Re: State of the GNUnion 2020

[Andreas R.]

On Fri, Feb 21, 2020 at 09:09:47PM +0100, Andreas Enge wrote:

> As I see it, the GNU Social Contract
> contains only trivialities in the sense that it summarises values of the
> GNU project that are already there, and as such it is far from extremist.

It could have contained only elements that were not controversial or trivial,
but it doesn't.

If concerns about the name of the document had been addressed, and point 3
had simply been lifted from the GKCG, I don't think there would have been
much opposition. It might even have become published as a GNU document, 
because it would have contained, as you say, only values that were already
there.

Unfortunately, from the outside, it looks like the opposite happened:
critique on the controversial parts were ignored, then doubled down on.

It has been lamented by supporters that resistance seems to focus on
the mere existence of the document, but that seems to be by design
of those who drafted it: to stir up controversy and keep it controversial
to garner attention.

The whole process has not reflected well on the inner workings of the draft 
working group, especially given its political ambitions for a later
stage.

iirc you personally had no objections to amending the document on these
points, and, from what I gather, were more interested in introducing
and discussing Debian style governance.

"Would GNU benefit from having a more Debian style governance, and is this
possible whilst safeguarding its current values?" would have been a
worthwile and straightforward discussion, but unfortunately, that was
not to be at this point in time.
        
        thanks,
        Andreas R.