Subject: Re: Community Issues ** LONG **
To: Herb Peyerl <hpeyerl@beer.org>
From: Julian Assange <proff@iq.org>
List: current-users
Date: 02/23/1999 07:17:08
Herb Peyerl <hpeyerl@beer.org> writes:

> This needs volunteers who will actually stick with it, be dedicated, and
> form a real PR department.  I'm about sucked-dry as it is.

What this needs is `people-with-power' in NetBSD
*actively-approaching* people who are NOT ace kernel
hackers. Currently `ace kernel hacking' seems to be the only
optimisation parameter in the NetBSD meritocracy. This view *needs to
be changed*. This is one area that Jordon was very successful in, no
doubt partly because he was not himself a kernel programmer of any
note. For example the FreeBSD documentation project was quite
successful in handing out cvs access to people who might not be great
coders, but who could write documentation.

We could do a lot on working towards a greater sense of inclusiveness.
For example, instead of waiting for people to hound core for cvs
access, core could *actively approach* those people who looked like
they might make a useful contribution in the future. A sense of
ownership will increase both productivity and code-quality. I often
see NetBSD patches on someone's home page, occasional quite good ones,
and am saddened to realise that the person concerned doesn't have cvs
access.

--
Julian Assange          <proff@iq.org>           http://iq.org/~proff

France is a dog-hole.
    - William Shakespeare, _All's Well That Ends Well_