[OSM-talk] New Logo in the Wiki

[Mikel Maron]

thank you Frederik

 == Mikel Maron ==
+14152835207 @mikel s:mikelmaron




________________________________
From: Frederik Ramm <frederik at remote.org>
To: David Murn <davey at incanberra.com.au>
Cc: talk at openstreetmap.org
Sent: Sun, May 1, 2011 5:21:53 AM
Subject: Re: [OSM-talk] New Logo in the Wiki

Hi,

David Murn wrote:
> Unfortunately, being involved in an OSMF (or SWG, LWG, DWG, etc) meeting
> isnt as easy as 'just showing up'.  Infact, its not even really possible
> to be invovled by reading the minutes or the meeting notes.  Those of us
> who wish to be involved, join public discussions and forums.  Apparently
> those who are actually in the positions of power are no longer
> interested in public discussions and forums.  Exactly how was anyone to
> have 'shown up' to discussions about a new logo, when the first that
> 99.9% of us became aware of the change was when someone asks HERE after
> its already been decided and changed.

Thing is, we have a ton of people who like to have a say, but that's all you 
ever get from them - words. They demand to be informed, so that they can then 
pick and choose where they want to be "involved", where "being involved" means 
that they will say things like "I think this should be done differently".

This, however, is not how things work in OSM. There is hardly any part of OSM 
that is not open for you to participate; OSMF board may be an exception because 
you would actually have to persuade people to vote for you before, but any 
working group will most certainly accept anyone who offers to do a share of the 
work.

What you cannot do is join a working group, do not participate in the work, but 
expect to have a say. You can of course still say things like "I think this 
should be done differently", and you may even get heard, but if you instead say 
"I have made this plan and worked out the following and is everyone ok with me 
implementing that next week?" then you will have 10 times the weight of someone 
saying "this should be done  differently". Or 100 times.

This is something that I had to learn, and still have to learn, as well.  Still, 
I am tempted very often to say my opinion about something where I am not capable 
or not willing to help, and I frequently do - but at least I have learned not to 
complain if those who do the work choose to ignore me. OSM is not a democracy in 
which everyone has equal say with no questions asked. In OSM you have to earn 
your say.

Strategic working group can hardly be said to be doing things "behind closed 
doors", in fact their meeting notes were usually up online HOURS after a meeting 
was over, and meetings were always announced in advance and held on an open IRC 
channel.

From time to time there may be really important things where one would like to 
have a broad input from people in the project. (I don't consider the logo change 
to be one of them.) And I can see that many of those who do the most work in 
this project are meanwhile critical of doing something like a post to talk 
becasue it will attract so many people who  don't help to do the work but 
actually pull the cart in another direction.

In a sane environment you would do it anyway, because any sane person must take 
into account the possibility of being wrong - so that sometimes people pulling 
the cart in another direction might help to prevent a mistake being made. Also, 
in a sane environemnt, for any one person who is disruptive you would attract 
five others, giving you a positive net contribution.

But I - very reluctantly - start to agree with those who say that while it would 
be desirable to involve the community-at-large, the mechanisms we currently have 
seem to somehow not target the community but a handful of malcontents whom you 
cannot please whatever you do. This is an unfortunate dynamic, and we should 
look to other large communities to find out how they deal with it.

Certainly, after this thread, anyone *not* wanting to involve the 
community-at-large will have one more reason.

It would be great if we could somehow reboot and arrive at something sane again. 
This should not be an "us against them" situation on any side.

Bye
Frederik

-- Frederik Ramm  ##  eMail frederik at remote.org  ##  N49°00'09" E008°23'33"

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