Rust is still rebuilding from when the entire moderation team resigned. If everybody resigns again Rust governance will have to start over yet another time.
The amount of drama in the Rust "leadership" really is excessive. This is not the first time that somebody gets slighted like this, and not only does nobody take any responsibility for what happened, few if any relevant details are provided, and the people who are mad can't even call out the people who supposedly did wrong by name. This post being signed by "leadership chat membership" is a fantastic example of how absurd this has gotten.
Thankfully as someone who writes a lot of code in Rust but has little involvement in building it I can largely ignore it, but I do worry that it is damaging the long-term health of the community.
What about the current trademark policy was a deal breaker? Are you sure that you aren't talking about the new policy draft that recently had a feedback round?
> The proposed policy, which is clearly political in nature, has resulted in our firm decision not to adopt the crab language for our projects. Although Rust™ offers valuable features, introducing politics into the equation was both unnecessary and has caused a rift that may prove difficult to mend.
That seems like a bad faith argument. You are fighting against something that is just a draft. Besides, using the phrase "crab language" makes your stance even worse. Are you talking about Rust, the official, or the recent fork (https://crablang.org/)?
I've seen enough. You are not evaluating Rust by its merits, but by its affiliations.
But the trademark policy and how it's weaponized to control social behavior through affiliation is entirely crux of the matter.
This draft would have passed if there wasn't such a large public outcry. The foundation was completely silent when our VP of engineering expressed concern about the draft and our ability to start using Rust™ for projects. The software firm we work for primarily contracts in red states. Had this draft policy passed, it would have likely resulted in us losing some of our state contracts.
I don't think that's good for any language ecosystem, but apparently the HN echo chamber believes we're wrong about this.
It's clear over the last 6-months that the project lacks clear and mature (in multiple senses) governance. I suggest you quickly take the following actions:
1. The individual(s) responsible for this situation publicly apologize, With their name(s) attached, and possibly resign from their leadership position. This muddy, cloak and dagger, he said she said, stuff is completely unnecessary and just breeds distrust. The community/project needs clarity and accountability if it is going to survive.
2. All statements need to have names of individuals attached, either "John Smith, on behalf of Rust Leadership chat" or a big list of all members of the leadership chat. Stop hiding behind amorphous groups.
3. Adopt and implement the Leadership Council RFC. It's obvious this intrum leadership chat is ineffective in providing direction and clarity on the project. Rust needs a clear organizational structure.
One of my more memorable work moments was sitting in a conference room with 20 irate colleagues and two sheepish executives, one of whom had sent out a company wide email adding a layer of middle management to production releases and making our jobs ten times harder.
The email was not signed, and the executives agreed that they had proofed it but there was no possible way to know who sent it! Never mind the email account or rationale or executive team; must have been a ghost. One hour later we were no closer to the truth. Moral of the story; accountability is difficult, and I doubt we will get an answer here.
> It's clear over the last 6-months that the project lacks clear and mature (in multiple senses) governance.
We have given Rust governance enough time and it is essentially still infantile and they continue to add fuel to the fire to this pointless drama.
Some people have warned for years [1] about the issues with Rust's governance structure as a 501(c)6 and now the core team have realized its inherent issues and is no more bureaucratic than the Linux Foundation. This is why you have these leadership issues and the opaqueness you have right in front of you.
Rust governance is not a 'community'. And its (past and present) problems of setting it up as a 501(c)6 just shows that to them the 'community' never mattered, only corporate interests.
The Rust Foundation is a 501(c)6, but the Rust Foundation was not involved here. The Rust Project (which is not a formal legal entity, AFAIK, more like "the people who can approve GitHub PRs") was entirely at fault.
That is even worse. It only shows that the so-called Rust community and the project is still infantile and full of evangelists as well as the Foundation's interest is focused on corporate interests in general regardless.
> Leadership chat has been the top-level governance structure created after the previous Moderation Team resigned in late 2021. It’s made of all leads of top-level teams, all members of the Core Team, all project directors on the Rust Foundation board, and all current moderators.
It sounds like this is governance by a committee. Is that right? As in, there is no single person in charge here? If so, I can certainly see how that might not work out.
I don't care who's right and who's wrong in this whole drama, the mere existence and scope of it puts me off relying on rust or adopting it at a workplace. I've explored the language since 2014 and for a long time was really excited about it. Now I'm glad I haven't invested more time into it.
The "leadership chat membership" made a mistake, then they apologized and they're discussing how to avoid this mistake in the future. How is that irrelevant for HN?
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[ 343 ms ] story [ 1584 ms ] threadThankfully as someone who writes a lot of code in Rust but has little involvement in building it I can largely ignore it, but I do worry that it is damaging the long-term health of the community.
> The proposed policy, which is clearly political in nature, has resulted in our firm decision not to adopt the crab language for our projects. Although Rust™ offers valuable features, introducing politics into the equation was both unnecessary and has caused a rift that may prove difficult to mend.
That seems like a bad faith argument. You are fighting against something that is just a draft. Besides, using the phrase "crab language" makes your stance even worse. Are you talking about Rust, the official, or the recent fork (https://crablang.org/)?
I've seen enough. You are not evaluating Rust by its merits, but by its affiliations.
This draft would have passed if there wasn't such a large public outcry. The foundation was completely silent when our VP of engineering expressed concern about the draft and our ability to start using Rust™ for projects. The software firm we work for primarily contracts in red states. Had this draft policy passed, it would have likely resulted in us losing some of our state contracts.
I don't think that's good for any language ecosystem, but apparently the HN echo chamber believes we're wrong about this.
It's clear over the last 6-months that the project lacks clear and mature (in multiple senses) governance. I suggest you quickly take the following actions:
1. The individual(s) responsible for this situation publicly apologize, With their name(s) attached, and possibly resign from their leadership position. This muddy, cloak and dagger, he said she said, stuff is completely unnecessary and just breeds distrust. The community/project needs clarity and accountability if it is going to survive.
2. All statements need to have names of individuals attached, either "John Smith, on behalf of Rust Leadership chat" or a big list of all members of the leadership chat. Stop hiding behind amorphous groups.
3. Adopt and implement the Leadership Council RFC. It's obvious this intrum leadership chat is ineffective in providing direction and clarity on the project. Rust needs a clear organizational structure.
The email was not signed, and the executives agreed that they had proofed it but there was no possible way to know who sent it! Never mind the email account or rationale or executive team; must have been a ghost. One hour later we were no closer to the truth. Moral of the story; accountability is difficult, and I doubt we will get an answer here.
We have given Rust governance enough time and it is essentially still infantile and they continue to add fuel to the fire to this pointless drama.
Some people have warned for years [1] about the issues with Rust's governance structure as a 501(c)6 and now the core team have realized its inherent issues and is no more bureaucratic than the Linux Foundation. This is why you have these leadership issues and the opaqueness you have right in front of you.
Rust governance is not a 'community'. And its (past and present) problems of setting it up as a 501(c)6 just shows that to them the 'community' never mattered, only corporate interests.
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35583460
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28513316
https://github.com/rust-lang/team/blob/2cea9916903fffafbfae6...
It sounds like this is governance by a committee. Is that right? As in, there is no single person in charge here? If so, I can certainly see how that might not work out.
The "leadership chat membership" made a mistake, then they apologized and they're discussing how to avoid this mistake in the future. How is that irrelevant for HN?