it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me [LWN.net]

it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me

Posted Dec 19, 2024 15:49 UTC (Thu) by decathorpe (subscriber, #170615)
Parent article: FESCo provenpackager sanction causes problems

While I agree that this has been handled and communicated poorly, I am quite confused by some responses from the community, given that

1. both the policy around packager / provenpackager responsibilies [0] [1] and the documentation for what changes are OK to be made using provenpackager privileges are quite clear (and not ambiguous at all, in my opinion) [2], and

2. it is (for now) undisputed that both policies have been violated numerous times in this case.

All information regarding this issue are being (or have already been) forwarded to the Fedora Council, and I am confident their investigation will eventually confirm that the FESCo decision was justified (if quite badly communicated).

I am also disappointed by how some FESCo members' efforts (including mine) to calm the waters have been received on the mailing list, and were often just interpreted in the worst possible way: "we are working on providing more details" is not enough, "we cannot share everything yet" results in being accused of backroom deals, but actually mentioning *why* it's not as easy as just un-marking the FESCo tickets as "private" is somehow even worse.

I get that people are disappointed or even angry, but this looks like a situation in which *no* answer would satisfy some commenters on the mailing list.

Side note: I also don't understand why some contributors are so agitated about loss the of provenpackager status here - they are *special* privileges that should be used in *exceptional* circumstances, and which should not be needed for normal workflows. Also, losing provenpackager group membership can happen as easily as ... just not contributing to Fedora for six months (for which there *is* an established process [1, last paragraph]), so I am confused why this is apparently considered such a draconian measure by some.

[0]: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/fesco/Package_mainta...
[1]: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/fesco/Provenpackager...
[2]: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/fesco/Who_is_allowed...

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it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me

Posted Dec 19, 2024 17:37 UTC (Thu) by hailfinger (subscriber, #76962) [Link] (2 responses)

Disclaimer: I don't use Fedora nor am I involved in this in any way, but I've seen similar situations unfold elsewhere. Enforcement action may be well-intentioned, but the (collateral) damage can be huge.

> I am also disappointed by how some FESCo members' efforts (including mine) to calm the waters have been received on the mailing list, and were often just interpreted in the worst possible way: "we are working on providing more details" is not enough, "we cannot share everything yet" results in being accused of backroom deals, but actually mentioning *why* it's not as easy as just un-marking the FESCo tickets as "private" is somehow even worse.

Try to take a birds-eye view on this: Some people in power make a decision, announce and enforce it. At the time of announcement/enforcement, they are not providing detailed reasoning nor transparency. People not in power fill the information vacuum with the explanation they think is most likely and start getting angry. People in power are still not providing transparency for reasons which can't be verified either. People not in power start getting angrier.

Something along the lines of "Trust us, we did the right thing, but we can't tell you our reasons (yet)" may be intended to calm the waters, but the only situation where this can even remotely work is parents taking care of very young children. If grown-up people realize they are treated like children, they get even angrier.

With adults, it's just politics. If elected officials can't justify their actions, the electorate will complain. Some officials have figured out that apologies go a long way in getting re-elected.

> I get that people are disappointed or even angry, but this looks like a situation in which *no* answer would satisfy some commenters on the mailing list.

A possible answer which may satisfy some commenters: an apology and a retraction of the decision until the reasoning can be made public completely.

Side note: If there is a process which may result in disciplining a person, that process should also afford at least a robust set of protections for the defendant. That's something which quite a few projects are lacking.

it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me

Posted Dec 19, 2024 21:43 UTC (Thu) by ttuttle (subscriber, #51118) [Link]

As a former young child, it didn't work on me either.

it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me

Posted Dec 20, 2024 0:33 UTC (Fri) by tchernobog (subscriber, #73595) [Link]

Very well said.

Additionally, the accused should be able to defend against accusations leveraged against them, before disciplinary action is taken.

I ask my kids "did you really hit your sister?" and "why?" before deciding whether to revoke television rights for the week. And sometimes accused and accuser swap...

Never mind adults and their complex courts of laws.

It's very hard to trust any process if even the accused is just shelled out punishment out of the blue fur something they don't feel responsible for. Would you trust your government if you had no hearing from a judge once being put to trial?

Even worse, supposing any accusations is founded, it takes away the ability of the perpetrator to learn from their punishment, instead than just righteously balking at the injustice that befell them.

FeSCO did not seem to hear the other side, met behind closed doors, had at least one person with a personal stake on the board that should have revised themselves, and publicly made an example of a person by publishing their full name publicly.

When all of this is wrong "trying to calm down people" because "it's a small punishment" is missing the fundamental point of social contract in a community based on trust among people.

it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me

Posted Dec 20, 2024 2:49 UTC (Fri) by AdamW (subscriber, #48457) [Link]

Well, what you should have done is get all your ducks in a row properly.

Don't remove PP status till you're ready to announce the decision (because someone may notice and trigger a mess). Don't announce it until you're ready to justify it. If doing that requires work to hide something that *really really* needs to be private, do all that work first. Peter's been a PP for more than a decade and he hasn't burned the project down yet, whoever he might have annoyed a bit. There was no rush to remove his privileges immediately.

Once you hadn't done that, the first response by FESCo to people highlighting the issues should have been the response Matthew and the Council eventually had to do instead: apologize for the errors, and announce that the revocation was being suspended while all the ducks were put in the correct order.

It's possible the decision is entirely justified. The problem is nobody outside of FESCo can judge that, and it doesn't seem like there was any legitimate reason to delay disclosure of the reasons for the decision beyond disclosure of the decision itself.

it's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me

Posted Dec 20, 2024 13:06 UTC (Fri) by farnz (subscriber, #17727) [Link]

Fundamentally, no answer is satisfactory because it's all "we have private tickets, which you're not allowed to see, but trust us, they're damning".

There's an ordering problem here - first, you should have had the evidence ready to go public as easily as un-marking FESCo tickets as public. Second, probinson should have been granted read access to the tickets you're going to make public, and be given a chance to prepare his response - with you able to show via logs that he had indeed seen the tickets. And then, and only then, should you have made the announcement.

The trouble is that having done things backwards, you're in a bad place. You're effectively saying "trust us, our super-secret private information proves that you can trust us, but we can't show you it", and that's always a hard statement to make successfully, especially if people have emotional ties to Peter (friendship, for example).