From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Bernhard Bitsch To: development@lists.ipfire.org Subject: Aw: Re: I am taking a little break Date: Mon, 11 Jan 2021 16:26:50 +0100 Message-ID: In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="===============3219729680290713378==" List-Id: --===============3219729680290713378== Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Hi to all, I can fully agree with Michaels opinion. The community is a mix of help requests, problem reports, ... Each category contains posts with essence and those which just say "Not funct= ioning" or "IPFire is incomplete in this or the other area". To my opinion many of the latter posts just originate in false expectations. = This can be not really understanding what IPFire is for or how networking wor= ks.=20 Another problem in this area is, that more and more users think it is possibl= e just to install an "app" ( without cost!) and all problems are solved. For = this you must not know, how internet communications work, it is enough that t= he developers know this. Sometimes my reaction to these posts is sarcasm, doesn't help to solve the pr= oblem but helps me to calm down. ;) I've decided now trying to minimize this reaction. I'll just be quiet in such= a case and try to tolerate the "screaming" about no help. We need a forum ( whatever the software is ) because this is the tool of comm= unication which is awaited by most users. The "inner circle" just must learn = to ignore false or irrelevant postings, as in all fields in everyday life. Regards, Bernhard > Gesendet: Montag, 11. Januar 2021 um 15:28 Uhr > Von: "Michael Tremer" > An: "Jon Murphy" > Cc: development(a)lists.ipfire.org > Betreff: Re: I am taking a little break > > Hello all, >=20 > Thank you everyone for your kind words on this matter. I appreciate it very= much, although I didn=E2=80=99t know how to respond back then. >=20 > > On 26 Nov 2020, at 03:47, Jon Murphy wrote: > >=20 > > Hi Michael, > >=20 > > Sorry for the late reply to your note. I've been sick the past few days = and sleeping too much. All is good now. > >=20 > > Sorry for what you are going through. It really takes the joy out of wor= king especially when working at something you love. Nobody should ever be su= bject to this abuse. >=20 > Luckily, absuse has somewhat disappeared recently. I am getting rather kind= emails from users or people send me a nice email and said why they donated a= couple of bucks to the project. That feels really nice. >=20 > > I completely agree with taking a step aside. Take whatever time is neede= d. You definitely deserve the time off! >=20 > Yes, many people told me that they can absolutely understand my - rather co= nfusing - reasoning, because they have considered the same. Various people ar= e popping in and out of the forum and are usually leaving with a feeling of d= isappointment. >=20 > I do not want that. >=20 > I want our community to be a nice one. Although this is not the lounge of t= he Internet and people come here to solve a problem, there is no need that th= is cannot be done in a nice way. >=20 > Two months ago, I was considering to simply shut down the community portal.= It has been a pain point for a long time, and the transition from the old so= ftware to Discourse has not really helped too much. I do not know really what= I expected but at least a change in dynamic. >=20 > > I would suggest never fully reading the nasty messages. Find a nasty par= t - hit the delete key! It won't give you any insight to their problem and i= t isn't worth your time. And it will definitely bring you down. >=20 > As I heard, more messages have been deleted without any further ado. Has th= at helped? I do not know. Did anyone notice change? >=20 > > After the November holiday I'll reach out to the Community moderations. = I have a few thoughts and suggestions of ways to make this better: (e.g., wat= chlist / sh**list of bad apples, flagging sh** messages ). It'll probably ta= ke 100 little things that'll make the difference. > >=20 > > Side thought: I use Apple Mail and SpamSieve. Maybe you can set its cor= pus up with nasty words (e.g., arsehole) from nasty messages. Trash anything= nasty before reading it! The delete key is your friend! =20 >=20 > People don=E2=80=99t use nasty language. After all, I am German and that la= nguage is a lot filthier than English. We say things as they are, and that is= not really what is bothering me. >=20 > What is bothering me more is that people are wasting my time, because I am = not really convinced that they are hoping to get their problem fixed with ema= ils like this. They want to vent. Maybe it is a sign of the times that they c= annot do it elsewhere, and maybe we are simply the first victim that they ran= domly find. It does=E2=80=99t really matter. >=20 > One of the recent public examples would be this tweet: https://twitter.com/= BaatorianPrince/status/1344704180913627141 >=20 > =E2=80=9CNothing works=E2=80=9D. Well, I am glad for you that you found bet= ter software. This software works absolutely fine for me. >=20 > > Hope you are able to get out and do something different! >=20 > The pandemic does not really help with this, but I found some time to do so= mething different :) >=20 > But now, I would like to talk about how we can fix this. The other day, we = got a message from another person who said that they gave up on the Community= Portal and I cannot accept that. Me not being a leading example here, it is = not what I want. >=20 > It is not a requirement in the project to read every single post on there, = and of course I cannot and do not want to force anyone to do things they do n= ot enjoy. >=20 > But if we want to keep the Community alive, we all need to engage with it i= n some way. >=20 > So I am here to ask for ideas on how we can achieve this? I would like to h= ave a conversation about what is going wrong (are we doing something wrong or= is it just the same everywhere else) and what we can do about it. >=20 > To me, engaging with the community is essential to good development and ult= imately to the success of the project. Right now, it does not give a very goo= d image of us and what are all doing. >=20 > How can we fix this? >=20 > Best, > -Michael >=20 > >=20 > > Take care! > > Jon > >=20 > >=20 > >>=20 > >>=20 > >> Message: 2 > >> Date: Wed, 18 Nov 2020 19:17:32 +0000 > >> From: Michael Tremer > >> To: "IPFire: Development-List" > >> Subject: I am taking a little break > >> Message-ID: > >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=3Dutf-8 > >>=20 > >> Hello everyone, > >>=20 > >> I would like to announce that I am taking a hiatus from the support foru= m on community.ipfire.org. > >>=20 > >> The main reason is not new, but I thought that it has been enough in the= last few weeks: The amount of abuse I receive is unreasonable. It comes in p= ersonal messages, emails and on public forums and are often quite personal. > >>=20 > >> I do not want to give any examples, because those people do not deserve = that their message is being singled out. There is no incident in particular t= hat has caused me frustration, but you all have seen what is being posted pub= licly and that is good enough to work as a foundation to what I would like to= point out... > >>=20 > >> We have a bit of a problem with our discourse. People have an entitlemen= t problem, put no work into their posts and expect - or even demand - people = to do their job for them. > >>=20 > >> I feel that reading those posts and writing a response which is not bein= g read by the original poster (let alone them trying to implement what I sugg= ested) is a waste of time. Of course it is up to them, but why would you ask = in the first place? Usually the problem is that it was not understood what I = answered. > >>=20 > >> Who would have thought that IT security is hard? > >>=20 > >> I am tired of trying to educate people about the most basic things that = are required to run IPFire. I am sick and tired of seeing IPFire being used w= rong and therefore people complaining about things that do not work as they w= ant them. I feel like I am explaining the same things over and over again. > >>=20 > >> I am done with having endless debates about the same topics which are do= ne already. Different people bring up the same arguments again but that does = not change anything. They complain when not being answered in length when the= y are just too lazy to search for the answer in a previous post. > >>=20 > >> I am being very frustrated and this is not good for neither me or the co= mmunity. > >>=20 > >> Not coming across as my finest recently I believe that I am starting to = act unfairly towards people who have not done anything wrong and try to make = a difference in this project. It will be better if I invested my time into th= ose things than those outlined above. > >>=20 > >> Closing the forum entirely was a thought that crossed my mind many more = times than once - and I know that I am not the online one who is thinking tha= t. It was in fact debated on our monthly team meeting before. > >>=20 > >> I do not care about the offenders and bullies at all. Trolls are gonna t= roll. There is only very little chance to point someone into the right direct= ion and help them to help themselves. I would rather prefer to have a smaller= user base instead of having these people who are destroying the community - = willingly or unwillingly. > >>=20 > >> We are an open source project - one community. I do care a lot about tha= t - and I would not allow anyone to destroy what we have all achieved togethe= r. It is sad to say, that it only needs very few people to spoil it for the r= est of us. > >>=20 > >> My personal pride aside, those who know me in person can tell you that I= do not care much about any defamation towards me, or accusations, blame or b= eing called an arsehole. But I do know for a fact that others take them less = lightly. > >>=20 > >> Some things recently have stopped being fun and are now quite the opposi= te. To avoid ruining mine and other people?s days I have decided to stop read= ing and replying on the support forum. I am not contributing anything useful = for anyone and it has not given me any input that will help me to do my job b= etter. This won?t be a big loss to anyone. > >>=20 > >> I would even encourage the rest of you who feel passionate about it help= to make that place useful again. It is the only place that we have where our= community can be. > >>=20 > >> This announcement is just there to let you all know that my perception o= f the project might vary from yours in the near future. I will of course be a= round on the development mailing list and get involved in the debates that we= have on here and would like to remind everyone to keep development talk on t= his list for that reason and avoid having that on the support forum. > >>=20 > >> If anyone has something to say about this, I would be happy to read your= thoughts. If you do not want to disclose them in public, feel free to email = me in private, too. > >>=20 > >> And now I am going to focus on that massive pile of work I have to do? > >>=20 > >> Best, > >> -Michael > >>=20 > >=20 >=20 > --===============3219729680290713378==--