| |||||||||||||
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free SoftwareFSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free SoftwarePosted Aug 27, 2009 3:13 UTC (Thu) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639)In reply to: FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software by itgrrl Parent article: FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software
Yep..ive said it before and I'll say it again....I am genetically and anatomically ill-equipped to solve this problem. At best I am a sideshow.
My gut tells me that the best solutions to the problem are only going to come if we deliberately build a project development team for a FOSS project completely made up of women..deliberately excluding any male participant.. and let that team develop its own cultural norms and workflow without being warped by existing culture. We might have to do several of these experimental projects. The hope would be that such a group would end up pollinating a number of other women-initiated projects over time which start out with this revised development culture and male participants would learn to adapt to it.
But again...I have a Y chromosome so my suggestions as to any solution are already suspect.
-jef
(Log in to post comments)
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 19:57 UTC (Thu) by Skud (guest, #59840) [Link]
Dude, it's BEEN DONE. There are at least two large, majority-women open source projects I've been speaking about, who have their own cultural norms and processes, and which "mainstream" open source could learn a lot from. Go read some of the links above, esp. to my "Standing Out In The Crowd" OSCON talk.
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 20:12 UTC (Thu) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link]
Okay....there are communities that get it right. Good. So have those communities been able to pollinate people from their projects into other projects and spreading their culture to existing projects?
These are examples of projects that start off with the right culture. Do you have any examples of projects which have successfully made a transition to a more inviting culture? That's the hard part....once a culture is in place for years..how do you successfully transition?
Or is our only hope to burn all the existing projects to the ground and start over? I don't know if I personally have enough gasoline on hand to make that happen.
-jef
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 20:22 UTC (Thu) by Skud (guest, #59840) [Link]
I'm not going to repeat myself when the information you seek has been widely linked already. http://infotrope.net/blog/2009/07/25/standing-out-in-the-...
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 20:41 UTC (Thu) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link]
I read it..again..before my last comment...did i miss something? Is there an example at the URL or a link their in which depicts a project that successfully accomplished a cultural transition around an existing codebase instead of building a new culture while building a new codebase? To my reading, both Dreamwidth and AO3 are examples of doing things right very early on. Or did a read that wrong?
But I do appreciate the RTFM attitude...it quote comforting while I am cast adrift in this brave new world of inclusiveness.
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 20:52 UTC (Thu) by hypatiadotca (guest, #60478) [Link]
The Python community is currently working on a diversity statement along the lines of Dreamwidth's, as an example of an existing project actively working on these issues. The Ubuntu project also has Ubuntu-Women, which has been active for a few years.
Your reading the manuals is appreciated. These discussions can be kinda exhausting. The Geek Feminism wiki and blog are also excellent resources on the topic :)
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 21:11 UTC (Thu) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639) [Link]
Watching python attempt a transition will be instructive. I recognize that if we had the luxury to start over today many of the projects cultures would perform better. The do's and don't list for starting a project at this point has some traction as a meme. I'm not as concerned about new projects moving forward. But I am concerned that we don't know the do's and don'ts yet on how to transition smoothly for projects that are established.
It's a lot easier to drive a car to where you want to go..if you know where you are. I think a lot of projects know where they want to go..I don't think they know where they are...and they are just starting to figure out its okay to ask for directions. Cultural inertia is a hard problem and we can make just as many wrong turns changing cultures trying to get to where we want to go..as we can deciding on a culture at the beginning.
-jef
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 28, 2009 4:05 UTC (Fri) by maco (guest, #53641) [Link]
I believe Dreamwidth is a fork of LiveJournal.
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 20:01 UTC (Thu) by hypatiadotca (guest, #60478) [Link]
nah, they aren't suspect, they've just probably already been suggested :)
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 27, 2009 20:47 UTC (Thu) by lizhenry (guest, #60479) [Link]
I do like the approach you describe and think it will work (and is working).
FSF to host a mini-summit on Women in Free Software Posted Aug 31, 2009 22:46 UTC (Mon) by njs (guest, #40338) [Link]
> I am genetically and anatomically ill-equipped to solve this problem. At best I am a sideshow.
Just to say, this doesn't necessarily have to be the case. It's us men who have the problems, after all.
An interesting article: http://cavlec.yarinareth.net/2007/03/30/what-some-folks-c...
|
|||||||||||||