[FFmpeg-devel] Voting committee

[Nicolas George]

L'octidi 28 fructidor, an CCXXIII, Michael Niedermayer a écrit :
> saying "no" to a candidate here does not require prior problems or
> hate between the people but it will lead to that afterwards at least
> to some extend. very little in some, quite a bit in others.
> people have different points of view, and two people can differ
> easily in oppinion if someone is a active contributor or not

Yes, people have different opinion about that like about anything else.

NOT ASKING THE QUESTION DOES NOT SOLVE THE PROBLEM.

Any works made by several people will sometimes make decisions that
displease some of the members, that is unavoidable. Members should realize
that and accept it. If they can not accept it, that means they are unable to
work with others without being the project's dictator. We all know a few
libre software projects that work that way.

If the project is strongly and evenly split on an issue and no side is
willing to compromise, the project will fork again. There is no avoiding
that, that is in the nature of libre software projects.

The purpose of this voting system is to avoid that as much as possible: if
the project is strongly split on an issue, it gives a way of reaching a
decision that can not be contested. If a minority can still not accept it,
we can not force them, but that is their problem for being unable to
compromise, and they are free to leave.

Anyway, let us not confuse the immediate issue of the initial list with the
more long term issue of designating "active FFmpeg developers". For the long
term issue, feel free to draft a practical proposal that can be approved by
the other members of the project.

I have been thinking of a practical proposal myself, I will word it and post
it shortly.

For the immediate issue of the initial list: think of it as a bootstrap
problem. The bootloader has to work with limited resources and services, but
as long as it manages to load the kernel, everything is fine eventually.

You, members of the initial list, are the first stage of the bootloader:
your only task is to load the second stage, i.e. agree on a complete list of
current active FFmpeg developers.

We, members of that second stage ("we", assuming I am on it), will have to
load the kernel, i.e. write and approve rules for all later formal decision
making.

I strongly think that we will able to reach unanimous consensus about the
members of the second stage list, and clear consensus about the decision
rules. If that happens, there is no doubt this is legitimate. Do not forget:
you are on the list, so if the list is unanimous about itself, that means
you agree too.

If we do not manage to reach unanimous consensus about the members of the
second stage list, we have a deep problem.

Regards,

-- 
  Nicolas George