]] Ian Jackson > Tollef Fog Heen writes ("Re: Replace the TC power to depose maintainers [and > 1 more messages]"): > Lars Wirzenius > > > I suggest a lighter approach than a GR for eroding the strong package > > > ownership further is to start another page, "LowThresholdHijack" or > > > something, listing maintainers who are OK if someone hijacks their > > > package if the maintainer isn't taking good care of it. Would anyone > > > else than I put themselves on that new page? (If you would, start the > > > page on the wiki and announce it on this thread, and I'll add myself.) > > > > A similar proposal: Have a way of declaring the package to be under > > collective maintenance (put it under collab-maint on alioth + > > Maintainer: collect...@debian.org or somesuch?) That'd move closer to a > > model where individuals don't own that particular package. > > This is all very well and good, but frankly, Lars (and the others in > this conversation) are not the problem. The problem maintainers won't > put themselves on a LowThresholdAdoption list either. > > We already have ways of dealing with maintainers who are simply > absent or busy, and not actively resisting. Our processes for that > are rather cumbersome but it is possible to use them effectively. > > What we lack is a way of dealing with maintainers who are determined > not to lose control of their packages. (And I do mean "control".)
I believe that cultural change can happen through collective action on an individual level, rather than sweeping regulation and legislation. The culture around NMUs has changed _immensely_ in the years I've been involved in the project. Nowadays, they're a pretty routine matter (as an example, look at the conflict over global where the petitioners have NMUed a newer version into experimental where this isn't really that big a deal). I believe our view of maintainership can change similarly if enough people say «here are the keys to the kingd^Wpackage, please be considerate», even for the packages which are not collectivised. -- Tollef Fog Heen UNIX is user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are