On Thursday, April 18th, 2024 at 1:52 PM, Richard Brown <rbrown@suse.de> wrote:
On 2024-04-16 13:28, Andreas Jaeger wrote:
Hi Richard,
the current board is different than when you where chair person - and different doesn't mean better or wrong, just different.
Your comments are based on speculation and the way you're addressing the whole discussing is something that looks toxic to me.
openSUSE should be a welcoming community and the way you attack individuals is not fostering a welcoming environment.
Hi AJ
I do not judge the Board by any past standard.
I find that suggestion baseless and am offended you choose to invent this attack line rather than consider my actions from the place they actually come from - as an active community member.
I am asking the Board to take one of two approaches-
A) act as a cohesive unit, deciding together and supporting their collective decisions.
Or
B) alternatively, acting as an active bunch of individuals where each member is visible and their opinions are clearly communicated on topics being addressed by the Board.
I’d prefer A), as I think that’s both the easiest for the community and supports the Board to operate with both more extrovert and introverted characters.
However, the Board has been currently acting far more like B). Its messy, it’s also unfair on the community as it becomes effectively impossible for community members to address deficiencies in the Board without naming individuals.
An act you clearly characterise as an attack.
The understandable inability for people to seperate critique of individuals from personal attacks is probably a good reason to eliminate B) as a suggestion.. but I still wanted to propose it.. else you or folk like you would probably accuse me of railroading the Board
I don’t really see much room for an alternative approach to A) or B)
The community need to be able to hold either the whole Board accountable, or each member.
That’s just basic good governance.
This is very well put, Richard! I know that I personally was expecting to see a united front on the matter from the Board, and a swift explanation of the situation for the community. What we've seen is the opposite, and indeed suits option B.) best from the option you've described. We all see where this option leads to. Anyhow, characterizing Richard's suggestions as an attack on the Board is just wrong. Attacking him for his efforts to better the situation is also wrong. Me, and quite a few others could be attacked for the same reason as well. I was very clearly, and publicly asking the Board for their stand on the situation for a while now. Don't try and portray these messages for something that they're not. Those who put in the effort to create something in the community, those who vote for the members of the board. are rightfully turning to the Board for guidance. After all that is the main purpose of the Board. And yes, the Board can and should be held accountable for their actions or inactions in this case. Seeing the suggested options for governance is a nice bonus tho. Also, just a friendly reminder, personal attacks are a violation of the CoC. A.