[openbeos] Re: Icon Design Contest submission

Hi Stephan,

I do not want to close up anything; I just think Haiku sucks at communicating with the outside world, and would want communication to be smarter. :-)

If Haiku is so open that anybody can say and do anything in the name of the Haiku project (this is more or less what you are suggesting), then there is no unified message, and there is no team work. With no unified message, then you can hardly articulate intelligently your goals. If there is no team work, then you become inefficient. All this may be OK if Haiku is happy with just catering to the small existing community, but it is very detrimental if Haiku wants to grow the community. I think we all want more devs/volunteers, don't we?

I have heard the "we are just a few volunteers" argument many times, and I think that this is actually a flawed logic. Because we do not communicate smartly, the few of us have to spend precious time rectifying/clarifying information and/or contradictions. Of course you can keep putting out news or messages on the mailing list as needed, but how can that be an efficient way of using your limited resources? Frankly, I think that is wasted time that the few of us could for things that are more constructive (inside and outside the project). In other words, because we are so few, it is in our best interest to be smarter. :-)

Please, keep in mind that not everybody that follows the project reads all the forums and mailing lists postings. Whether you like it or not, to the outside world (the many people that may not contribute today but that are watching and may potentially become members in the future), the announcements on the Haiku website are what they will go by. Which is why what you post on the Haiku website needs to be officially sanctioned messages.

The reason that I am pointing this problem out is because I do not think Haiku is learning from its mistakes: this has happened before, it is happening now, and will most likely happen again, as long as the members of the project do not seem to feel a need for change in this respect. But then, if that is what everybody wants, so be it. :-)

Cheers!

Koki

Stephan Assmus wrote:
On 2006-08-14 at 04:50:47 [+0200], "Jorge G. Mare (a.k.a. Koki)" <koki@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi Curtis,

It does not matter that this is an open source project; the problem with
being so open is that the line between what is a discussion that leads
to a decision and the decision itself becomes blurred. The result is
that you have lots of bits and pieces of information about a single
topic spread all over the place, some of which may even contradict one
another, and making sense of it all can be difficult and open to
interpretation. What looked like a simple "we are having a contest;
submit your work and everyone will vote to choose the best" message
(that's what I thought it was from reading the announcement) seems to
have turned into something different that few know what exactly is.

Specifically, although I understand everything that has been said, it is
still unclear to me how Haiku plans to come out with a new icon set.
Statements such as "we will discuss" and the like are good generalities,
but do not clearly define how you will come up with the icon set that
Haiku needs, given that no single icon set is chosen from the contest.

So, artists will submit their work, people will vote (or rate) the icon
sets, and then what? Will you mix and match the best rated (don't know
if that is viable)? Will someone (from Haiku?) create an icon set based
based on the submissions and the feedback from the community? What am I
missing?

Expecting people to follow/read all the posts on mailings lists and
forums is not realistic. Which is why, if you think in terms of both
building/growing the community as well as that of presenting the project
to the world with a consistent/clear message, it is much more effective
to have a single unified (official) voice to the outside world. If that
requires the decision-making process to be closed, so be it. In the case
of the icon contest, the people will still have a chance to influence
the outcome of the contest by voting, so although the decision process
may not be open, the contest itself is.

Koki, what is your problem? :-) Why do you want "us" to close up? You are on this list, so *you* are part of Haiku. What is "Haiku" as an origanization from your perspective? In my understanding, we as a community are! We ain't Be nor yellowTAB. What sense is there in purposefully shutting ourselfs up from valuable input on this list (or somewhere else)? The people having contributed the most to Haiku (the project) do have more weight and get to make "final decisions". Whoever is actually doing it... Like we could discuss or vote or rate all we want, the person(s) creating the rest of the icons will have the final word. As I have written in one of my very first emails, if you don't like how this "contest" proceeds, you are free to make your own "contest". I know this would be silly, but it makes it clear that I'm just a guy wanting to move forward with one particular piece of the Haiku project. Nothing more, nothing less. I think you ought to take this stuff less seriously. :-) We're just a bunch of people doing this in our spare time. I agree, the news item should have been worded more clearly, so what - what is the big deal? We can put out another news item, what is the problem? The "we should have" stuff is nice, but I like it more if we just move forward and learn from our mistakes.

Best regards,
-Stephan





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