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Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

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Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#11

Post by jergason »

This feels like the intersection of a technology problem and a communication problem. What do you do when someone says something that is technically wrong? I understand not wanting to embarrass someone else, but I also see Yehuda's point of view. People will be worse off if they do bad things in their code, so the best time to correct misinformation may have been right then, when everyone who heard it was still all together.

Maybe it could have been done with more tact, but I don't see it as heckling. You can attack someone's ideas without attacking the person. The less tied up you are to being right, the more open you are to criticism taking it personally, the more likely you are to learn something new.

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#12

Post by bad_user »

There are some people going to such meetings that have the habit of contradicting the speaker in the hope of sounding smart. Yehuda Katz has proved that he's smart already and I hope he ain't one of those people.

That said, this story doesn't have the right context, ignoring the actual talk and the actual arguments brought by Katz. Maybe the mistakes done by the speaker were too great to be ignored - and this is very unlike the Dale Carnegie story quoted in the article, because such presentations are attended by people that want to learn something.

I have been feeling embarrassed myself when other people corrected me in public and it feels awful, however it's a lot better to accept and acknowledge valid criticism and valid counter arguments and actually thank the person that stood up to you, because you know, you learned something new.

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#13

Post by [deleted] »

tmorton wrote: post #8

Wow. A post about etiquette that calls someone out by name, with an insulting headline? Face-to-face is the right channel for this sort of pointed criticism. Failing that, email might work. To pass the lesson along to the larger community, leave the specific names out of it - talk about "a big name in the community" who behaved badly. People who were there will know who you're talking about, but it doesn't become par…

[deleted]

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#14

Post by jvoorhis »

tmorton wrote: post #8

Wow. A post about etiquette that calls someone out by name, with an insulting headline? Face-to-face is the right channel for this sort of pointed criticism. Failing that, email might work. To pass the lesson along to the larger community, leave the specific names out of it - talk about "a big name in the community" who behaved badly. People who were there will know who you're talking about, but it doesn't become par…

Hear hear!

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#15

Post by scott_s »

I suppose you need to say up front what the expectations for the meeting are. I give and sit on presentations from other researchers, and I have even come up with a metric to express how many questions there are: MTTI, mean time to interruption. I have been in presentations with an MTTI of 1 minute. A typical presentation has an MTTI of about 5 minutes. A presentation with "few" interruptions has an MTTI of about 15 minutes.

Generally, questions come in three classes: clarification ("I'm not sure I understand, can you explain..."), discussion ("Have you considered extending this to..."), and criticism ("I think there is a problem with this approach..."). In an academic setting, all are welcome unless otherwise stated. (Sometimes we say no discussion and critical questions because of time limitations.)

However, what is never acceptable is someone commandeering the presentation and using it to talk about their own thing. Moderators will step in if it starts devolving like that.

So, simply, you need to let your audience know what the format is, because had I been in your audience, I may have asked questions, too.

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#16

Post by calinet6 »

This appears to be a perspective issue. The writer took it as rude without mentioning the most important part:

Was Katz right?

We need more context, and we need less emotional argument. If the original presenter could effectively support his position then he would not have left the stage. And I would hope that Katz would not commit such a social atrocity without a very, very good reason. I don't find it hard to believe that the actual story is much more tame and logical than the author of this article thinks it is.

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#17

Post by methoddk »

It's basic etiquette to not interrupt someone in that manner if they have the podium. Even if he was right, he should've waited. Real douche move to do that to someone's entire presentation.

I'm all for speaking your mind in public, and standing up for an opinion, but timing is everything. Yehuda Katz has poor timing.

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#18

Post by thibaut_barrere »

gaius wrote: post #9

Dear Ruby "community", no-one cares about your internal bickering. Much as I hate to admit it, Zed Shaw was right.

This comment is cute I must admit. I think I've seen this kind of bickering in pretty much all languages I've programmed with :)

The only thing I took away is: don't waste energy reading this.

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#19

Post by igorgue »

j2labs wrote: post #10

This is basically to well-actually an entire presentation. http://tirania.org/blog/archive/2011/Feb-17.html

I was about to post that link, sadly I am that way too, I'm trying to get better but is hard to keep to yourself that what you're listening is wrong.

Re: Why you shouldn't invite Yehuda Katz to your user group meeting

#20

Post by Delmania »

latch wrote: post #4

A bit more context wouldn't hurt. You don't want attendees, who don't know any better, to adopt really bad practices. For example, what if this was the context: sql = "select * from users where id = #{params[:id]}" Although even here there's a right and a wrong way to approach this.

Your last sentence is key here. I personally think you need to ask yourself when you have the urge to call someone out "does this add value to the current discussion?". If it does, you should lead in with questions like "Have you thought about..?" or "I don't think your example is quite correct, here's why.." Definitely stating "You're wrong, this is how you should do it" is great way to immediately shut the other person down. If calling out the person in question doesn't add value to the conversation, save it for a private conversation later. Simply being technically adept is no excuse for poor communication skills.
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