On Mon, 24 Sep 2018 at 11:32, Mariatta Wijaya <mariatta.wijaya@gmail.com> wrote:

It is now 7 days until October 1, the deadline for coming up with Python Governance PEPs.

Some still relevant links:

• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8000/ Python Language Governance Proposal Overview
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8001 Python Governance Voting Process
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8002 Open source governance survey

These are current ideas and proposals, some are placeholders still.

• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8010 The BDFL Governance Model
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8011 The Council Governance Model (I'm claiming this PEP)
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8012 The Community Governance Model
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8013/ The External Council Governance Model
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8014/ The Commons Governance Model

I have some questions:

1. Is everyone still ok with the Oct 1 as deadline for coming up with governance PEPs?

2. How do we discuss these PEPs?

I assume people will start threads about their PEPs to discuss them here (I'm also personally fine with discussing on Zulip, but I don't know how others feels about that). The one thing I would say is I would propose all discussion threads have a subject line that clearly denotes which PEP is being discussed to help keep it straight (e.g. "[PEP 8011] ..."). That way it's easy to keep the threads straight.

3. At the sprint, there's a small workgroup formed for coming up with the procedure to vote. How is that coming? Could someone please write up a brief summary? (perhaps as a separate email thread) I think it would be great to have this written up soon, before Oct 1.

Raymond agreed to write up the approach we all agreed upon in our little breakout group as a draft PEP so they can be presented here to make sure people overall are happy with the ideas we reached consensus on. I'm not sure what his ETA is on that, but we were tentatively aiming for the last half of November for a vote so there isn't a hard deadline to have it posted and agreed to necessarily within the week (although obviously we would want to make sure people have plenty of notice of when the voting will occur so people aren't taken by surprise).

I wanted to read these 4 PEPs:

Le lun. 24 sept. 2018 à 20:32, Mariatta Wijaya <mariatta.wijaya@gmail.com> a écrit :

• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8001 Python Governance Voting Process
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8010 The BDFL Governance Model
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8011 The Council Governance Model (I'm claiming this PEP)
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8012 The Community Governance Model

All of them are empty.

1. Is everyone still ok with the Oct 1 as deadline for coming up with governance PEPs?

It doesn't make sense to me:

• Nothing explains how we take a decision: PEP 8001 is empty
• Governance PEPs are empty: how are we supposed to take a decision on an empty PEP?

2. How do we discuss these PEPs?

I suggest to use emails as we did previously, but only on python-committers. If someone wants to change that, I suggest to wait after the new governance is decided.

Victor

Hi,

Le 25/09/2018 à 12:14, Victor Stinner a écrit :

Since there are no concrete PEPs, I don't know where I should post my comments. I decided to send them here :-)

For the new council/board idea (group of 3 or 5 peoples):

• Can we require that each people comes from a different company? At least, require that no all of them work for the same company. I would mean that a member of this council would have to nominate someone else if they decide to move to a different company which already has ("too many") council members.

The details must be ironed out, but that sounds like a good idea. There were routinely concerns about <come company> influencing the Python development process. Once it was Google, nowadays it seems to be Microsoft.

(admittedly, Google probably didn't influence us very much in the end, but I'm not sure it's because we are immune to such a danger, rather than Python simply not being an attractive target enough, as opposed to e.g. Go or Javascript)

• Mariatta proposed to require to have a least one woman in that council. What do you think of this idea? Honestly, I have no opinion yet, since I don't think this idea has been discussed enough yet. I would expect that only core developers could join the council and right now, there are 4 women core developers: Mariatta, Carol, Emily, Lisa.

Why stop at women? There are many underrepresented groups. You could discriminate based on gender, skin colour, nationality, socio-economic origins, etc.

The main problem, though, is we are talking about a very little group chosen amongst a likely very small number of candidates (I don't expect more than a dozen candidates, two dozens at most). If you start doing positive discrimination amongst such a small number of people, you disrupt the democratic process (by which I mean voting) a *lot*.

Regards

Antoine.

Le 25/09/2018 à 13:52, Mariatta Wijaya a écrit :

I don't appreciate you jumping straight to accusing me for discrimination. Assume positive intent, and ask for clarity before scrutinizing and making accusations.

Not sure what you mean here. What you are asking for is routinely called, AFAIK, "positive discrimination". Please correct me if I'm wrong.

You ask me to assume positive intent, but you are the one assuming negative intent on my part...

Regards

Antoine.

On Sep 24, 2018, at 14:32, Mariatta Wijaya <mariatta.wijaya@gmail.com> wrote:

1. Is everyone still ok with the Oct 1 as deadline for coming up with governance PEPs?

I’m afraid that I may not be, actually. I expected to have time to work on my PEP while I was on leave for my son’s wedding, but y’know, family! :) Mariatta and I are collaborating a bit on 8011, but I haven’t really had time to work on 8010. I don’t want to push it back too far, but a couple of weeks would really help.

-Barry

My proposal is taking into consideration The PSF's mission and diversity statement. I will not remove the diversity clause from PEP 8011.

To save us all trouble of discussing this particular issue, for those of you who disagree completely, and have other ideas about how you'd like Python to be governed and who should be in it, you can do one or more of the following:

• not vote on my PEP
• vote on the other PEPs
• write their own PEP

Le mar. 25 sept. 2018 à 13:57, Antoine Pitrou <antoine@python.org> a écrit :

Not sure what you mean here. What you are asking for is routinely called, AFAIK, "positive discrimination". Please correct me if I'm wrong.

You ask me to assume positive intent, but you are the one assuming negative intent on my part...

Note: in french, we say "discrimation positive", but in english, we prefer "positive action".

Le mar. 25 sept. 2018 à 14:42, Giampaolo Rodola' <g.rodola@gmail.com> a écrit :

"white men", "women", "slave"... Personally I find this tendency quite worrying and discriminating and frankly I don't understand what it has to do with a programming language nor why it's emerging only recently. (...)

If anyone is interested to talk about diversity, code of conduct and things like that: please contact me in private.

These topics are difficult to discuss in a public space. At least, I'm not comfortable today to talk about them in public. There are good reasons why people don't talk about things like that in public.

Victor

Le 25/09/2018 à 17:54, Guido van Rossum a écrit :

On Tue, Sep 25, 2018 at 7:11 AM Antoine Pitrou <antoine@python.org <mailto:antoine@python.org>> wrote:

I would suggest November 1st, so that nobody feels pressured.

You realize that then exactly the same will happen around that date, right?

Not really.

Have you ever been on the organizing side of a conference? Both paper/talk submissions and attendee registrations tend to happen immediately before the deadline.

I'll take your word for it.

Regards

Antoine.

On Tue, Sep 25, 2018 at 7:28 AM Mariatta Wijaya <mariatta@python.org> wrote:

My proposal is taking into consideration The PSF's mission and diversity statement. I will not remove the diversity clause from PEP 8011.

+1

To save us all trouble of discussing this particular issue, for those of you who disagree completely, and have other ideas about how you'd like Python to be governed and who should be in it, you can do one or more of the following:

• not vote on my PEP
• vote on the other PEPs
• write their own PEP

I would remind people that it's well documented that diverse group make better decisions. And given that there is a historical bias, often unconscious, towards white men I think it's good to try to counter this bias explicitly.

I should also think that "merit-based" criteria tend to reinforce the existing unconscious bias.

-- --Guido van Rossum (python.org/~guido)

Le 25/09/2018 à 18:10, Guido van Rossum a écrit :

To save us all trouble of discussing this particular issue, for
those of you who disagree completely, and have other ideas about how
you'd like Python to be governed and who should be in it, you can do
one or more of the following:

- not vote on my PEP
- vote on the other PEPs
- write their own PEP

I would remind people that it's well documented that diverse group make better decisions.

Can you point us to such documentation? It would be nice to know under which conditions the assertion holds, according to which metrics, etc.

Also, may I make the matter more concrete? You have been the BDFL during 20+ years. A one-person deciding group of a single white male is not exactly diverse. Retrospectively, do you think this led you to take worse decisions?

Regards

Antoine.

On Tue, 25 Sep 2018 at 09:18, M.-A. Lemburg <mal@egenix.com> wrote:

On 25.09.2018 16:28, Mariatta Wijaya wrote:

...

My proposal is taking into consideration The PSF's mission and diversity statement. I will not remove the diversity clause from PEP 8011.

I cannot comment on what you actually have in PEP 8011 as diversity clause, since the page is just a placeholder at the moment, but please take into consideration that we're *not* debating a council which is to represent the Python community or other group of people.

The council is intended to be a technical body for steering language design and needs experts as members who we all trust and respect to make good decisions - regardless of any other criteria and, of course, open to all core developers, regardless of background (which is what the PSF diversity statement is all about).

...

To save us all trouble of discussing this particular issue, for those of you who disagree completely, and have other ideas about how you'd like Python to be governed and who should be in it, you can do one or more of the following:

• not vote on my PEP
• vote on the other PEPs
• write their own PEP

I think we're grown up enough to work on these PEPs together and in the usual spirit of coming up with good solutions. We owe this to the Python community at large who will be affected by whatever we decide.

Correct, but since the PEP isn't ready to be published for discussion this thread is all speculation based on imperfect information since Mariatta tried to summarize something ahead of time.

For me personally, I am not going to participate in any discussion about any PEP until there is a published text to refer to, otherwise the discussion is ripe for misunderstandings. If a PEP comes out which people disagree with and want an alternative for I'm sure we can give them an opportunity to create a tweaked PEP (but I also assume we will have a civil discussion first in hopes of finding consensus first).

I'm still optimistic that the October 1 deadline is achievable. It's important for the larger Python community to have confidence that we enter 2019 with a governance plan.

On Sep 25, 2018, at 2:58 AM, Antoine Pitrou <antoine@python.org> wrote:

Le 24/09/2018 à 20:32, Mariatta Wijaya a écrit :

...

It is now 7 days until October 1, the deadline for coming up with Python Governance PEPs.

Some still relevant links:

• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8000/ Python Language Governance Proposal Overview
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8001 Python Governance Voting Process
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8002 Open source governance survey

These are current ideas and proposals, some are placeholders still.

• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8010 The BDFL Governance Model
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8011 The Council Governance Model (I'm claiming this PEP)
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8012 The Community Governance Model
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8013/ The External Council Governance Model
• https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-8014/ The Commons Governance Model

I have some questions:

1. Is everyone still ok with the Oct 1 as deadline for coming up with governance PEPs?

As I predicted, Oct 1 seems to be coming up too early.

Regards

Antoine.

---

python-committers mailing list python-committers@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-committers Code of Conduct: https://www.python.org/psf/codeofconduct/

Really sorry folks, but I also would like to request an extension, by one week to Oct 8. It's not because I've been slacking; I've started a five-page document (only Barry has seen it), but I still need his help before it can be ready for the public. In addition, I'm facing personal health issue. I'll be unable to work on the proposal for the next few days.

I hope this will be ok with you all. Sorry again for delaying this process.

Although we should still be good to "vote" on proposals by Mid November. I still think it would be good for that PEP 8001 to be ready sooner, so we all have good understanding of how this all will go down.

Thanks. ᐧ

Le jeu. 27 sept. 2018 à 01:28, Mariatta Wijaya <mariatta@python.org> a écrit :

Really sorry folks, but I also would like to request an extension, by one week to Oct 8.

The PEP 8000 lists 5 governance PEPs:

""" PEPs in the 8010s describe the actual proposals for Python governance. It is expected that these PEPs will cover the broad scope of governance, and that differences in details (such as the size of a governing council) will be covered in the same PEP, rather than in potentially vote-splitting individual PEPs.

• PEP 8010 - The BDFL Governance Model

  This is a placeholder PEP for the continuation of the Benevolent Dictator For Life <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benevolent_dictator_for_life>_ model. The name is an homage to Guido's title and does not necessarily imply that the next BDFL will be required to serve without time limit. Also within scope is whether an advisory council aids or supports the BDFL. This PEP does *not* name either the next BDFL, nor members of such an advisory council. For that, see PEP 13.

• PEP 8011 - Python Governance Model Lead by Trio of Pythonistas

  This PEP describes a new model of Python governance lead by a Trio of Pythonistas (TOP). It describes the role and responsibilities of the Trio. This PEP does *not* name members of the Trio. For that, see PEP 13.

• PEP 8012 - The Community Governance Model

  This is a placeholder PEP for a new model of Python governance based on consensus and voting, without the role of a centralized singular leader or a governing council. It describes how, when, and why votes are conducted for decisions affecting the Python language. It also describes the criteria for voting eligibility.

• PEP 8013 - The External Governance Model

  This PEP describes a new model of Python governance based on an external council who are responsible for ensuring good process. Elected by the core development team, this council may reject proposals that are not sufficiently detailed, do not consider all affected users, or are not appropriate for the upcoming release. This PEP does *not* name members of such a council. For that, see PEP 13.

• PEP 8014 - The Commons Governance Model

  This PEP describes a new model of Python governance based on a council of elders who are responsible for ensuring a PEP is supported by a sufficient majority of the Python community before being accepted. Unlike some of the other governance PEPs it explicitly does *not* specify who has voting rights and what a majority vote consists of. In stead this is determined by the council of elders on a case by case basis.

• PEP 8015 - Organization of the Python community

  This PEP formalizes the current organization of the Python community and proposes 3 main changes: formalize the existing concept of "Python teams"; give more autonomy to Python teams; replace the BDFL (Guido van Rossum) with a new "Python board" of 3 members which has limited roles, mostly decide how a PEP is approved (or rejected). """

The PEP 8000 still says "Additional governance models may be added before the final selection.": are we still expecting new governance PEPs? Or should we remove this sentence?

In clear, does anyone want to write a new governance PEP?

Victor