📅 Original date posted:2015-06-18
📝 Original message:On 6/18/2015 11:03 AM, Mark Friedenbach wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 18, 2015 at 6:31 AM, Mike Hearn <mike at plan99.net
> <mailto:mike at plan99.net>> wrote:
>
> The first issue is how are decisions made in Bitcoin Core? I
> struggle to explain this to others because I don't understand it
> myself. Is it a vote of people with commit access? Is it a 100%
> agreement of "core developers" and if so, who are these people? Is
> it "whoever reverts the change last"? Could I write down in a
> document a precise description of how decisions are made? No, and
> that's been a fairly frustrating problem for a long time.
>
>
> There is a quote from United States Supreme Court Justice Potter
> Stewart to describe his threshold test for obscenity which is relevant
> here: "I know it when I see it."
>
> It is hard certainly, and perhaps even impossible to write down a
> system of rules that is used to resolve every dispute among core
> developers. But that doesn't mean it isn't obvious to all the
> participants what is going on. If a contentious change is proposed,
> and if after sufficient debate there are still members of the
> technical community with reasoned, comprehensible objections who are
> not merely being obstinate in the views -- a neutral observer would
> agree that their concerns have not been met -- then there is a lack of
> consensus.
>
> If there was some sort of formal process however, the system wouldn't
> work. Rules can be gamed, and if you add rules to a process then that
> process can be gamed. Instead we all have a reasonable understanding
> of what "technical consensus" is, and we all know it when we see it.
> Where we do not see it, we do not proceed.
>
There is always a process. Right now the process is haphazard, unclear,
and constantly changing without being written down so people don't
actually know what it is. In fact you do not all have a reasonable
understanding of "technical consensus" because if you did then you could
write it down ... but you can't. The current process is being gamed by
people making tweets, reddit posts, videos, and blog posts. A more
formalized process would channel that activity into a a more usable format.
This kind of thing always happens as projects become larger and more
diverse. Something that was once a small group turns into a big group
of diverse stakeholders. When it gets too big for the informal
processes then some people get upset and defensive. Happens all the time
but it is not really a good excuse to keep doing things in an
inefficient manner. The old ways just don't scale and if you ever
worked on massive projects then you know these formal processes work better.
Russ
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Milly Bitcoin [ARCHIVE] /
npub1rv…hc5wt
2023-06-07 15:38:41
in reply to nevent1q…gph2
Author Public Key
npub1rv5ajnhgrc0wq3ulrk6tcjkgsaq8h4rs5rtsvrnklz4j0lw40egqphc5wtPublished at
2023-06-07 15:38:41Event JSON
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"content": "📅 Original date posted:2015-06-18\n📝 Original message:On 6/18/2015 11:03 AM, Mark Friedenbach wrote:\n\u003e On Thu, Jun 18, 2015 at 6:31 AM, Mike Hearn \u003cmike at plan99.net \n\u003e \u003cmailto:mike at plan99.net\u003e\u003e wrote:\n\u003e\n\u003e The first issue is how are decisions made in Bitcoin Core? I\n\u003e struggle to explain this to others because I don't understand it\n\u003e myself. Is it a vote of people with commit access? Is it a 100%\n\u003e agreement of \"core developers\" and if so, who are these people? Is\n\u003e it \"whoever reverts the change last\"? Could I write down in a\n\u003e document a precise description of how decisions are made? No, and\n\u003e that's been a fairly frustrating problem for a long time.\n\u003e\n\u003e\n\u003e There is a quote from United States Supreme Court Justice Potter \n\u003e Stewart to describe his threshold test for obscenity which is relevant \n\u003e here: \"I know it when I see it.\"\n\u003e\n\u003e It is hard certainly, and perhaps even impossible to write down a \n\u003e system of rules that is used to resolve every dispute among core \n\u003e developers. But that doesn't mean it isn't obvious to all the \n\u003e participants what is going on. If a contentious change is proposed, \n\u003e and if after sufficient debate there are still members of the \n\u003e technical community with reasoned, comprehensible objections who are \n\u003e not merely being obstinate in the views -- a neutral observer would \n\u003e agree that their concerns have not been met -- then there is a lack of \n\u003e consensus.\n\u003e\n\u003e If there was some sort of formal process however, the system wouldn't \n\u003e work. Rules can be gamed, and if you add rules to a process then that \n\u003e process can be gamed. Instead we all have a reasonable understanding \n\u003e of what \"technical consensus\" is, and we all know it when we see it. \n\u003e Where we do not see it, we do not proceed.\n\u003e\n\nThere is always a process. Right now the process is haphazard, unclear, \nand constantly changing without being written down so people don't \nactually know what it is. In fact you do not all have a reasonable \nunderstanding of \"technical consensus\" because if you did then you could \nwrite it down ... but you can't. The current process is being gamed by \npeople making tweets, reddit posts, videos, and blog posts. A more \nformalized process would channel that activity into a a more usable format.\n\nThis kind of thing always happens as projects become larger and more \ndiverse. Something that was once a small group turns into a big group \nof diverse stakeholders. When it gets too big for the informal \nprocesses then some people get upset and defensive. Happens all the time \nbut it is not really a good excuse to keep doing things in an \ninefficient manner. The old ways just don't scale and if you ever \nworked on massive projects then you know these formal processes work better.\n\nRuss\n\n\n-------------- next part --------------\nAn HTML attachment was scrubbed...\nURL: \u003chttp://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/bitcoin-dev/attachments/20150618/84bd5100/attachment.html\u003e",
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