another example. I don’t know if anyone was ever ostracised from a tech conference for listening to Eminem though.

human20190310 7y ago

Pseudonyms should be allowed if that's what people want for themselves, but that doesn't solve the problem of people who want to use their real identity but might be targeted for harassment as a result. Pseudonymity by expectation is akin to requiring everyone to be "in the closet", even if they feel it's important for them not to be.

timw4mail 7y ago

Anonymity also avoids unproductive and abusive viewpoint and history shaming. What political party I belong to (or don't), or what position I hold on a controversial issue will almost never have any bearing on how well I can accomplish a programming task.

maxerickson 7y ago
Of course, collaboration is not just a series of programming tasks.

rimunroe 7y ago

> It's pushing talented, good people, with controversial lifestyle/opinion out of open source, out of the very thing that, in theory, should welcome contributions from anyone as long as it's technically sound and clear. What if the people who are being pushed out have been pushing other people out this whole time? People complain a lot about losing talented/high-profile developers because they made parts of the community uncomfortable, but then seem to ignore/minimize the way that person was driving other talented people--often from underrepresented/marginalized groups--away.

pmlnr 7y ago
It may have been when these scandals started many moons ago and there are always exceptions to anything, but from what I've been reading for the past ~2 years, this is not the case any more. People being pushed out are, in many if not most cases those who have a personal life, with personal view on life, which other can't accept, despite the fact that those views and their work are usually well separated from each other.
- 0xB31B1B 7y ago
  I don’t think they write articles/scandals on the huge amount of harassment people receive just for being a woman on the internet, or black on the internet. The reality is that (1) everyone gets harassed online (2) black people get harassed more than white people (3) women get harassed much much more than men. If all you’re reading is articles about “gates” then of course it seems like there is an assault on a specific type of person, but you need to adjust your priors to understand that many women receive that volume of abuse much more frequently and no one is writing articles on it. There might be acute attacks on individuals in scandals, but there is a constant mid to high level harassment on some individuals.
  - pmlnr 7y ago
    I've not challenged or questioned your points. The scandals, CoC, []Gate, on the other hand, doesn't really seems to be working, because they keep popping up. Hence the thought of pseudonyms.