Re: [tsc-devel] RFC: Voting rules draft

Chris Jacobsen | Tue, 21 Jul 2015 06:48:24 UTC

>Yes, but it is too vague. It must be avoided that there is any dispute

about whether someone is allowed to vote or not; the issue that is voted
upon is controverse enough, further complicating it by having an
argument about whether someone has done enough for TSC to be able to
vote seems not very good to me. At vote time, I want a criterion that
can quickly be determined without dispute.

There could be two methods by which people are added to the team:
1) Based on commits - people who obviously have lots of commits (or lots of content in their
commits) are just added to the organization by a team admin.  The admin could optionally send
an email to the team.  If people have objections, a vote is then taken, possibly removing them.
2) Based on non-content-contributions - Existing team members can nominate people at any time
along with a reason for the suggestion.  If there is any question, a vote is taken.  This is,
as you said, a bit more subjective, so it is based on discussion and possibly a vote.

In both cases these people are added to our organization, which is then used for votes.


> That document included a paragraph that said that everybody who had at

least one commit accepted into the “devel” branch was eligable to be
added to the GitHub organisation.

There are many kinds of work that do not necessarily produce commits:
* Beta testing
* Forums discussions or administration
* IRC discussions or administration
* Server administration

* Story writing


If someone is a proven-enough contributor in one or more of these areas, it may warrant voting
power.  As mentioned above, though, discussion and possibly a vote would be needed to add them
to the team.

> As for removal, it said that after somebody did not interact with the

project for one year, he should be removed automatically from the
organisation.

This is probably reasonable.  I had thought 6 months was too short.  We may have to discuss
how interaction with the project is defined, though; we may not want to be too demanding of
people, so as to encourage volunteer work.

> I don’t think I’ve seen him taking part in IRC discussions much. He did

contribute the French translation, yes, but I am unsure if I’d have that
suffice for team membership. To be fair, I’d say the same about danfun
for example.

giby is a lot more available in IRC than some of the main team members.  I usually have to ask
people to show up in IRC.  In danfun64's case, he only contributed to the story, while giby
contributed both the Transifex idea and work towards the French translation.

I could possibly see a case being made not to add giby until he makes more contributions (content or non
content based).  You do have valid points you have brought up regarding his team membership.  I
do think he is getting close, though.  I would be curious what others on the team think, too.


He probably is not going to be too concerned about missing this vote for god mode, since he did
not participate in the tracker discussion.  Thus it would seem reasonable just to take that vote
without him and resolve the question of his team membership separately.

> In short, if I grant someone

team membership, I expect him to care enough about the project to
actually follow the development, make contributions or participate in
discussions more or less regularyly, and make use of the vote right he
has. People who are at the edge of vanishing shouldn’t be included into
the team.

Did you remove aakburns from the team?  I remember you had added him earlier.
Is tristan still involved in the project?  I don't want to discourage him, but I don't think
he has contributed much content or discussion in a while.

I'm not eager to boot people off the team in a rush; as you said these discussions must be
handled carefully to prevent sore feelings.

> Please don’t read this as an offender; I’m only outlining the views I

have on the topic and don’t want to attack anybody personally. I want to
find objective criteria that allow a good judgement of the right to vote
and team membership, that’s all.

I do not see anyone as an offender.  As always we should try to come to agreement via discussion
if possible and take a vote if that is not possible.

-datahead