Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

[Posted October 11, 2011 by corbet]

From:		"Jared K. Smith" <jsmith-AT-fedoraproject.org>
To:		announce-AT-lists.fedoraproject.org
Subject:		Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name
Date:		Mon, 10 Oct 2011 21:02:23 -0400
Message-ID:		<CA+0bQbF_rqWtxzMmbLRexRzNwAG2r_VfyvRyRWb5X8UAQYfnsQ@mail.gmail.com>

The voting has concluded for the Fedora 17 release name, and the
results are in!  Thank you to the Fedora community members who made
name suggestions and participated in the voting.

The Fedora 17 release name is: Beefy Miracle

Voting period:  Tuesday 2011-11-04 00:00:00 UTC to Monday 2011-10-10
23:59:59 UTC
Number of valid ballots cast:  292

Using the range voting method, each release name candidate could
attain a maximum of (292*8) = 2336 votes.

Results:

Votes :: Name
-------------------------------
 1182 :: Beefy Miracle
 1035 :: Liege
  881 :: Never
  791 :: Gernsback
  641 :: Rocky Ripple
  628 :: Alpharabius
  550 :: Panguipulli
  505 :: Tubeteika

--
Jared Smith
Fedora Project Leader
-- 
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Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 14:46 UTC (Tue) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] (11 responses)

That's a cheesy name. It really doesn't cut the mustard. Leaves a sour taste in one's mouth. But I guess I shouldn't whine; I don't want to be known as a weiner. Good luck and Bon Apetit, Fedora, in spite of the rather taco name.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 15:13 UTC (Tue) by imgx64 (guest, #78590) [Link] (10 responses)

The silver lining is that few people call Fedora releases by their code names (I can't tell what F15 is called without looking it up), unlike other distributions like Ubuntu or Debian.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 18:01 UTC (Tue) by mlinksva (guest, #38268) [Link] (9 responses)

I don't understand release names period. They make it harder to search, they're hard to remember, and are opaque to non-insiders. I can kind of remember Debian release names because Debian doesn't release often, but other project release names are hopeless for me, and I'd rather not have Debian release names in my head either.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 18:11 UTC (Tue) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link] (3 responses)

release names make some sort of sense when there is a huge amount of development work going on and you don't know what the final released product is going to be called (either product name or version number)

but in the case of projects that release on a predictable time schedule and release numbers, there's really no point other than the 'coolness' factor.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 22:15 UTC (Tue) by ewan (guest, #5533) [Link] (2 responses)

there's really no point other than the 'coolness' factor

That's not enough?

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 22:36 UTC (Tue) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

>> there's really no point other than the 'coolness' factor

> That's not enough?

no it's not. it's not enough any more than 1337 talk being 'cool' is enough to have people start using it everywhere.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 12, 2011 19:54 UTC (Wed) by gvy (guest, #11981) [Link]

Then there must be a non-zero cooling factor, and this one looks a zero.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 18:50 UTC (Tue) by ianweller (guest, #57101) [Link] (2 responses)

I seem to remember someone in a Fedora IRC channel mentioning that the only reason we still have a release name is that we're almost certain someone's code will break if we change the format of /etc/fedora-release. ;)

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 19:09 UTC (Tue) by mlinksva (guest, #38268) [Link] (1 responses)

That's not really an excuse, as the "release name" used in such files could be the same as or derived from the version name, eg "Fedora17" or "F17". ;)

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 12, 2011 13:39 UTC (Wed) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link]

Oh, come on. A bit of innocent fun is warranted after the hard work that goes into a release.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 13, 2011 12:04 UTC (Thu) by valhalla (guest, #56634) [Link] (1 responses)

I don't agree on the harder to search part: if I search for debian 5.0 I can get any page where a 5.0 is mentioned, in any context; it is harder to find a page that mentions the strings "debian" and "squeeze" with the two not being related.

This probably works better for Debian, usually mentioned by release name, than it does for Fedora, which as far as I know is usually mentioned by release number. Ubuntu is something in between.

One thing that Ubuntu did right is choosing names that are in alphabetical order, so that it is easy to guess the age of a distro even if one does not remember the specific name.

release names

Posted Oct 13, 2011 19:09 UTC (Thu) by rfunk (subscriber, #4054) [Link]

It actually bugs me that when searching on a specific Ubuntu release I need to account for both number and name. It's definitely easier in Debian where it's all about the name; nobody ever seems to know or care about Debian release numbers. And I agree that the name is easier to search than the number is.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 15:02 UTC (Tue) by slashdot (guest, #22014) [Link] (4 responses)

Well, when listed next to the other candidate names, it doesn't actually look so bad.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 15:21 UTC (Tue) by slashdot (guest, #22014) [Link]

And for the next release... "Tasty Cream Pie"!

"With great pleasure, we announce that, after having Beefy Miracle under our belts and working hard with it, we finally released Tasty Cream Pie!"

The connection is that "Beefy Miracle" refers to an hot dog, and after consuming it, it is commonplace to consume a dessert, such as a Tasty Cream Pie!

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 15:26 UTC (Tue) by clump (subscriber, #27801) [Link]

I completely disagree, save for "Rocky Ripple".

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 17:13 UTC (Tue) by tjc (guest, #137) [Link] (1 responses)

I like it! If it was just sort of silly it wouldn't be a good name, but this is inanity squared.

If nothing else, it's another data point that demonstrates the failure of democracy.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 12, 2011 0:36 UTC (Wed) by csigler (subscriber, #1224) [Link]

> If nothing else, it's another data point that demonstrates the failure of democracy.

NB that the modern rise of government of, by and for the people was effected through forms such as the Constitutional Republic.

Clemmitt

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 15:02 UTC (Tue) by jcm (subscriber, #18262) [Link] (1 responses)

I don't like the name, but it's got a history within the company and community - as anyone who follows the non-branded defaults in e.g. our boot infrastructure will know. I was a little concerned that the name could be offensive to vegetarians or those for whom cows are sacred and so on, but I'm vegetarian and I guess I'm more bemused than offended :)

Non-branded defaults

Posted Oct 11, 2011 18:09 UTC (Tue) by bgilbert (subscriber, #4738) [Link]

Those non-branded defaults, incidentally, make it more difficult to do Fedora remixes. (Remix builders may not care about adding their own logos, but may not want a cartoon of a dancing hot dog to appear at boot. They then have to do extra work to replace the logos.) Perhaps, now that the hot dog is associated with an official Fedora release, the generic artwork can finally be replaced.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 16:57 UTC (Tue) by jwakely (subscriber, #60262) [Link] (1 responses)

I understand the complaints that it sounds silly, but I don't think that's a problem, given the history of the name it's quite amusing. I don't understand the complaints that it's repulsive or "wrong". I've got a pretty warped imagination and I don't think of anything untoward when I hear "beefy miracle". Honi soit qui mal y pense.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 12, 2011 0:39 UTC (Wed) by csigler (subscriber, #1224) [Link]

> Honi soit qui mal y pense.

Off with their heads! ;)

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 17:13 UTC (Tue) by jengelh (guest, #33263) [Link]

>(From the webpage:) Unless you can find a link between Lovelock and Beefy Miracle, that name will likely be rejected. (For the record: I will give you one American dollar if you can find that link.)
>[Construct an arbitrary link]

Yay. Very reminiscient of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interesting_number_paradox .

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 17:27 UTC (Tue) by gmaxwell (guest, #30048) [Link] (3 responses)

People who chose something _other_ than Beefy Miracle outnumbered the ones who chose it 4.2:1.

Perhaps we've seen a failure mode of first past the post votes here though its impossible to say without knowing the voter's ranked preferences.

Perhaps someone should point Fedora to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schulze_method

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 17:27 UTC (Tue) by gmaxwell (guest, #30048) [Link] (1 responses)

Oh I feel stupid thats what I get for posting without reading. :-/ Now I wish there was a comment delete on LWN.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 21:51 UTC (Tue) by proski (subscriber, #104) [Link]

Actually, it's probably the best comment in the thread, even if Fedora didn't use "first past the post". It's important to raise awareness of preferential voting.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 14, 2011 21:20 UTC (Fri) by juhah (subscriber, #32930) [Link]

No, this is actually very interesting. Fedora uses range voting (aka score voting, there is, confusingly, a totally different range voting method). Voting methods do count (for example see this).

My initial impression is that Fedora might have failed to perform some counter measures against strategic voting or pranksters. OTOH, considering the other alternatives the outcome is not that surprising.

Election method do matter. Selecting a proper method and using it correctly is essential. For better or worse the Fedora might need to either to tune their election method or to try something completely different.

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 18:31 UTC (Tue) by endecotp (guest, #36428) [Link]

For fun, compare with how the voting worked in the Nokia Ringtone competition:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/10/11/nokia_ringtone/

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 11, 2011 22:50 UTC (Tue) by cbcbcb (subscriber, #10350) [Link] (1 responses)

This reminds me of the time of the release of Debian 3.0, when I stuck with potato (Debian 2.2) because I didn't want to tell my boss that I wanted to install something called "woody". At least explaining "Beefy miracle" isn't as bad as that...

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 12, 2011 17:16 UTC (Wed) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link]

Just wait until they come around to "Ken and Barbie"... ;-)

Results of the voting for the Fedora 17 release name

Posted Oct 13, 2011 10:38 UTC (Thu) by ctg (guest, #3459) [Link]

Is the miracle that there isn't any beef in it?

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2011/07/...