response 38 of 92:

Oct 10 16:53 UTC 2006

A true bum.  But it's not always you; a short time ago, I believe Glenda
rebooted grex.

response 40 of 92:

Oct 10 17:07 UTC 2006

Nah, we only do that if you say "Jehovah."

Oh, shit....

response 42 of 92:

Oct 10 18:04 UTC 2006

I say we double their pay!

response 44 of 92:

Oct 10 19:06 UTC 2006

Grex also has a staff, which seems to be getting smaller.

response 46 of 92:

Oct 10 20:23 UTC 2006

What was I doing?  Very little apparently.  And, when I did do something, 
I was screwed over - with no apology.  I did, however, besides the odd job 
here and there manage to highlight serious problems with the auto(bi)cratic 
management of staff and it's non-visionary/sheep culture.  Which to me is 
invaluable given the current predicament that is staff.  However, seems to 
me to go in one ear and out the other of most of the flock.

response 48 of 92:

Oct 10 23:08 UTC 2006

All I can say is that while I think it is an excellent idea to have 
people document things and train others, I can tell you that even in my 
place of employment where people are *paid* to do those things, it 
never gets done to a standard that makes the training/documentation 
useful. 

Of course where I work a lot of that has to do with people's fears 
about losing their jobs. No one wants to make a really good set of 
documents because as soon as one exists, it makes it a lot easier for 
management to fire everyone. Since they have demonstrated with their 
actions in the past that such a worry is well founded doesnt help get 
things documented. 

Naturally, no one will fire any grex staff simply because things are 
documented. But then there is the fact that writing documentation is 
kind of a pain in the neck. It is great when people do it but actually 
getting people to do it is another thing altogether. 

response 50 of 92:

Oct 10 23:58 UTC 2006

No offense, lyunne, but if you are going to import your negative experiences
with one employer to grex, then perhaps you are not well-suited to being a
board member. While I certainly hope that board members draw on all their
experiences when making decisions about grex, I don't think grex needs board
members with an "it didn't work there, so it can't work here" attitude. 

response 52 of 92:

Oct 11 00:44 UTC 2006

resp: 50 I am just pointing out that writing technical documentation is
not most people's idea of a good time. Not only that, sometimes people
have real reasons for NOT writing documentation. Since I have no way of
knowing what is going on in the heads of current staff members, I just
used a personal anecdote to illustrate why sometimes people have an
interest in keeping knowledge to themselves. 

So the question becomes, how do we motivate people to write
documentation and mentor other staff people?

As it happens, I dont currently have an answer to that question. I do
know that when it comes to motivation, most people respond more
positively to the carrot than they do to the stick. So you will forgive
me if I dont take your approach. I see an end where people donate lots
of time and money to grex because they think grex is worth it and they
get something positive for their efforts (a good feeling perhaps). I
dont, however, know how to get there. 

That might make me not well-suited to being on the board but that is a
moot point anyways since I dont agree with that point enough to cause me
to resign from the board. I am also not eligible for re-election when my
term is up and I can honestly say that there is at least a part of me
that looks forward to joining the ranks of those who get to criticize
and make OBVIOUS suggestions like "we need documentation" without having
to worry about actually having to put any effort into making that
happen. 

resp:51 I think it is ok for us to ask that staff put something in the
systems problems item or something in the motd. But I dont think we
should require it. One of my fears if we did that is that grex might
crash and someone might think something along the lines of "I have time
to run over and reboot it but I dont have time to log on and put
something in the motd or an item and I dont want to deal with people
being angry that I didnt inform them so I'll get to it later when I have
more time." 

My other big fear is what if the board requires such a thing and staff
simply ignores it? What a negative and terrible position that would be,
huh? Because well, you know, punishment works real well with a volunteer
staff. 

response 54 of 92:

Oct 11 01:02 UTC 2006

I think that slynne is a pretty good board member, actually; at least she's
willing to listen to suggestions.

The thing is, after you reach a certain point, you need some sort of process
to make things sane.  Otherwise, it becomes a free-for-all; this sorta how
it worked on the Sun, and it sorta worked because the OS had been EOL'ed, so
it didn't matter what changes grex made to the basic system.  As long as
they backed it up and could get it back in the event of a crash, it was ok,
since it wasn't like they had to worry about merging those changes into a
future version of the operating system (since there wouldn't be one).  Grex
got into the, ``I'll change this; maybe tell people, maybe not...''
mentality.  The situation now is different: the OS is supported and actively
developed.  It requires some maintenance.  The staff environment is
different.

Unfortunately, no one is willing to stand up to staff and say, ``hey, people
depend on this service.  You need to be more transparant.  You need to
document what you do.''  They should.  Because people *do* depend on this
service.  And if individual staff members don't like that, then they should
be thanked for their time and released from their duties and obligations as
a grex staff member.  Is that too harsh?  I don't think so.  People will
step up and volunteer and do the work; what does grex have to lose?

response 56 of 92:

Oct 11 01:54 UTC 2006

I dont think there is a simple answer to that question and I imagine
that the answer is different for every individual. But, honestly, I have
noticed that there is a lot of abuse online here that gets directed at
all staff and board members. It is something I accept as being part of
the territory but I think it is at least one factor in the equation.
People generally do not like to put themselves into positions where they
must deal with a lot of people telling them what they are doing wrong
all the time. 

Maybe one thing we could all spend a little more time doing (myself
included) is, in addition to pointing out what people are doing wrong,
we could also point out what they are doing right. For whatever reason,
people seem to have a more difficult time doing that than pointing out
what people are doing wrong. I am certainly like that. 

I know one person who doesnt get nearly as much credit as he deserves.
That is aruba. I dont think there would still be a grex if he wasnt
willing to put as much effort into the place as he does. For that
matter, *everyone* else who puts time into grex is making it a better
place, even the people who do nothing more than participate in bbs and
party. My fellow board members are all doing a pretty good job in my
opinion, some more than others. John and Mary Remmers certainly put a
lot of effort into this place. As a staff member, STeve puts in a lot of
time behind the scenes. Cross, you were an asset to the staff before you
resigned. I dont have a great base of UNIX knowledge upon which to form
opinions of the staff but I know I have heard people who do know what
they are talking about praise your abilities.

The thing is that a lot of the criticism flung around here could be very
constructive except that it seems to instead make people feel very
defensive which isnt constructive at all. People here have really good
ideas but often forget that the implementation of a good idea often
involves a lot of hard work. 

I mean, just the whole co-location thing is a good example. It was an
excellent idea in my opinion but moving out of the Pumpkin was several
hours of work put in by a lot of people. Not everyone is willing or able
to put in that kind of time and effort for a good idea or a positive
change. Had there not been people willing to do that work, there would
still probably be people sitting online here going on and on about what
a good idea co-location was. People who would be wondering online why no
one was listening to their VERY GOOD IDEA when the problem wasnt that
people didnt think it was a good idea but, rather, that no one was
willing to do the implementation. 

response 58 of 92:

Oct 11 02:20 UTC 2006

And I think there's a lot of truth to that last sentence. It's interesting 
that I made TWO suggestions, yet the response from lynne only focused on 
my documentation suggestion (and if it's so obvious, why hasn't it been 
done? Or if it was tried, why did it fail? Any "lessons learned"?). 

I also recommended training new people and got no response whatsoever. 
However, instead of tossing off some fairly sharp, and well-aimed, 
criticism at the board, etc., let me simply say that if NEW volunteers are 
welcomed more, perhaps they could both learn another person's job AND at 
least begin the documentation process. It's all about NEW blood, pure and 
simple. Either grex gets it or it doesn't. Ball's in your court, folks.

response 60 of 92:

Oct 11 04:14 UTC 2006

I think we can all agree that the board as well as the volunteers are just
waiting for STeve to die or something rather than addressing his behavior
head-on.  If I was wrong then the Board would've addressed the problem at the
recent meeting rather than dance around like they didn't remember.  If that's
not the case then it must be that they don't care enough about staff beyond
STeve.