Hi Chris, Thanks for bringing up this concern at the early stage of BifroMQ being considered. I understand your perspective and the concerns you've highlighted, and I also hope you can understand the current situation influenced by cultural differences.
Actually, to make the BifroMQ project more accessible to non-local users, we've taken several measures since day one. For example, our documentation and code comments are entirely in English, and we've set up communication channels such as a Discord group (although it’s still pretty quiet, that’s the reason why we think joining the ASF will help on this). We also encourage or deliberately guide our local users who communicate in Chinese on WeChat to post relevant discussions and issues in English on GitHub ISSUE (and follow our predefined template: https://github.com/bifromqio/bifromq/blob/release-v3/.github/ISSUE_TEMPLATE/bug_report.md). To be honest, this has indeed made both sides who are used to communicating in their mother tongue feel uncomfortable. Even so, there are still some domestic users who have followed our rules (although not many), but this shows that we have made efforts and there is progress. The Apache community’s preferred mailing list communication is somewhat similar to our existing practices, at least it won't feel strange. Based on the background of BifroMQ above, if you're willing to take on the role of a mentor for the BifroMQ project's incubation, we're more than happy to find a suitable communication method, even though currently all the team members are from China. I think mitigating the cultural gap needs efforts from both sides in the long run, but the language barrier is easy to overcome with proper tools, especially nowadays. That's what I want to say. I hope this can alleviate your concerns. Thanks, Yonny (Yu) Hao Christofer Dutz <christofer.d...@c-ware.de> 于2025年3月26日周三 18:53写道： > Hi, > > I wasn’t meaning this as a general accusation. I was more just reporting a > pattern I have been seeing in the projects I’m … or was … involved in. > > I quite often noticed, that communicating in English is not easy for > everyone. Tools such as Feishu closed the gap pretty well in the projects > that I came across it in the past (Wich were all projects with a strong > focus on a Chinese community) … at least I was able to work with a team, > where I knew some people simply could not or didn’t feel comfortable > communicating in English. > > So if theres a company with a significant influence, it’s an easy way, to > simply focus more and more on the tools that allow communicating easier, as > the company needs to get stuff done. I understand that. However there must > be a bigger understanding, that Apache still requires decisons to be done > in a way that anyone can participate. > > For example I’m a PMC member of Apache IoTDB and Apache TsFile. However, I > have absolutely no clue what the projects are actually working on. There’s > absolutely no discussion anywhere, where I could participate. > > So I want to make it clear: Being an Apache Project comes with > expectations from our side. These are not optional and can not be omitted, > just because of community or especially not because corporate needs dictate > it. In that case, I would say, that Apache is currently not the place to go. > > Right now, Apache is simply not very welcoming to non-english communities > … I would have loved to change this, however the one thing we’re even worse > at, is change itself. > > So … I would like to say again: I would be delighted, if BifroMQ accepted > this and embraced the way things work here and joined us. In that case I > would be more than happy to step up as a mentor, if not even help out as > champion. I just don’t want to invest so much time into a project, that I’m > excluded from after graduation. > > Hope that explains things a bit more. > > Chris > > > > > > > > > > Von: tison <wander4...@gmail.com> > Datum: Mittwoch, 26. März 2025 um 08:53 > An: general@incubator.apache.org <general@incubator.apache.org> > Betreff: Re: [DISCUSS] BifroMQ Proposal > > There seems to be a pattern with Chinese projects, that as soon as > graduation is over corporate interests take over and are valued higher than > apache's. > > >> This is not a pattern with Chinese projects. This is a serious > accusation, IMO, and I'm afraid this categorization creates a biased tag. > > I agree that we should not categorize projects in this way. In my > opinion, it's not "This is not a pattern with Chinese projects", but > "We don't categorize projects in this way." ASF projects grow, and we > have healthy projects that build a worldwide community despite their > possible "origins." > > To Chris: > > If you're wondering how BifroMQ would work, let's focus the discussion > around it. Projects that have third-party user community channels are > good; we have many projects that run their own Slack workspace as a > channel under the ASF Slack workspace. Specific projects that make > decisions off-list can need more oversight and help; you can start a > dedicated thread for them. > > I understand your concern about investing time and energy but getting > cut off later, and we have related several threads on board@ to > discuss the pattern, no matter what other tags it may have. But I'd > suggest we avoid a tag that may create a scarecrow or suddenly blame > unrelated projects. > > Best, > tison. > > Willem Jiang <willem.ji...@gmail.com> 于2025年3月26日周三 15:37写道： > > > > Hi Chris > > > > > > On Wed, Mar 26, 2025 at 2:47 PM Christofer Dutz > > <christofer.d...@c-ware.de> wrote: > > > > > > I'm just asking, because for example the previous projects, that i was > a mentor of: iotdb and answer, who's email lists I used to follow, are > completely closed to me now. During my job at timcho I was able to access > their feishu insurance and participate. Now, I'm just as cut off as anyone > else. > > > > > > There seems to be a pattern with Chinese projects, that as soon as > graduation is over corporate interests take over and are valued higher than > apache's. > > > > The podling project is like listening to a mentor's advice before > graduation. > > I always told the projects I mentored that they should wear two hats > > (one from the community and the other from the company) when they do > > their work. > > This is not a pattern with Chinese projects. This is a serious > > accusation, IMO, and I'm afraid this categorization creates a biased > > tag. > > > > As mentors, we can still discuss the project by sending emails > > directly to the PMC once they graduate, and we can escalate the > > situation if the PMC refuses to change. > > > > > > > > While I was on the board I wanted to help find new ways to be more > open to such communities, but right now these are not what Apache would > like to have, but actually demands and should enforce more. > > > > > > So I don't want to invest my time in a project, that I'm cut off after > graduation. > > > > > > Chris > > > > > > > > > Willem > > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > > To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscr...@incubator.apache.org > > For additional commands, e-mail: general-h...@incubator.apache.org > > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: general-unsubscr...@incubator.apache.org > For additional commands, e-mail: general-h...@incubator.apache.org > -- Yonny Hao
