Here’s something I haven’t seen before. A member of the MooTools development team made some intemperate remarks about some other JavaScript frameworks in a presentation, posted a video of the presentation to the project home page, and was kicked off the team. Here’s the upshot:
The apology here is not that Olmo gave his little rant, nor that it got posted on our blog. I am personally sorry that he did, but that’s not the point. No, my apology is for letting this kind of perspective have a place on our team. It’s immature, but it’s also disrespectful, and while I looked at it light heartedly as something fun, Olmo seems to have truly felt this way and I should have recognized that as both dangerous and infectious.
I’m not sure what I think about it, but I do find it interesting. Normally the level of accountability for volunteer projects is lower.
December 20, 2007 at 7:27 pm
FTFA:
This kind of ties in with McConnell’s Classic Mistakes (#3: Uncontrolled problem employees) – so, the sooner gone, the better.
Normally the level of accountability for volunteer projects is lower.
Especially on volunteer products, it needs to be higher, lest the other teammates leave for calmer waters. Keeping one guy around at the expense of the rest of the team doesn’t make for an effective project. Who wants to work with a prick?
This doesn’t mean that one need be a tyrant when it comes to riding herd, but dealing in a firm but fair manner is better overall, methinks.
December 21, 2007 at 11:08 pm
I don’t think volunteer projects have less accountability – if anything I’d actually say they have more. It’s just that the open source, online culture is usually much more accepting of rants and “rude” communication. It’s not accountability – it’s acceptable ways of communication – that’s the heart of the issue here.