On Sun, Feb 16, 2014 at 10:04 AM, Jon Robson jdlrobson@gmail.com wrote:
Brad since you work for the for the foundation and seem to have a lot of expertise in this area and seem to have been one of the more vocal supporters of free fonts have you reached out to your work colleagues over video conferencing or similar to understand the problems being hit and helped them work through them? Email doesn't seem to have been an effective method of communication in this situation as you have pointed out. Maybe you can help with documenting these issues and helping people like yourself understand the problems and why this change was reverted?
As Brad's manager, I think it's fine to invite Brad to a meeting if you believe that the mailing list won't work for the conversation you'd like to have. However, I object to putting the responsibility for initiating a video conversation on him. As Brian Wolff mentioned earlier in the font thread, a public mailing list is a perfectly fine place to bring this sort of thing up, since sooner or later, this issue would have found its way to this mailing list anyway.
For what it's worth, I think I can represent Brad's viewpoint pretty well, so if anyone wants to discuss this with me in the office, I'm happy to oblige.
Rob
On 16 February 2014 23:42, Rob Lanphier robla@wikimedia.org wrote:
For what it's worth, I think I can represent Brad's viewpoint pretty well, so if anyone wants to discuss this with me in the office, I'm happy to oblige.
Cool, I'll just pop in. Oh, wait.
- d.
On Sun, Feb 16, 2014 at 4:03 PM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 16 February 2014 23:42, Rob Lanphier robla@wikimedia.org wrote:
For what it's worth, I think I can represent Brad's viewpoint pretty
well,
so if anyone wants to discuss this with me in the office, I'm happy to oblige.
Cool, I'll just pop in. Oh, wait.
FWIW, I'm also frequently on IRC (like now). I asked a question on #wikimedia-dev a little bit ago which is relevant to my research on this conversation, since it looks like I'm going to be part of this conversation whether I want to or not. As of a few minutes ago, I'm also on #wikimedia-design, which is probably a little more targeted.
A big reason why we invest in an office rather than just have everyone everywhere work from home all of the time is that face-to-face conversations are often very high bandwidth and the type that many (most?) people are best equipped to deal with in a way that doesn't cause unnecessary escalation of tension.
I made the offer for an in-person conversation because I think I can provide our office conversations with a healthy dose of "Helvetica Neue" skepticism, and I suspect Brad will be relieved that it won't be all on him to defend his viewpoint. I also suspect you and I may be reasonably well-aligned on this issue, too.
Rob
On 17 February 2014 00:20, Rob Lanphier robla@wikimedia.org wrote:
I made the offer for an in-person conversation because I think I can provide our office conversations with a healthy dose of "Helvetica Neue"h skepticism, and I suspect Brad will be relieved that it won't be all on him to defend his viewpoint. I also suspect you and I may be reasonably well-aligned on this issue, too.
Yeah, sorry for snapping. I realise that a lot more gets done at high bandwidth, I worry that this can achieve "local consensus" that just happens to treat principles that may be important to others as disposable. I did get a whiff of the interaction as it happens visiting in December, even if I was mostly in the 6th-floor land of infuriating intangibles rather than the 3rd-floor land of things that work or don't. I apologise for my frustration.
- d.
David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
I made the offer for an in-person conversation because I think I can provide our office conversations with a healthy dose of "Helvetica Neue"h skepticism, and I suspect Brad will be relieved that it won't be all on him to defend his viewpoint. I also suspect you and I may be reasonably well-aligned on this issue, too.
Yeah, sorry for snapping. I realise that a lot more gets done at high bandwidth, I worry that this can achieve "local consensus" that just happens to treat principles that may be important to others as disposable. I did get a whiff of the interaction as it happens visiting in December, even if I was mostly in the 6th-floor land of infuriating intangibles rather than the 3rd-floor land of things that work or don't. I apologise for my frustration.
+1. In a physical meeting, there is higher bandwith, but a lot of the payload can be pity, intimidation, "nobody leaves before we have an agreement", etc.
Tim
On Sun, Feb 16, 2014 at 10:04 AM, Jon Robson wrote:
Brad since you work for the for the foundation and seem to have a lot of expertise in this area and seem to have been one of the more vocal supporters of free fonts have you reached out to your work colleagues over video conferencing or similar to understand the problems being hit and helped them work through them? Email doesn't seem to have been an effective method of communication in this situation as you have pointed out. Maybe you can help with documenting these issues and helping people like yourself understand the problems and why this change was reverted?
It always is a good idea to read IRC and pick up ideas there — especially if a channel isn't logged! If an idea is fruitful, you just get it actioned off-irc (as a bug report, or as an addition to documentation).
For decision-making IRC is just more interactive and more ideas get conveyed and analyzed with less effort.
E-mail and formal "meetings" are in my view harder due to difficulty in conveying ideas or simply participating where I come up with a small idea and want to simply know what others think of it without putting effort into writing a verbose email.
Le 19/02/2014 09:34, Gryllida a écrit :
For decision-making IRC is just more interactive and more ideas get conveyed and analyzed with less effort.
Since IRC is more or less real time, that dismiss feedback from people not in the room (ie sleeping because of different timezone, not paying attention etc).
So yeah if you want quick feedback for something small, IRC is nice.
Else mailing list must be used to reach a wider audience.
The meetings are nice when you want to start the process or to close it. They also get you to the point faster than day long mailing lists debates.
From: Antoine Musso Date: Wed, 19 Feb 2014 11:28:33 +0100
Le 19/02/2014 09:34, Gryllida a écrit :
For decision-making IRC is just more interactive and more ideas get conveyed and analyzed with less effort.
[...] The meetings are nice when you want to start the process or to close it. They also get you to the point faster than day long mailing lists debates.
Not sure what you mean. There usually is no need to debate; you can just come to irc and reach understanding /easier/.
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