The early days of setuptools/easy_install (around 2004) were interesting. The way I remember it, the main developer had a clear "don't ask for permission, just

The early days of setuptools/easy_install (around 2004) were interesting. The way I remember it, the main developer had a clear "don't ask for permission, just build what you think is best and put it out there" approach. That avoids the problems you can get where everything gets discussed to death and nothing actually gets written, but the downside was that the project spent a long time in an uneasy situation where it didn't have complete official buy-in but was popular enough that it would have been hard to push an alternative. There were a couple of questionable early design decisions that didn't help.