4 ms·

NixOS Foundation board: Giving power to the community

33 points by Macha 3y ago

srid 3y ago
Related submissions: Open letter to the NixOS foundation (50 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40107370 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40107370 The dire state of NixOS's moderation culture (87 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40166912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40166912 --- Additionally, these r/NixOS submissions may be of interest: Jon Ringer: "In case I'm unable to return, wish you all the best" (348 comments) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cd5fod/in_case_im_unable_to_return_wish_you_all_the_best/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cd5fod/in_case_im_u... Transparency about jonringer’s suspension (153 comments) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceeg8h/transparency_about_jonringers_suspension/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceeg8h/transparency... Thoughts on Jon Ringer's temporary suspension (71 comments) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceiz36/thoughts_on_jon_ringers_temporary_suspension/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceiz36/thoughts_on_... Moderation no-go zones (55 comments; ongoing) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cfv8vo/moderation_nogo_zones/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cfv8vo/moderation_n... --- Finally, the RFC to improve the situation: https://github.com/NixOS/rfcs/pull/175 https://github.com/NixOS/rfcs/pull/175
- _cenw 2y ago
  You forgot this one: https://github.com/NixOS/moderation/commit/e9d67b7efa03e6e9bc0bf2d03c6344d60c103395 https://github.com/NixOS/moderation/commit/e9d67b7efa03e6e9b...
  - anonfordays 2y ago
    That thread just makes me believe srid even more. Salient point here: "Evidently, Srid's concerns and values, as well as the recommendations and compromises he proposed in response to the charges, were casually dismissed, while other members' concerns and values, as well as their calls for his punishment and sanction, were disproportionately elevated. And that's unfortunate."
    - _cenw 2y ago
      I'm not sure what there is to believe. Srid started relitigating his impending suspension over the moderation teams head when it became clear that his values do not align with the moderators (or, if I can say that, most decent people that don't see left-wing conspiracies everywhere, casually go on about gender ideology destroying the west and perpetuate covid denial - so also likely the modified CoC of Nix). That is the worst way to go about challenging authority you don't like if you don't want bridges to burn.
      - anonfordays 2y ago
        >Srid started relitigating his impending suspension over the moderation teams head I haven't been closely monitoring the various NixOS spaces, but this seems nebulous. >it became clear that his values do not align with the moderators Nor should there be a requirement that they do. If you want an inclusive environment, you're going to have members with different values. >(or, if I can say that, most decent people that don't see left-wing conspiracies everywhere, casually go on about gender ideology destroying the west and perpetuate covid denial - so also likely the modified CoC of Nix) (or, if I can say that, most decent people that don't see right-wing conspiracies everywhere, casually go on about Christo-fascism destroying the west and perpetuate biological denial - so also likely the modified CoC of Nix) See what I did there? You don't get to define your political ideals as the ones "decent people" align with. All sides believe they're moral.
        _cenw 2y ago
        It's in the thread I linked, the very post you quoted. He started a poll to ask if he should be banned over him posting the "unwoke" page of his digital garden, when the stipulation he already preliminarily agreed to was to not bring it up in Nix spaces. An organization that allows for persistent relitigating and rules-lawyering can't have effective moderation (they're not countries after all), do I don't know what you think the alternative is. And now the same people that want (impossibly) apolitical spaces want this guy to also be able to post this very political rant that you've probably heard before somewhere in some form, that everyone else is endlessly tired of. https://srid.ca/unwoke https://srid.ca/unwoke - in case you are missing more context.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
emptysongglass 3y ago
This looks like Eelco was forced into a corner by a base of progressive extremists who wield terms like "concern trolling" and "sealioning" as weapons to crush dissent. There are a number of comments in the thread of this announcement that are gray-text reported as "off topic" despite their restrained and on-topic tone. One commenter, dedguy21, has all of his comments flagged asking what exactly they're protecting minorities from until they finally admit they're a black man. This is all pretty bad news for discourse in open source projects. And no, I'm not "concern trolling". We see it in action in the announcement thread, where dissenting opinions are pushed out of sight. That we've come to a point where people are simply washed out of view for "harmful" rhetoric that isn't some particularly dominant viewpoint is a regression of discourse.
- _cenw 2y ago
  I'd be interested to hear what you think was happening here, and if anything that happened here or could possibly happen could be considered concern trolling or sealioning, of if those are just woke concepts to be disregarded in its entirety.
  - rgoulter 2y ago
    > concern trolling or sealioning, of if those are just woke concepts to be disregarded in its entirety. Using terms like "concern trolling" or "sealioning" definitely marks cultural identity. Considering the term "sealioning": https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/sealioning-internet-trolling https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/sealioning-internet... I recall the original comic was along the lines of a sea lion arguing to the point of following someone into their bedroom. -- I think the idea of taking an argument to places where it's not appropriate is universal. Merriam Webster's definition is much more belligerent: 'something that appears civil, but actually the civility is disingenuous, and they're only arguing to be a jerk to you'. -- I think there's a good reason why e.g. HN guidelines suggest to try and see arguments in a good light.
    - _cenw 2y ago
      Would you consider Jon's behavior in the thread that contributed to him being banned (https://discourse.nixos.org/t/objection-to-minority-representation-by-a-single-class-in-nixos-sponsorship-policy/42968 https://discourse.nixos.org/t/objection-to-minority-represen... - this was not the sole reason) to be "the disingenuous action by a commenter of making an ostensible effort to engage in sincere and serious civil debate, usually by asking persistent questions of the other commenter. These questions are phrased in a way that may come off as an effort to learn and engage with the subject at hand, but are really intended to erode the goodwill of the person to whom they are replying, to get them to appear impatient or to lash out, and therefore come off as unreasonable" You don't have to reply with a yes or no. I'm just wondering if you see the traces, and then we can put the difference down to how much benefit of the doubt we each give to potentially bad actors based on how frequently we encounter them.
devaiops9001 2y ago
[flagged]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
phendrenad2 2y ago
It sounds like the community had power, and now they do not.
lfmunoz4 2y ago
As an engineer don't get any of this drama. Can someone summarize what this is all about? From what I had the patience to read people are getting censored on the Nix chat? How does this effect Nix on a technical level? Was the censoring related specially to technical debates?
- bennyhill 2y ago
  It seems to me like the primary claim is that no one is providing people management. I'm not really convinced that anyone wants to do that for free or that anyone technical wants to spend free time engaging with an organization that organizationally identical to an employer.
- rgoulter 2y ago
  > As an engineer don't get any of this drama. Since the rise of social media at least a decade ago, tech has seen all kinds of "dramas". > Can someone summarize what this is all about? From what I had the patience to read people are getting censored on the Nix chat? Any summary is going to be biased/motivated by who's doing the summarising. -- There are some summaries in some of the other HN threads. (See some top level comments). e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40115567 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40115567 this comment seems to summarize the concerns held by people in the letter. What seems to have drawn the most heat is "Anduril (builds military weapons) sponsors Nix" and "moderation doesn't ban bad people". The latter draws a lot of heated discussion, since people frustrated with the moderators both have a "good vs evil" fighting mentality, & a desire for broad powers to ban. (Or on the flipside, I guess: since there are so many bad actors & the moderators don't have power to ban them). FWIW, I think the term "suspended" would be more appropriate than "censored". > How does this effect Nix on a technical level? Was the censoring related specially to technical debates? The moderation actions have never been over technical posts. Some of the open letter signatories have opted to no longer contribute to Nix. One of these was a top-5 contributor to the Nixpkgs repository. Anduril is a gold sponsor of the NixCon 2024 event. To the extent that the letter signatories are a significant chunk of nixpkgs contributors, these contributions are lost. -- Perhaps to the extent that most people agree (or disagree) with stuff like in the letter, might discourage people from joining the community depending on how the moderation gets done.

33 points by Macha 3y ago

srid 3y ago

Related submissions: Open letter to the NixOS foundation (50 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40107370 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40107370 The dire state of NixOS's moderation culture (87 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40166912 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40166912 --- Additionally, these r/NixOS submissions may be of interest: Jon Ringer: "In case I'm unable to return, wish you all the best" (348 comments) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cd5fod/in_case_im_unable_to_return_wish_you_all_the_best/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cd5fod/in_case_im_u... Transparency about jonringer’s suspension (153 comments) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceeg8h/transparency_about_jonringers_suspension/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceeg8h/transparency... Thoughts on Jon Ringer's temporary suspension (71 comments) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceiz36/thoughts_on_jon_ringers_temporary_suspension/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1ceiz36/thoughts_on_... Moderation no-go zones (55 comments; ongoing) https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cfv8vo/moderation_nogo_zones/ https://old.reddit.com/r/NixOS/comments/1cfv8vo/moderation_n... --- Finally, the RFC to improve the situation: https://github.com/NixOS/rfcs/pull/175 https://github.com/NixOS/rfcs/pull/175

_cenw 2y ago
You forgot this one: https://github.com/NixOS/moderation/commit/e9d67b7efa03e6e9bc0bf2d03c6344d60c103395 https://github.com/NixOS/moderation/commit/e9d67b7efa03e6e9b...
- anonfordays 2y ago
  That thread just makes me believe srid even more. Salient point here: "Evidently, Srid's concerns and values, as well as the recommendations and compromises he proposed in response to the charges, were casually dismissed, while other members' concerns and values, as well as their calls for his punishment and sanction, were disproportionately elevated. And that's unfortunate."
  - _cenw 2y ago
    I'm not sure what there is to believe. Srid started relitigating his impending suspension over the moderation teams head when it became clear that his values do not align with the moderators (or, if I can say that, most decent people that don't see left-wing conspiracies everywhere, casually go on about gender ideology destroying the west and perpetuate covid denial - so also likely the modified CoC of Nix). That is the worst way to go about challenging authority you don't like if you don't want bridges to burn.
    - anonfordays 2y ago
      >Srid started relitigating his impending suspension over the moderation teams head I haven't been closely monitoring the various NixOS spaces, but this seems nebulous. >it became clear that his values do not align with the moderators Nor should there be a requirement that they do. If you want an inclusive environment, you're going to have members with different values. >(or, if I can say that, most decent people that don't see left-wing conspiracies everywhere, casually go on about gender ideology destroying the west and perpetuate covid denial - so also likely the modified CoC of Nix) (or, if I can say that, most decent people that don't see right-wing conspiracies everywhere, casually go on about Christo-fascism destroying the west and perpetuate biological denial - so also likely the modified CoC of Nix) See what I did there? You don't get to define your political ideals as the ones "decent people" align with. All sides believe they're moral.
      - _cenw 2y ago
        It's in the thread I linked, the very post you quoted. He started a poll to ask if he should be banned over him posting the "unwoke" page of his digital garden, when the stipulation he already preliminarily agreed to was to not bring it up in Nix spaces. An organization that allows for persistent relitigating and rules-lawyering can't have effective moderation (they're not countries after all), do I don't know what you think the alternative is. And now the same people that want (impossibly) apolitical spaces want this guy to also be able to post this very political rant that you've probably heard before somewhere in some form, that everyone else is endlessly tired of. https://srid.ca/unwoke https://srid.ca/unwoke - in case you are missing more context.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

emptysongglass 3y ago

This looks like Eelco was forced into a corner by a base of progressive extremists who wield terms like "concern trolling" and "sealioning" as weapons to crush dissent. There are a number of comments in the thread of this announcement that are gray-text reported as "off topic" despite their restrained and on-topic tone. One commenter, dedguy21, has all of his comments flagged asking what exactly they're protecting minorities from until they finally admit they're a black man. This is all pretty bad news for discourse in open source projects. And no, I'm not "concern trolling". We see it in action in the announcement thread, where dissenting opinions are pushed out of sight. That we've come to a point where people are simply washed out of view for "harmful" rhetoric that isn't some particularly dominant viewpoint is a regression of discourse.

_cenw 2y ago
I'd be interested to hear what you think was happening here, and if anything that happened here or could possibly happen could be considered concern trolling or sealioning, of if those are just woke concepts to be disregarded in its entirety.
- rgoulter 2y ago
  > concern trolling or sealioning, of if those are just woke concepts to be disregarded in its entirety. Using terms like "concern trolling" or "sealioning" definitely marks cultural identity. Considering the term "sealioning": https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/sealioning-internet-trolling https://www.merriam-webster.com/wordplay/sealioning-internet... I recall the original comic was along the lines of a sea lion arguing to the point of following someone into their bedroom. -- I think the idea of taking an argument to places where it's not appropriate is universal. Merriam Webster's definition is much more belligerent: 'something that appears civil, but actually the civility is disingenuous, and they're only arguing to be a jerk to you'. -- I think there's a good reason why e.g. HN guidelines suggest to try and see arguments in a good light.
  - _cenw 2y ago
    Would you consider Jon's behavior in the thread that contributed to him being banned (https://discourse.nixos.org/t/objection-to-minority-representation-by-a-single-class-in-nixos-sponsorship-policy/42968 https://discourse.nixos.org/t/objection-to-minority-represen... - this was not the sole reason) to be "the disingenuous action by a commenter of making an ostensible effort to engage in sincere and serious civil debate, usually by asking persistent questions of the other commenter. These questions are phrased in a way that may come off as an effort to learn and engage with the subject at hand, but are really intended to erode the goodwill of the person to whom they are replying, to get them to appear impatient or to lash out, and therefore come off as unreasonable" You don't have to reply with a yes or no. I'm just wondering if you see the traces, and then we can put the difference down to how much benefit of the doubt we each give to potentially bad actors based on how frequently we encounter them.

devaiops9001 2y ago

[flagged]

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

phendrenad2 2y ago

It sounds like the community had power, and now they do not.

lfmunoz4 2y ago

As an engineer don't get any of this drama. Can someone summarize what this is all about? From what I had the patience to read people are getting censored on the Nix chat? How does this effect Nix on a technical level? Was the censoring related specially to technical debates?

bennyhill 2y ago
It seems to me like the primary claim is that no one is providing people management. I'm not really convinced that anyone wants to do that for free or that anyone technical wants to spend free time engaging with an organization that organizationally identical to an employer.
rgoulter 2y ago
> As an engineer don't get any of this drama. Since the rise of social media at least a decade ago, tech has seen all kinds of "dramas". > Can someone summarize what this is all about? From what I had the patience to read people are getting censored on the Nix chat? Any summary is going to be biased/motivated by who's doing the summarising. -- There are some summaries in some of the other HN threads. (See some top level comments). e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40115567 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40115567 this comment seems to summarize the concerns held by people in the letter. What seems to have drawn the most heat is "Anduril (builds military weapons) sponsors Nix" and "moderation doesn't ban bad people". The latter draws a lot of heated discussion, since people frustrated with the moderators both have a "good vs evil" fighting mentality, & a desire for broad powers to ban. (Or on the flipside, I guess: since there are so many bad actors & the moderators don't have power to ban them). FWIW, I think the term "suspended" would be more appropriate than "censored". > How does this effect Nix on a technical level? Was the censoring related specially to technical debates? The moderation actions have never been over technical posts. Some of the open letter signatories have opted to no longer contribute to Nix. One of these was a top-5 contributor to the Nixpkgs repository. Anduril is a gold sponsor of the NixCon 2024 event. To the extent that the letter signatories are a significant chunk of nixpkgs contributors, these contributions are lost. -- Perhaps to the extent that most people agree (or disagree) with stuff like in the letter, might discourage people from joining the community depending on how the moderation gets done.