board candidates: tell me about transparency
All of the people nominated for the PSF board are good people who will do good things. If things were running smooth, I wouldn't really care who gets elected. But once again, we see people asking questions due to lack of transparency. So once again, I ask: What will you do about it? -- Carl K
Stand for the board and make sure it becomes more transparent? S Steve Holden On Sat, May 28, 2016 at 3:15 PM, Carl Karsten <carl@personnelware.com> wrote:
All of the people nominated for the PSF board are good people who will do good things. If things were running smooth, I wouldn't really care who gets elected.
But once again, we see people asking questions due to lack of transparency.
So once again, I ask: What will you do about it?
-- Carl K
_______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
User testing? On Sat, May 28, 2016 at 12:02 PM, Steve Holden <steve@holdenweb.com> wrote:
Stand for the board and make sure it becomes more transparent? S
Steve Holden
On Sat, May 28, 2016 at 3:15 PM, Carl Karsten <carl@personnelware.com> wrote:
All of the people nominated for the PSF board are good people who will do good things. If things were running smooth, I wouldn't really care who gets elected.
But once again, we see people asking questions due to lack of transparency.
So once again, I ask: What will you do about it?
-- Carl K
_______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
_______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
-- Jacqueline Kazil | @jackiekazil
One thing we could do is publish agendas either in full or in part before the Board meetings. This could give time for members to express opinions and concerns to the Board. I am not a current Board member, and won't know until Tuesday if I am going to be a Board member, and haven't spoken with any existing Board members to see if this is possible. We might be doing this already, and I'm just not aware of it. My take on the recent discussion is that many felt blindsided by the decision, and publishing agendas in advance of the meeting might alleviate that concern.
On May 28, 2016, at 07:15, Carl Karsten <carl@personnelware.com> wrote:
All of the people nominated for the PSF board are good people who will do good things. If things were running smooth, I wouldn't really care who gets elected.
But once again, we see people asking questions due to lack of transparency.
So once again, I ask: What will you do about it?
-- Carl K
_______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
Before I was on the board, I also used to wonder what was being discussed behind closed doors. Spoiler alert: it's far less exciting than you might expect. As Tim Peters once put it: "Exciting as watching rocks sleep? Yup, but essential - the glory of serving on the Board isn't for everyone ;-)". Having now served on the board, I can confirm that the meeting minutes published every few weeks pretty accurately reflect our actionable discussions. These twice monthly meetings are an hour long which doesn't leave much time for real discussion. For the most part, these meetings are just used to cast votes on the resolutions you see listed in the meeting minutes. Most of the actual discussion happens prior to the meetings on the PSF board mailing list. https://www.python.org/psf/records/board/minutes/ https://www.python.org/psf/records/board/resolutions/ Even so, the vast majority of email on the PSF board mailing list just revolves around grant requests for regional conferences, workshops, etc. The new Grants Working Group is starting to take on more and more of those requests which will hopefully free up the board for more strategic work. That said, I suspect people think the PSF board is more hands-on than it actually is. For the most part, the Python community sits on the shoulders of individual volunteers with no official PSF titles (and the PSF staff, of course). The PSF board has very little to do with PyCon US or PyPI, for example. Baby just woke up, so quickly now (and please excuse any typos). In an effort to address some of the past concerns around transparency & communication, the PSF: - promptly publishes meeting minutes & resolutions online - retired the old private psf-members mailing list and created this new public mailing list - opened up pretty much all of the historically private PSF wiki content - sends twice monthly emails to this list with grant summaries, meeting minute links, etc - has two bloggers broadcast community success stories, PSF news, etc I hope that helps clarify the kinds of discussions the PSF board has during the meetings and on the board mailing list, as well as the current efforts around transparency. There's always room for improvement, so do let the board know if you have any fresh ideas on this front. Bonus points for having the time to help implement them. Cheers, --diana On Sat, May 28, 2016 at 10:15 AM, Carl Karsten <carl@personnelware.com> wrote:
All of the people nominated for the PSF board are good people who will do good things. If things were running smooth, I wouldn't really care who gets elected.
But once again, we see people asking questions due to lack of transparency.
So once again, I ask: What will you do about it?
-- Carl K
_______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
I also used to wonder what was being discussed behind closed doors.
We shouldn't have to wonder. If it really is that boring, fine, but it should be up to me to decide how I spend my time. The posted minutes are just a summary and results of the discussions and votes. They don't tell me what was seen as pros and cons and how they were weighted. I have no idea what the individual board members think. Even when there is a unanimous vote, I still don't know why they voted that way. I have no idea what the board or any of the members thinks their roll is regarding PyCon US, something I care deeply about. I have had to have face to face conversations to hear some a surprising opinion as to it's direction. That person is not running this year, so we don't need to worry about if that makes any sense or we should vote him out. But it was a very short conversation and we didn't have time to talk about it. If I could read the archives, I wouldn't need to talk about it, nor would I be surprised. I may disagree, that's fine. Being surprised, I have a problem with that. On Sun, May 29, 2016 at 12:54 AM, Diana Clarke <diana.joan.clarke@gmail.com> wrote:
Before I was on the board, I also used to wonder what was being discussed behind closed doors. Spoiler alert: it's far less exciting than you might expect. As Tim Peters once put it: "Exciting as watching rocks sleep? Yup, but essential - the glory of serving on the Board isn't for everyone ;-)".
Having now served on the board, I can confirm that the meeting minutes published every few weeks pretty accurately reflect our actionable discussions. These twice monthly meetings are an hour long which doesn't leave much time for real discussion. For the most part, these meetings are just used to cast votes on the resolutions you see listed in the meeting minutes. Most of the actual discussion happens prior to the meetings on the PSF board mailing list.
https://www.python.org/psf/records/board/minutes/ https://www.python.org/psf/records/board/resolutions/
Even so, the vast majority of email on the PSF board mailing list just revolves around grant requests for regional conferences, workshops, etc. The new Grants Working Group is starting to take on more and more of those requests which will hopefully free up the board for more strategic work. That said, I suspect people think the PSF board is more hands-on than it actually is. For the most part, the Python community sits on the shoulders of individual volunteers with no official PSF titles (and the PSF staff, of course). The PSF board has very little to do with PyCon US or PyPI, for example.
Baby just woke up, so quickly now (and please excuse any typos). In an effort to address some of the past concerns around transparency & communication, the PSF:
- promptly publishes meeting minutes & resolutions online - retired the old private psf-members mailing list and created this new public mailing list - opened up pretty much all of the historically private PSF wiki content - sends twice monthly emails to this list with grant summaries, meeting minute links, etc - has two bloggers broadcast community success stories, PSF news, etc
I hope that helps clarify the kinds of discussions the PSF board has during the meetings and on the board mailing list, as well as the current efforts around transparency. There's always room for improvement, so do let the board know if you have any fresh ideas on this front. Bonus points for having the time to help implement them.
Cheers,
--diana
All of the people nominated for the PSF board are good people who will do good things. If things were running smooth, I wouldn't really care who gets elected.
But once again, we see people asking questions due to lack of
On Sat, May 28, 2016 at 10:15 AM, Carl Karsten <carl@personnelware.com> wrote: transparency.
So once again, I ask: What will you do about it?
-- Carl K
_______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
-- Carl K
On Sun, May 29, 2016 at 4:17 PM, Carl Karsten <carl@personnelware.com> wrote:
I also used to wonder what was being discussed behind closed doors.
We shouldn't have to wonder. If it really is that boring, fine, but it should be up to me to decide how I spend my time.
The posted minutes are just a summary and results of the discussions and votes. They don't tell me what was seen as pros and cons and how they were weighted.
For Heaven's sake. We elect a board to look after these issues. You can't expect to second-guess every deliberation. If you want to do that, stand for the board.
I have no idea what the individual board members think. Even when there is
a unanimous vote, I still don't know why they voted that way.
Because that's what they thought would be in the Foundation's best interests.
[...] Steve Holden
Please correct me if I get any quoting below wrong, it seems to have come through a bit confused. [Steve Holden]
For Heaven's sake. We elect a board to look after these issues. You can't expect to second-guess every deliberation. If you want to do that, stand for the board.
[Karl Karsten]
I have no idea what the individual board members think. Even when there is a unanimous vote, I still don't know why they voted that way.
I too think it's legitimate for members to want to know not just the "what" but also the "why". [Steve Holden]
Because that's what they thought would be in the Foundation's best interests.
The PSF is a pretty big organization now. (Though I don't seem to be able to find a recent budget to see just how big. Is that a fault in my searching?) I think that members could have an interest in something more than belief in good intentions. The same good intentions can lead different people to different conclusions. I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions! Regards, Matt
Le 29/05/2016 21:59, Matthew Dixon Cowles a écrit :
The PSF is a pretty big organization now. (Though I don't seem to be able to find a recent budget to see just how big. Is that a fault in my searching?)
I think that members could have an interest in something more than belief in good intentions. The same good intentions can lead different people to different conclusions.
Definitely agreed.
I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions!
They are good at hiding it. Regards Antoine.
Just trust. On Mon, May 30, 2016 at 1:53 AM, Antoine Pitrou <antoine@python.org> wrote:
Le 29/05/2016 21:59, Matthew Dixon Cowles a écrit :
The PSF is a pretty big organization now. (Though I don't seem to be able to find a recent budget to see just how big. Is that a fault in my searching?)
I think that members could have an interest in something more than belief in good intentions. The same good intentions can lead different people to different conclusions.
Definitely agreed.
I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions!
They are good at hiding it.
Regards
Antoine. _______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
Hello all, I don’t mean to derail the discussion on board transparency, but I felt I could not let these particular comments go by:
I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions!
They are good at hiding it.
In my opinion, these comments are disrespectful and not inclusive. I know how it seems fun to poke at other languages. I personally have written Perl code in the past, and strongly dislike it. However, that doesn’t mean Perl programmers have any less worth. If we make it seem as if the Python community considers Perl programmers lesser people/programmers, we are making our community unwelcome to people that have made different technology choices, or even are unable to make different choices. I assume that these comments were meant as non-malicious jokes. But that made it especially important for me to draw attention to the effects they can have. So that we can help our community be inclusive to everyone :) Erik
Levity and comedy, by its very nature, is at the expense of *someone*. It becomes a problem when it is levied with undue malice, in which case, I would agree with calling it out in a forum such as this. This is not the case here. Python and Perl are historic rival languages. Most developers will see these comments for what they are - historic jabs between the communities. This is the conversation that happens, mostly in jest, when members of the language communities get together. "Your language is write only!" "Whitespace? For structure? HA!". They are not ad hominem attacks of the users, but a reference to a classic - dead - argument. I don't see (considering an objective view of the perl community, if I am honest) how this can be truly offensive to a polyglot. -----Original Message----- From: PSF-Community [mailto:psf-community-bounces+tritium-list=sdamon.com@python.org] On Behalf Of Erik Romijn Sent: Monday, May 30, 2016 8:52 AM To: PSF Community <psf-community@python.org> Subject: Re: [PSF-Community] on perl programmers Hello all, I don’t mean to derail the discussion on board transparency, but I felt I could not let these particular comments go by:
I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions!
They are good at hiding it.
In my opinion, these comments are disrespectful and not inclusive. I know how it seems fun to poke at other languages. I personally have written Perl code in the past, and strongly dislike it. However, that doesn’t mean Perl programmers have any less worth. If we make it seem as if the Python community considers Perl programmers lesser people/programmers, we are making our community unwelcome to people that have made different technology choices, or even are unable to make different choices. I assume that these comments were meant as non-malicious jokes. But that made it especially important for me to draw attention to the effects they can have. So that we can help our community be inclusive to everyone :) Erik _______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
On 30 May 2016 at 13:52, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
Hello all,
I don’t mean to derail the discussion on board transparency, but I felt I could not let these particular comments go by:
I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions!
They are good at hiding it.
In my opinion, these comments are disrespectful and not inclusive.
I applaud your intention of assuring the community is inclusive, something I believe is a shared opinion on this list. However the way you have chosen to voice this raises some concerns with me. I think it is hard to find anyone in the Python community who really believes Python programmers are superior over Pel programmers, as much as I doubt that you can find anyone in the Perl community that really believe that Perl programmers are superior. Of course there will be outliers that truly believe that, but as stated these are outliers, and I doubt they are really part of their respective community. The part what concerns me is that you find it necessary to speak on behalf of the people you assume are supposedly disenfranchised, if there are people offended by this they are very well capable of standing up here and saying for example: "Well Perl may be a write only language, but Python is read only and doesn't get things done!". By choosing to speak for them, you are actually disempowering them from speaking for themselves. Inclusion and equality is not achieved by speaking on behalf of others, not even by positively discrimination of groups (you are still negatively discriminated other groups), but by removing barriers and giving *everyone* the opportunity to voice their opinion regardless of who/what/where/why they are. Sure this means that the most common opinion will be heard most often, but that does not mean that uncommon opinion are any less valid. Don't let good intentions translate to holier-than-thou approach, or you might as well end up as a group that censores the Life of Brian and totally missing the (absence) of the point. The appropriate response of being taken the piss is off is laughing if it is funny or a raised eyebrow and in extreme cases an "O'RLY" if it isn't. -- mph
On Mon, May 30, 2016 at 1:52 PM, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
I assume that these comments were meant as non-malicious jokes. But that made it especially important for me to draw attention to the effects they can have. So that we can help our community be inclusive to everyone :)
Particularly at this time of year, with PyCon in progress, readers might wish to remember that without substantial help from the Perl community (who had been organising the YAPC conferences for some time) PyCon might never had got off the ground. Nat Torkington gave freely of his time to share his experiences and offer helpful suggestions. Steve Steve Holden
I had the same exact feelings when reading that comments here. Thanks for speaking up Erik! On Mon, May 30, 2016 at 1:52 PM, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
Hello all,
I don’t mean to derail the discussion on board transparency, but I felt I could not let these particular comments go by:
I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions!
They are good at hiding it.
In my opinion, these comments are disrespectful and not inclusive.
I know how it seems fun to poke at other languages. I personally have written Perl code in the past, and strongly dislike it. However, that doesn’t mean Perl programmers have any less worth. If we make it seem as if the Python community considers Perl programmers lesser people/programmers, we are making our community unwelcome to people that have made different technology choices, or even are unable to make different choices.
I assume that these comments were meant as non-malicious jokes. But that made it especially important for me to draw attention to the effects they can have. So that we can help our community be inclusive to everyone :)
Erik _______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
Meta classes are tricky. so is meta discussion. and whatever this is. I think it is fine to post opinions when one "felt I could not let these particular comments go by." I may or may not agree with the opinion, but I do like hearing what people think, and being reminded about undesirable behaviour isn't the end of the world. On Mon, May 30, 2016 at 11:08 AM, Ola Sitarska <ola@sitarska.com> wrote:
I had the same exact feelings when reading that comments here. Thanks for speaking up Erik!
On Mon, May 30, 2016 at 1:52 PM, Erik Romijn <erik@erik.io> wrote:
Hello all,
I don’t mean to derail the discussion on board transparency, but I felt I could not let these particular comments go by:
I bet even Perl programmers have good intentions!
They are good at hiding it.
In my opinion, these comments are disrespectful and not inclusive.
I know how it seems fun to poke at other languages. I personally have written Perl code in the past, and strongly dislike it. However, that doesn’t mean Perl programmers have any less worth. If we make it seem as if the Python community considers Perl programmers lesser people/programmers, we are making our community unwelcome to people that have made different technology choices, or even are unable to make different choices.
I assume that these comments were meant as non-malicious jokes. But that made it especially important for me to draw attention to the effects they can have. So that we can help our community be inclusive to everyone :)
Erik _______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
_______________________________________________ PSF-Community mailing list PSF-Community@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/psf-community
-- Carl K
On 28 May 2016, at 7:15, Carl Karsten wrote:
All of the people nominated for the PSF board are good people who will do good things. If things were running smooth, I wouldn't really care who gets elected.
But once again, we see people asking questions due to lack of transparency.
So once again, I ask: What will you do about it?
I think others raise good points and Diana has very accurately reflected the current PSF board operations and communications. Personally, I would advocate for actions that continue to increase the level of transparency: - publishing an annual calendar of board meetings at the beginning of each term - releasing board meeting agendas to the community prior to the board meetings by posting the meeting agenda on the website ideally 72 hours before a scheduled meeting - drafting a meeting agenda that defaults to information being public but also allows for an executive session portion of the agenda for items where confidentiality is important i.e. anonymity requested by a donor, personnel discussions, etc. - listening and responding to community questions in a timely, thoughtful, and respectful manner We could consider new ways to gain feedback from the community about specific areas that the community would like to see greater transparency. Perhaps offering a mid-term survey of community satisfaction on a number of topics including transparency to get a representative sense of “How are we doing as a board?”. A link could be posted at the bottom of agendas where community members can easily email the entire board thoughts about agenda items. Warmly, Carol Carol Willing Research Software Engineer, Project Jupyter @ Cal Poly Director, Python Software Foundation
participants (13)
-
Antoine Pitrou -
Carl Karsten -
Carol Willing -
Diana Clarke -
Erik Romijn -
Jacqueline Kazil -
Martin P. Hellwig -
Matthew Dixon Cowles -
Ola Sitarska -
Philip James -
Srinivasa KP -
Steve Holden -
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