[Spi-private] Bruce's Platform

[John Goerzen]

On Fri, Jul 14, 2006 at 12:35:10PM +0200, Thijs Kinkhorst wrote:
> On Thu, 2006-07-13 at 21:09 -0500, John Goerzen wrote:
> > I've bit my tongue about you for a few years now, out of respect for a
> > fellow candidate for the board, a fellow member of it, and out of a
> > need to be a force for unity and progress as president.
> 
> Right. I've only just joined this organisation as a member, but I'm
> quite worried that you appearently believe this to be the right approach
> to such a situation.
> 
> When you're troubled about the actions or non-actions of a fellow board
> member, you eiter:
> 1) Try to change it as soon as possible, talk with them about it, maybe
>    first in private, if it can't be resolved, with the board as a
>    whole. You seek changes that address the problems. Or,

Thijs, with respect, please consider that if this was done in private,
you wouldn't know about it.  In fact, it has been done in private, on
multiple occasions, and not just by me.

> 2) You accept and ignore it.

Which also was done, on multiple occasions, by more than just me.

> However, you *don't*:
> 3) Keep silent about it when it's still possible to change the
>    situation, and only when it's over and done with make a big
>    fuss. And not even just on spi-private but publically!

It is not "over and done".  It would have been if he had chosen not to
run again.  I was hoping that Bruce would not run again, given his
obvious lack of interest in actually participating in SPI.  But he went
ahead and turned in his platform 30 minutes before the deadline.

> Option three is a highly unprofessional attitude in my opinion,
> regardless of the person Bruce Perens or whatever he's done. It's just
> destructive criticism. You're putting the dirty laundry out in front of
> the world to see it, without an attempt to resolve the differences in
> private and at a time that it would actually have a good effect.

Again, why do you think no attempt was made in private?

Frankly, I care more about having people on SPI's board that will
actually take an interest in SPI than maintaining a professional
attitude at this point.

I also wouldn't have taken the attitude I did if he had posted a less
outrageous platform.  It really offends me that someone that hasn't
really done anything at all for SPI for the last few years, yet was on
its board, would seek to run again for that position AND would try to
say that he's done more for free software than anyone except RMS.  AND,
if that weren't bad enough, after standing up the board 9 times in the
past year, he says that it's OK he didn't even bother to say he wouldn't
be there because important things don't happen at meetings anyway.  If
Bruce believes himself so important that things like getting SPI's
finances in order, paying taxes, and making board election happen are
unimportant, then I wonder why he bothers to run.  And if he has so
little respect for the busy schedules of everyone else on the board --
and the contributing members and members of the public that show up --
that he sees nothing wrong with just not showing up, that is also
telling.

I think I am quite right to be offended at this insult against SPI, and
believe that what I posted was quite calm compared to what he really
deserved, after harming SPI's reputation numerous times.

-- John