Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk • Hacker News Board

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#171

Post by tripzilch » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 4:38 PM UTC

nagrom wrote: post #127

jasonkester wrote: post #53

This isn't restricted to open source project leaders, or even open source developers. You'll find the same childish elitism in pretty much every field of human endeavor. Programmers certainly do it. Laughing at noobs and being mean to them is pretty much the sole purpose of IRC, unless I'm mistaken. Surfers do it. Climbers do it. I've even seen rocket scientists do it. The interesting thing is watching which members…

I think it has to do with the level of mastery. At some point, when you become really good at something (almost anything), you realise that a lot of your own knowledge now comes from explaining the basics to people who don't know anything. By forcing yourself to redo the basics, you get fresh insight on a level that someone new to whatever activity simply can't appreciate because they don't have X years experience wi…

Sounds to me you became really good at explaining. And skill in explaining stuff is a much better predictor of not-being-a-jerk than mastery of anything in general.

It's pretty difficult to explain things well and be a jerk at the same time!

(although my pope-hat's off to those that manage to do both ;) )

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#172

Post by tripzilch » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 4:47 PM UTC

vorg wrote: post #129

kyllo wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this is because the experts don't feel threatened by noobs. They know they are actually experts, so they don't need to stoop to the level of picking on noobs to make them selves feel like experts. It's the "nervous middle classes" that feel a need to pick on noobs to reassure themselves. PG wrote an article that describes this same phenomenon vis-a-vis nerds and popular kids in school: If I remember correctly, t…

These nervous middle classes who aren't experts in anything more complex than "fizz without the buzz" often rise to project manager status by taking out the existing leaders. These are the "open source project leaders" who engage in backslagging, usually indirectly, e.g. telling their clueless minions that so-and-so represents a threat to revenue and perhaps someone should "earn another stripe for their hacker colors…

The funniest thing is that they tend to rise, rise some more, until they reach a level that they're not really skilled enough for, and that's where their career plateaus. In case you wonder how all the incapable people end up there.

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#173

Post by paulhauggis » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 4:56 PM UTC

msbarnett wrote: post #110

zzzeek wrote: post #61

this blog post has a major omission of any specifics whatsoever. I've never seen this kind of behavior, and I'm having a great urge to say something like, "oh well because PHP/Ruby/etc". But that is all prejudicial. Won't we be given some specifics so that we don't have to guess what famous OSS author actually typed "HAHAHA" at a pull request ?

It's hard to believe that people "have never seen this behaviour" have spent much time watching the OSS community. Ulrich Dreper, well known OSS contributor and former steward of glibc, was famous for flaming the ever-living shit out of anyone who dared submit a patch that he in any way did not care for. To give but one example, http://www.sourceware.org/ml/libc-alpha/2000-08/msg00053.htm...

I feel like many leaders of OSS projects never had any power in life and abuse it when they finally get a little bit.

This sort of behavior is childish and I would never be a part of a project with someone like this (or hire anyone with this sort of behavior).

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#174

Post by kimmel » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 5:08 PM UTC

shadowfiend wrote: post #67

Karunamon wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Derision of stupidity is probably one of the worst characteristics of hacker culture, because “stupidity” tends to be shorthand for “disagreement with my point of view”. Then it's not stupidity. That's not what this article (at least that I can see), or my post, was talking about. I was referring specifically to failure to RTFM as the big one, with a side order of bad commits and pull requests. Ask any tech support…

“Ask any tech support monkey at the end of their day what they think about the average person.” The mistake so many people make is to let someone's lack of knowledge translate into “stupidity”, which is typically defined, and defined by you yourself, as an inherent, unchangeable trait. We toss around the word stupid, but it's got two meanings. One is the one I use with my friends when I talk about something who doesn…

"Time is valuable."

In that vein I would look to point out this handy reference: http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html which goes into depth about why certain reactions happen.

"What we are, unapologetically, is hostile to people who seem to be unwilling to think or to do their own homework before asking questions. People like that are time sinks — they take without giving back, and they waste time we could have spent on another question more interesting and another person more worthy of an answer."

Note: We are upset that people do not think for themselves and feel that they have to be spoon fed because they are special.

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#175

Post by kyllo » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 6:11 PM UTC

tripzilch wrote: post #172

vorg wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These nervous middle classes who aren't experts in anything more complex than "fizz without the buzz" often rise to project manager status by taking out the existing leaders. These are the "open source project leaders" who engage in backslagging, usually indirectly, e.g. telling their clueless minions that so-and-so represents a threat to revenue and perhaps someone should "earn another stripe for their hacker colors…

The funniest thing is that they tend to rise, rise some more, until they reach a level that they're not really skilled enough for, and that's where their career plateaus. In case you wonder how all the incapable people end up there.

Yeah, there's a theory that people tend to get promoted to their level of incompetence.

Also related is the "Dilbert Effect" where the incompetent get promoted to management so they can't screw everything up by doing actual work, so they get to just have meetings instead, while the competent workers continue working away.

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#176

Post by WalterBright » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 8:03 PM UTC

jasonkester wrote: post #53

This isn't restricted to open source project leaders, or even open source developers. You'll find the same childish elitism in pretty much every field of human endeavor. Programmers certainly do it. Laughing at noobs and being mean to them is pretty much the sole purpose of IRC, unless I'm mistaken. Surfers do it. Climbers do it. I've even seen rocket scientists do it. The interesting thing is watching which members…

The leader(s) of an open source project tend to set the tone of that community, and so are responsible for it.

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#177

Post by WalterBright » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 8:08 PM UTC

groby_b wrote: post #99

jasonkester wrote: post #53

This isn't restricted to open source project leaders, or even open source developers. You'll find the same childish elitism in pretty much every field of human endeavor. Programmers certainly do it. Laughing at noobs and being mean to them is pretty much the sole purpose of IRC, unless I'm mistaken. Surfers do it. Climbers do it. I've even seen rocket scientists do it. The interesting thing is watching which members…

I had the same experience in the dance world. I was privileged enough to be able to train with national and world champions. At the lower end of that scale, people were incredibly full of themselves. Work with somebody who's recognized world wide? She's the nicest person ever. (Even though I clearly wasn't as good as she'd have liked me to be ;) It's inspiring to work with people who don't have anything to prove to y…

I've been in the dance world years ago, and I knew several champions. They were all very nice. I suspect that being nice was a very large component of their success. For example, they were always willing to help out their rivals, cheer them on, etc.

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#178

Post by stan_rogers » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 9:37 PM UTC

detst wrote: post #136

kyllo wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this is because the experts don't feel threatened by noobs. They know they are actually experts, so they don't need to stoop to the level of picking on noobs to make them selves feel like experts. It's the "nervous middle classes" that feel a need to pick on noobs to reassure themselves. PG wrote an article that describes this same phenomenon vis-a-vis nerds and popular kids in school: If I remember correctly, t…

This. When jasonkester says: Generally it ranges between "reasonably good" and "better than most people I know" [...] [b]ut there it stops. I don't believe it's necessarily true. It has more to do with how they think they are perceived. Look at Kobe Bryant, one of the best basketball players to ever live. I've seen videos where someone will challenge him, "I'll get 2 before you get 10". Kobe takes that as disrespect.…

Some surgeons (who, these days, happen to hold the degree of MD) still find the "mister" thing respectful of their specialty. Sure, it may be a hangover from a time long past when surgeons usually weren't qualified physicians, but now it signifies that you understand they aren't "mere" GPs/physicians attending. (Interesting note only, not a rebuttal.)

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#179

Post by grogenaut » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 10:11 PM UTC

JonnieCache wrote: post #166

grogenaut wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time I've gone to RubyOnRails I've had to fend off supposed experts who are really morons. Like since 2005. I've had the experts tell me, when asking questions about how I might fix an issue with upgrade issues with a big rails plugin (now engine) and rails that "You should just wait and the plugin maintainers will do it eventually". No help on what to try, nothing. It took me throwing down the commit log / web…

Never, ever go in #rubyonrails. Every time I've ever been in there I get nothing but industrial strength sarcasm from people who don't actually know what they're talking about. Who are these people? Are they socially awkward nerdy types, or are they more the "jock" side of the coin who understand social rules better than most but simply consider themselves above them? My first instinct is to assume they're all 14 yea…

I usually go in there with different nicknames to troll the one specific person I truely hate. That's a good drunk sunday night.

Re: Dear Open Source Project Leader: Quit Being A Jerk

#180

Post by christkv » Sat, Dec 15, 2012, 10:56 PM UTC

tjbiddle wrote: post #91

There are a lot of other angles we can look at this as well: The user ("I need.."), The cocky contributor ("This is right, accept my pull request!"), The belittled contributor ("I'm not sure.. but let me try.."), The helpful leader ("I can't accept this because it will break xyz.") The douche leader (As the article stated: "LOL!"), and the cocky leader ("No, that's wrong." - And then they realize later it's actually…

Sometimes it's hard because reminding someone who sends you pull request about the projects contributor guidelines sends them off in a huff and even though they pull "might" be good in that it does not break any tests it's hard to know what scenario it's guarding against or if the person is doing something strange in their code.

The cocky contributor is usually a bad contributor in my experience and are both energy drains and time sinks. The belittled (or humble) contributor is the one I am that I really appreciate and value as they are willing to enter into a dialog about what needs to be in the pull request to get it in.

In the end is all about normal human social decency. Treat people badly and don't be surprised when they treat you as a leper.