Re: Stepping back up as a co-maintainer

[Mark H Weaver]

zx spectrumgomas <address@hidden> writes:

> Of your words: “RMS has not yet appointed me as a co-maintainer.” , the
> word “yet” I guess that means if he would have had his permission then you
> wouldn't have needed it of the current maintainers, as I also deduce from
> here:
> “Frankly, it should not be your decision to make.”
> https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/guile-devel/2019-10/msg00021.html

Yes, and I stand by that statement.  I made my case clearly in the
message cited above.

That said, I agree that it would have been improper for RMS to appoint
me without first consulting the existing maintainers.  In fact,
discussions are currently ongoing with Andy and Ludovic to resolve the
situation, and I'm hopeful that we'll reach a mutually acceptable
resolution.

Regarding my phrase "In light of recent events", which I cited as the
reason for my decision to return, I should now be clear what I meant by
that:

GNU is far more fragile than I had supposed.  It's like if your mother
has a heart attack, and you suddenly realize that although you've always
taken her presence in your life for granted, her mortality has now
become real to you in a way that it wasn't before.

I realize now that I took GNU's continued existence and integrity for
granted, like a steady rock that I naively assumed would be there and
stay strong regardless of whether I was a part of it or not.  Now I see
that it will depend on all of us who care about software freedom to do
what we can to keep GNU strong.

I'm not interested in dividing the Guile community.  That would
obviously be disastrous.  I fully support Andy's work, and I recognize
that he is the main driver in core Guile development.  His continued
participation is crucial.  Still, we must guard against Guile becoming a
one-man show if it can possibly be avoided.  Keeping GNU strong means,
among other things, resolving our differences peacefully and working
together to make Guile better.  That's what I intend to do.

I hope that clarifies things.

      Thanks,
        Mark