TAG | Debian secretary quits over Lenny release vote |
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| by Sam Varghese | |
| Friday, 19 December 2008 | |
  
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In a message posted to one of the project mailing lists, Srivastava said he had taken the step of quitting the post of secretary due to the dissatisfaction over the options offered in a recent vote about the release of the next version of Debian, Lenny. The voting process ends on December 21. There are moves afoot by some developers to ask for his removal from the project altogether and this is why Srivastava has held out the possibility of leaving Debian. At least two other senior developers - Martin Krafft and Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho - have indicated that if Srivastava were asked to leave they would follow suit. Lenny was expected to be out in September but there has been a protracted debate going on over whether it should be released with firmware blobs or not. Debian has a set of free software guidelines and some developers feel that the project should continue to adhere to this; others feel that some exceptions are needed in order to ensure that a lot of current software can be included in the distribution. Srivastava set in motion a vote on December 13 about what should be done regarding a release; however, members of the project were unhappy about the options allowed in the voting process and said so, at times vociferously. There were also personal insults cast at Srivastava, two of which can be seen here and here . In his resignation message, Srivastava said: "I concede that I have made mistakes with the current set of votes. And the arguments being made now, after the vote was called and started, are fairly compelling. But these arguments could have been made when the vote page went up, when I was sending in the emails about which option had how many seconds, or when the draft ballot was sent in. There are, in my opinion, far more cogent arguments being offered now, than there were in the discussion period, and had these being made earlier, we would not have come to this pass." He added: "It has been made clear to me that the project no longer trusts me, and many consider that I have been the epitome of sleaze over the years, manipulating votes for my own ends. That hurts. I have also read planet. The amount of vitriol there makes it untenable for me to participate in any efforts to recover from this mess." Srivastava also made reference to the deterioration of communication within the project, something that recently led to two women considering the possibility of leaving. "I am very distressed at the amount of vitriol that saturates the project communication channels now. Subjectively, this seems worse now than the flame filled days of yore -- because, back then, despite the apparent flames, people used to be amicable and friendly with the people they occasionally had heated discussion with. That seems to have passed, with real meanness being far more prevalent than before," he said. |
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