When GNOME co-founder Federico Mena Quintero suggested a way out by having a planet-gnome module on SVN, Waugh indicated that he wanted to continue to retain sole control of Planet GNOME, saying: "planet-web already exists, but making it a free-for-all isn't a useful solution."

The discussion was a long one; at one point Dave Neary suggested having "a second person with full editorial control, alongside Jeff, and some published guidelines on the criteria so that people know whether their blogs have a good chance of getting accepted onto the planet or not." Though this seemed to be a sensible idea, it was never taken up for discussion.

Later in the same thread, Bjorn Lindqvist, addressed Waugh and raised, what was by now, a familiar theme: "...many months ago I emailed you and asked to get my blog syndicated. I never got any reply and left it as that because I didn't care very strongly about it and my blog isn't that good anyway."

He added: "One could speculate why one doesn't receive any reply: 1. Jeff gets so many mail each day that he forgot about it. 2. The mail got lost in the spam filter. 3. Jeff doesn't like you. 4. Jeff doesn't like your blog. 5. Jeff doesn't like your politics. 6. Neither you nor your blog is elite enough. 7. planet.gnome.org in an old boys club.

"Of those, only 1 and 2 are really plausible. But there is *no way to know that*. Which is why you people resort to speculations which is why this whole thread started. Which is why a transparent process is really really important."

Another who had a similar plaint was Pascal Terjan: "I agree with you (Lindqvist). I asked by email to be added in May. In June someone asked my "why don't you ask to get on planet GNOME ?" so I asked again. I think I asked again by mail since but can't find it... About one month ago I tried to ask in private on IRC without answer again."

There was a great deal of discussion about editorial control of Planet GNOME and towards the end of the thread Waugh said he was writing up guidelines for this aspect of the administration of the site.