response 47 of 126:

Jul 6 16:37 UTC 2008

re #40
 You have no idea what I do or don't do as staff.

We've kind of been having this discussion about staff accountability and
knowing what it is that staff does.  Maybe you could outline for lar and some
others to give them an idea?

response 49 of 126:

Jul 7 01:28 UTC 2008

 I'm trying to stay out of this fight, but I want to point out that
 whatever discussion may have occurred in the staff conference is
 irrelevant to the question of whether staff acted accountably.
 I also don't think it's a fair argument tactic to rebut someone
 else's claims by referring to information which practically nobody
 is entitled to read.  Glenda is probably right that nobody has any
 idea what she and other staff members are doing to help the system.
 But when the only record of what gets done in a non-public conference,
 whose fault is that?

response 51 of 126:

Jul 8 16:54 UTC 2008

I think steve and glenda should have their root privileges pulled because they
thing they're entitled to it, and there's nothing quite as offensive as
entitlement.

response 53 of 126:

Jul 8 21:48 UTC 2008

(Rimshot).

response 55 of 126:

Jul 10 00:15 UTC 2008

I don't see much utility in pointing fingers and playing the blame game
on newuser being off, but let's be honest: there wasn't any discussion
in the staff conference.  Here's the only mention of the issue:

----
response 555 of 559:      Feb 14 19:26 EST 2008

   Brought Grex back up after mickeyd crashed the system.

   Newuser is off till we get it moderated or the latest version
of OpenBSD installed which fixes this problem.
----

(That's from Steve.  Of course, no one [including me] mentioned it
later.)

Further, it's worth noting that the following guidelines were posted by
Jan in April of 2007 on staff decision making:

----
Policies on staff decision making          Apr 2 12:55 EDT 2007

Last night we had some discussion of staff decision making procedures. 
I've posted a summary of them to coop, but I thought a copy should go
here too.

-------------------

I guess I should have kept notes during the joint staff/board meeting.
I didn't.  This is from memory.  It was not run as a formal meeting, but
as a discussion to establish some ground procedures for how staff should
work.

Traditionally the Grex board has operated by consensus.  We would
regularly meet, discuss things that needed to be done, and reach a
consensus on how an whether they should be done.  This worked very well
for many years, but in the last few years has largely broken down. 
Staff has actually met very infrequently, and it is hard to come to
consensus if you only discuss things on-line or in email.  Furthermore,
many of the staff people who used to be very active (myself and Marcus,
notably) are now much less active, and do not always keep up with the
current issues on Grex.  They've become kind of intermittant staff.  How
do you form consensus with people who aren't even listening to the
discussion?  We also increasingly have staff in remote locations, which
makes meetings to reach consensus more difficult.

Suggestions arising out of this include:

  - Staff should resume meeting regularly, probably bi-monthly at least.
    The conference phone should be available, so people can call in.

    (Staff has not, however, scheduled it's next staff meeting.  I
     wonder if we should make a habit of meeting after board meetings?)

  - The staff conference is to be considered the main place for
    discussion of things to do.  If a staff member raised a topic in
    the staff conference, and got no negative feedback, they are
    welcome to feel free to go ahead.  They don't necessarily need to
    seek input from people who aren't currently actively reading the
    staff conference and keeping up on things, though they may, in
    some cases, WANT to do so.  We understand that staff members are
    sometimes busy and have to drop out of the loop for a while, but
    things need to be able to go on without them if they are out of
    the loop.

  - Some things don't actually require a lot of staff consensus.

    In an emergency, the staff on hand need to act independently on
    their own best judgement.  They should obviously make an effort
    to inform other staff of what they are doing or what the did.

    Some changes to Grex are fairly limited and local.  If you are
    installing a newer version of 'tcl' that has very limited impact
    on the system.  The only thing you're doing that a regular user
    couldn't do is putting it in a system directory where everyone
    can easily access it.  Modifying things more central the operating
    system that might impact other parts of the system or overall
    system security would require more discussion.

  - Of course, other changes may require broader discussion in the
    coop conference and/or at a board meeting.  These are changes that
    impact the user interface routinely experienced by many users,
    or changes that have policy implications.
----

Note the part on emergencies: it seems that Steve certainly acted within
the guidelines set forth by the board.  The problem is that none of us
bothered to follow up (again, myself included).

Grex does have a problem: what to do with too lots of inactive staff who
plain don't have time and a community that has needs.  How do we get
back to where we need to be?

Personally, I'd like to see some constructive input on this.  Lar's and
Mary's button-pushing isn't getting us anywhere, and neither is the
complaining coming from tsty and Rane.  Nor is my inaction.  What's the
best course of action?

response 57 of 126:

Jul 10 06:16 UTC 2008

 > What's the best course of action?

 Instead of insisting on a fix for everything at once, which seems to
 be what these discussions always degenerate into, how about if we
 focus on identifying one or two modest but achievable goals and make
 them the first priority with the hopes that forward progress might
 encourage more engagement?

response 59 of 126:

Jul 10 12:09 UTC 2008

I think cross has pretty much blown glenda's claim( by pious fraud) that
that newuser's status was discussed at length in staff. I wouldn't be
too surprised if steve and glenda stormed in here and dumped the whole
baby on cross and resigned 

response 61 of 126:

Jul 10 14:29 UTC 2008

want some violin music with that whine? 


I mean they are SOOOOO abused.

response 65 of 126:

Jul 11 00:11 UTC 2008

"While I am sure they cant possibly give a rats ass about your opinion,
you have been somewhat nasty in your remarks."

That's the problem, he doesn't care about ANYONE's opinion and that's
why he acts in such a prima dona manner. 

response 67 of 126:

Jul 11 02:08 UTC 2008

I wish that you would quit lumping me in with your tirades against
STeve. I am his wife, not his clone.  I have never acted in an arbitrary
manner in any staff capacity on Grex, unless you count my going over and
rebooting it without checking in with anyone when I notice it is down
and I am free to get there.  I am uncomfortable with doing anything else
on the system alone, I am not experienced enough.  I am, however, very
good at doing things under the direction of others when I am the only
one physically available when something needs to be done NOW.  I can be
talked through almost any technical problem and am using this as a
further learning tool as the hands on I don't get from the computer
science program at Eastern.

For you information, you can't take root away from me.  I don't even
know the current root password.  I have to call another staff member to
get it when I need to use it, I just don't use it often enough to keep
it in my active memory.  What have I ever done to you or Grex for you to
be so up in my face against me?

response 69 of 126:

Jul 11 04:42 UTC 2008

 #68 could be read to imply that I was a grex founder.  I was active on
 the system fairly early in its history, but I was not one of the founding
 group.

response 71 of 126:

Jul 11 06:03 UTC 2008

"Bringing my views about people's sovereignty over their own bodies into
this discussion is just another example of the low blows you're making
in this item."

You're the one that gets making desparing remarks about another's
character. To criticize someone for making a decision you don't agree
with Isn't a low blow. However, to try to spin the battle into a
question of character  is a way to weasel away from the salient issue. 
 I have just as much to call into question your disgusting position of
murdering babies as you do to question my tactics. I actually don't care
what you think of my opinion. However, I don't think I have swung any
low blows here. Not like YOU are trying to do. Now If I said something
like "slynne, if your opinion carried as much weight as that fat ass of
yours, then you could rule the world", then THAT would be a low blow.
However,I'm not saying that.