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I'm having a hard time following this. Is there a summary of this "Freenode drama" from the sidelines?

by lxe 5y ago

notRobot 5y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27169301 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27169301
guavaNinja 5y ago
https://youtu.be/gKAIazAJuzQ https://youtu.be/gKAIazAJuzQ https://gist.github.com/joepie91/df80d8d36cd9d1bde46ba018af497409/#ok-so-whats-going-on https://gist.github.com/joepie91/df80d8d36cd9d1bde46ba018af4...
enriquto 5y ago
The canonical references on all kinds of drama: Law of Drama: https://xkcd.com/1124/ https://xkcd.com/1124/ Drama: https://xkcd.com/592/ https://xkcd.com/592/ ( after s/sex/irc/g )
Macha 5y ago
Christel, the previous freenode head of staff, sold freenode to andrew lee (then of PIA). This was downplayed at the time, both publicly and to staff, so this is effectively delayed drama that would have happened in 2017 otherwise. Christel stepped down, new staff lead shut out Andrew Lee, not realising the depth of his ownership - helped by both Christel and Andrew Lee downplaying it in the past. When it became clear that "Freenode" was owned by Andrew Lee, and not the volunteer run organisation they believed it to be, drama ensued over whether she had the legal right to (probably yes), whether it was morally appropriate to (probably not) and what she actually sold (Freenode runs via volunteer staff on loaned servers, none of which freenode ltd owns or has contracts for, so it basically just owns a domain and a website). After the legal discussions found that Andrew Lee did legally own whatever freenode itself owned, the staff all quit and formed libera.chat, their own network. Andrew Lee brought in new staff to freenode and some policy changes (notably allowing network ops to reclaim channels that were abandoned as redirects, and toning down the code of conduct portion). More detailed timeline: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27236455 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27236455
- hn-detective 5y ago
  What irks me is that the former staff could have said something along the lines of "it's come to our attention freenode is owned by a privately owned company, something we can't stand behind. Join us at Libera Chat to participate in a truly community-owned network" and everyone would still side with them. Instead, they decided to portray this as a hostile takeover in order to gather further sympathy from the public at large without providing any evidence that Andrew actually planned this. Christel could have cleared any misunderstandings to both sides, yet she is the only person who got anything out of this, with an acquisition and a salary, while Andrew is the target of a smear campaign after spending who knows how much money sponsoring freenode for years, and the staff and community had to create a brand new network after spending who knows how much time on running freenode for years.
  - em-bee 5y ago
    the parent comment and this response are the fairest summary and characterization of the whole debacle. there were misunderstandings on both sides on who owns what, and actions, while initially well-meaning that were influenced by suspicion and mistrust of the other side. mistrust that was caused by those early misunderstandings.
hn-detective 5y ago
Seconding this, and I'd be grateful if anyone could shed light into questions brought up here: Ask HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27253900 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27253900 Timeline document: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27250514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27250514
tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
It doesn't help that various documents refer to the various actors either by their first name, last name, or screen name. Andrew Lee <rasengan> currently controls the freenode domains and is being accused of a hostile takeover. The network was sold to Andrew Lee by Christel Dahlskjaer <christel>, who was head of staff until she resigned in March 2021. The other side seems to be the "staff", which seems to have mostly moved over to the libera.chat side now. Among them <tomaw>, who was elected as head of staff after <christel>'s resignation. What I don't fully understand is the structure of the Freenode network. There's the domain/website, presumably under control of Andrew. There are the individual servers, which as I understand it are under the control of their independent owners/maintainers, some of which are also "staff" but others aren't. There is the nickserv database that is likely under control of Andrew Lee now, although it's unclear on what infrastructure it runs, who owns it, who pays for it, where it is, etc.
- sampo 5y ago
  > Andrew Lee <rasengan> currently controls the freenode domains and is being accused of a hostile takeover. The network was sold to Andrew Lee Doesn't it sound contradictory to be accused of a hostile takeover of something you already own?
  - kelnos 5y ago
    I think the issue is that it's unclear what was actually sold to Lee (possibly just a domain name and a website), because the IRC servers themselves are loaned to the network and are run by volunteers. And when the sale happened, it was downplayed to the other staff members so they believed something not quite the same as what really happened during the sale. The question is really... what is an IRC network, and what constitutes ownership of it? If all the people who own and run the IRC servers themselves change their banner from Freenode to Baznode, and tell people to start connecting to irc.baznode.com instead, then perhaps the entity that owns freenode.com doesn't really own an IRC network? (I know that's not what happened, as Freenode-the-IRC-network is still running as-is, but just presenting it here given that it could happen based on how the servers are run.)

I'm having a hard time following this. Is there a summary of this "Freenode drama" from the sidelines?

by lxe 5y ago

I'm having a hard time following this. Is there a summary of this "Freenode drama" from the sidelines?

notRobot 5y ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27169301 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27169301

guavaNinja 5y ago

https://youtu.be/gKAIazAJuzQ https://youtu.be/gKAIazAJuzQ https://gist.github.com/joepie91/df80d8d36cd9d1bde46ba018af497409/#ok-so-whats-going-on https://gist.github.com/joepie91/df80d8d36cd9d1bde46ba018af4...

enriquto 5y ago

The canonical references on all kinds of drama: Law of Drama: https://xkcd.com/1124/ https://xkcd.com/1124/ Drama: https://xkcd.com/592/ https://xkcd.com/592/ ( after s/sex/irc/g )

Macha 5y ago

Christel, the previous freenode head of staff, sold freenode to andrew lee (then of PIA). This was downplayed at the time, both publicly and to staff, so this is effectively delayed drama that would have happened in 2017 otherwise. Christel stepped down, new staff lead shut out Andrew Lee, not realising the depth of his ownership - helped by both Christel and Andrew Lee downplaying it in the past. When it became clear that "Freenode" was owned by Andrew Lee, and not the volunteer run organisation they believed it to be, drama ensued over whether she had the legal right to (probably yes), whether it was morally appropriate to (probably not) and what she actually sold (Freenode runs via volunteer staff on loaned servers, none of which freenode ltd owns or has contracts for, so it basically just owns a domain and a website). After the legal discussions found that Andrew Lee did legally own whatever freenode itself owned, the staff all quit and formed libera.chat, their own network. Andrew Lee brought in new staff to freenode and some policy changes (notably allowing network ops to reclaim channels that were abandoned as redirects, and toning down the code of conduct portion). More detailed timeline: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27236455 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27236455

hn-detective 5y ago
What irks me is that the former staff could have said something along the lines of "it's come to our attention freenode is owned by a privately owned company, something we can't stand behind. Join us at Libera Chat to participate in a truly community-owned network" and everyone would still side with them. Instead, they decided to portray this as a hostile takeover in order to gather further sympathy from the public at large without providing any evidence that Andrew actually planned this. Christel could have cleared any misunderstandings to both sides, yet she is the only person who got anything out of this, with an acquisition and a salary, while Andrew is the target of a smear campaign after spending who knows how much money sponsoring freenode for years, and the staff and community had to create a brand new network after spending who knows how much time on running freenode for years.
- em-bee 5y ago
  the parent comment and this response are the fairest summary and characterization of the whole debacle. there were misunderstandings on both sides on who owns what, and actions, while initially well-meaning that were influenced by suspicion and mistrust of the other side. mistrust that was caused by those early misunderstandings.

hn-detective 5y ago

Seconding this, and I'd be grateful if anyone could shed light into questions brought up here: Ask HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27253900 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27253900 Timeline document: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27250514 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27250514

tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago

It doesn't help that various documents refer to the various actors either by their first name, last name, or screen name. Andrew Lee <rasengan> currently controls the freenode domains and is being accused of a hostile takeover. The network was sold to Andrew Lee by Christel Dahlskjaer <christel>, who was head of staff until she resigned in March 2021. The other side seems to be the "staff", which seems to have mostly moved over to the libera.chat side now. Among them <tomaw>, who was elected as head of staff after <christel>'s resignation. What I don't fully understand is the structure of the Freenode network. There's the domain/website, presumably under control of Andrew. There are the individual servers, which as I understand it are under the control of their independent owners/maintainers, some of which are also "staff" but others aren't. There is the nickserv database that is likely under control of Andrew Lee now, although it's unclear on what infrastructure it runs, who owns it, who pays for it, where it is, etc.

sampo 5y ago
> Andrew Lee <rasengan> currently controls the freenode domains and is being accused of a hostile takeover. The network was sold to Andrew Lee Doesn't it sound contradictory to be accused of a hostile takeover of something you already own?
- kelnos 5y ago
  I think the issue is that it's unclear what was actually sold to Lee (possibly just a domain name and a website), because the IRC servers themselves are loaned to the network and are run by volunteers. And when the sale happened, it was downplayed to the other staff members so they believed something not quite the same as what really happened during the sale. The question is really... what is an IRC network, and what constitutes ownership of it? If all the people who own and run the IRC servers themselves change their banner from Freenode to Baznode, and tell people to start connecting to irc.baznode.com instead, then perhaps the entity that owns freenode.com doesn't really own an IRC network? (I know that's not what happened, as Freenode-the-IRC-network is still running as-is, but just presenting it here given that it could happen based on how the servers are run.)