Daniel Pocock and Debian

Posted Mar 11, 2020 22:37 UTC (Wed) by hartmans (subscriber, #135969)
In reply to: Handling attacks on a community by rgmoore
Parent article: Handling attacks on a community

So, at one level, it doesn't matter. Debian asked Daniel to leave, and rather than leave, he engages in a campaign challenging the community.
At another level, back in 2018, some things happened while Daniel was representing Debian that the DPL and account managers (and others) were unhappy about.. Debian asked Daniel to take a six-month break and not to represent Debian (and thus not to be a developer) during that time.
Instead of taking some time away from Debian, Daniel escalated the situation, spammed a list of most project members accusing various people of misconduct, and things went from there, eventually ending up with my action Sunday.

Daniel Pocock and Debian

Posted Mar 12, 2020 19:27 UTC (Thu) by rahvin (guest, #16953) [Link] (3 responses)

Regardless of what happened. When you asked him to take break and he didn't, and then escalated attacks (the unsubscribe thing at FSFE in particular was extremely childish) you were fully justified in telling him to get lost. As the article mentions, freedom of association goes both ways. Debian has every right to tell him to take a hike and his behavior afterwards is only further justification you made the right decision.

From my point of view, because of abuse like this there aren't that many public lists that don't moderate new members for a while to verify they aren't sock puppet accouts or bots. This type of moderation is perfectly reasonable.

Daniel Pocock and Debian

Posted Mar 17, 2020 19:35 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] (2 responses)

Maybe I'm being an idiot, but... how would moderation of new members help when Pocock is forging messages from *existing* members? Wouldn't they go through anyway?

Daniel Pocock and Debian

Posted Mar 17, 2020 20:39 UTC (Tue) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link] (1 responses)

It shouldn't be too hard to block what he's doing in this case; he's using a different email address and only forging the screen name. In the long run, though, blocking spoofing might require either signed email or a move to something other than email that would let Debian vet the poster's ID better than a spoofable email address.

Daniel Pocock and Debian

Posted Mar 23, 2020 13:11 UTC (Mon) by gray_-_wolf (subscriber, #131074) [Link]

> require either signed email

which should be sane default anyway...

Daniel Pocock and Debian

Posted Mar 12, 2020 23:20 UTC (Thu) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75) [Link]

I hope I didn't sound critical of Debian for this most recent action. The stuff he's described as doing here is way beyond what any organization should have to tolerate. Even if he started from a legitimate gripe, he's gone far beyond acceptable means of getting redress.

Daniel Pocock and Debian

Posted Mar 13, 2020 23:03 UTC (Fri) by Tov (subscriber, #61080) [Link]

Hi Sam,
FWIW, I would like to thank you for all your effort. Being a long-time Debian user (directly and indirectly), I am deeply grateful for the work of awesome and levelheaded people like you. Being a head-shaking spectator to all the commotion, I admire your patience and I am sorry for the emotional stress you have to endure for being at the forefront of the project.
Thanks and all the best wishes!