[Inpycon] Stepping down from the PyCon India 2018 core team

[Balachandran Sivakumar]

Hi,


On Tue, Jan 16, 2018 at 12:35 AM, chandan kumar
<chandankumar.093047 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello Anand Chitipothu, Noufal Ibrahim, Anand Pillai, Bibhas and  the
> other members of the community,
>
> decentralized way of working in the year 2014 and 2015.  He always encouraged
> each volunteer to understand and take the responsibility to own the task end to
> end, provided confidence and made them comfortable.
>

        Until that distasteful/impolite github comment...


> The job of core team was to support volunteers on a need basis.
>
> Under the leadership of Vijay during PyCon India 2015, we had taken PyCon India
> one step above and all the participants, from sponsors till attendees had
> something to appreciate in the event. I don't think anyone can deny that PyCon
> India 2015 was one of the best conferences to date. Here you can find the

    We all agree that he has made great contributions in the past. No
one refuted that. But past achievements do not automatically make
someone exempt from criticisms. This current call for apology is for
what happened in the last few days and the response that he has given
in that specific thread.


> the mailing list, in 2017 edition all the discussions were taken offline
> through Telegram groups. Were those Telegram groups more trustworthy and
> transparent than this year team? All the decisions were taken by a particular

    Of course not. Any thing other than publicly accessible
means(mailing lists, IRCs) etc. should be considered bad.

> chance to get involved (thanks to those sacred groups of Lords and friends).

     I fail to understand why criticism of an incorrect stand taken by
one volunteer is now getting into "us vs them" :( If discussions
happened behind "closed doors" it is bad. Doesn't matter when/which
year. Doesn't matter who did it. It is bad. period.


>
> Let me share how we all did in 2014 or in 2015. It was based on trust. Every
> year is a fresh start.  We reconfigure access to email alias, social media, and
> other required locations. let us know if we misunderstood it?
>

    Was access to everyone's github removed on that day or only that
specific guys ? You have been saying you were open and transparent,
but organisers of the last two weren't. If that's the case, should you
have not brought up the case of an "incorrect" PR acceptance in the
mailing list and suggested that the access rights of that account be
revoked if it happens again ?

> makes me think of a very interesting point. If the people (Lords?) running PSSI

    uncalled for.

> are so concerned about the community, why are you not involving the community
> in the organization (PSSI), instead kicked everyone else out from the
> organization (no one allowed us to renew our memberships)? Could anyone please
> tell me when was the last Annual General Meeting happened? So, please do not
> show your concern about the community when you do not care about the community
> at all.
>

    Who is this addressed to ? You had a list of people + the
community in your original greeting. Do you think the community
doesn't care for the language ? If that's the case, there would not
have been this community :)

>
> In the last thread, Vijay and Vanitha stepped down and we both are in there in
> core team still. Yet, you have asked for a new leadership team to run PyCon
> India 2018 without consulting us.  Looks like you and others already have a


    I am just quoting Anand B Pillai from this[1] thread

<quote>
I'd suggest for the current team minus Vijay to have a meeting and
discuss options and suggest approaches. And discuss them in the mailing
list - listen to feedback and take appropriate actions.
</quote>


So, looks like you missed that email. The suggestion was to have a
meeting of the core team minus Vijay. Also, Anand C was referring to
problems he had faced with Vijay. So, I don't understand how you
arrived at your conclusion. Thanks

[1] https://mail.python.org/pipermail/inpycon/2018-January/011749.html


This mail seem to have taken the focus on what triggered the whole
episode and so I have to add the next bunch of lines.

 I have not been an organiser or a formal volunteer ever. But have
been participating and doing bits and pieces in every edition that's
been out of Bangalore since 2009. I don't know anyone from the
organising team of the last couple of years. And I don't know most of
the 2015 team either. So, I am as neutral as possible here, without
taking sides. But here is what I believe the core team should do

1) Come up with a list of all action items
2) Check with community if something is missed/needs modification
3) Start with the first item on list
4) Discuss how to get it done (may be IRC or even mailinglist), inform
others so that they can join the discussion
5) Send minutes to list, seek opinion with a max response wait time
(say 2 or 3 days)
6) Act on it (either the core team, or the sub team responsible  or
some ad-hoc volunteer)
6a) If core team/sub team/random volunteer does something unexpected,
discuss on mailing list/IRC(inform IRC meet timings on mailing list)
7) Inform list that the action item is complete
8) Pick next item from list (created in (1))
9) GoTo step 4

In the current incident, (6a) happened (some volunteer unexpectedly
accepted a PR). The reaction was
* He was asked not to volunteer
* His access rights were revoked

That's neither open nor transparent nor welcoming. 6a could have been
properly followed. Or at least on github he could have been asked, in
a polite way, to wait for a couple of more people to review before
accepting it. When this point was brought up, an apology would have
solved the problem. But there was none until the mail in which apology
and stepping down came together. That isn't how someone who has been
volunteering and co-ordinating responds. A person with such experience
should have shown more patience and restraint. That didn't happen and
that triggered this mess. Hop you understand. Thanks


-- 
Thank you
Balachandran Sivakumar