On Fri, 29 Jul 2016 08:10:40 -0400
Hendrik Boom <hendrik@???> wrote:

> On Fri, Jul 29, 2016 at 10:05:20AM +0000, hellekin wrote:

> > I'm very much concerned that our own Devuan Constitution inherit the
> > "toxicity" that Joey Hess interpreted in the Debian Constitution,
> > and that's why I drafted one that departs from Debian's (although I
> > cannot be certain of its lack of toxicity.)
>
> Can we get Joey Hess to review it?


I wouldn't be in a hurry to create a Devuan constitution. As we saw a
couple years ago, a power group within the Debian community used the
letter of the law of Debian's constitution to ram through a very
undemocratic and technically stupid major architectural change.

Part of the reason I like the Devuan community is I trust the reason
and motives of Jaromil, Helliken, Nextime, Golinux, KatolaZ, and the
rest of the leaders.

Yeah, of course eventually we'll need a constitution, but not now.

True story. As one of ten founders of a LUG in 1999, and
concerned about some future "evil group" "kidnapping" the LUG, I
convinced everyone to put a very difficult quorum requirement into the
constitution. Everyone was excited about the new quorum requirement:
All of us had concerns because the previous LUG had been a (pretty
darned good, in retrospect) cult of personality. Eight years later,
when LUGs weren't so hip and populated anymore, that quorum requirement
prevented the LUG from electing new officers, essentially killing it.

Constitutions are great, but you'd better be careful: The outcome
flowing from its provisions might surprise you years later.

SteveT

Steve Litt 
July 2016 featured book: Troubleshooting Techniques
     of the Successful Technologist
http://www.troubleshooters.com/techniques