Friends, Griffons, Spacemen, Lend me your ears
Posted: Sat Apr 19, 2014 2:29 am
Today i realized why NT was split off. Not because of people, it would not of mattered the people, it is the system itself that lead to it.
NT comprises of ~70% forumites who never get on IRC (and ~10% people who were ostracized from coderbus for various reasons and ~20% people who are straddling the gap between the two branches). Coderbus prefers to do its work on the IRC for reasons explained later on. I believe this is the fundamental issue.
What happens when the forumites get mad? They make a spincycle thread of venom that coderbus might skim later and post things on IRC out of context.
What happens with coders get mad? They make a spincycle IRC chat of venom until they tucker themselves out and get back to talking about normal stuff. Forumites might get some logs posted to the forum at one point or another, most likely in a mess or something of shock value out of context.
I am not trying to say anybody is innocent. We are all apes and shitflinging comes naturally to us all. I am saying that with such an institutional divide between the parties involved, it is only a matter of time until another such event happens again.
A mutually agreed upon system of transparency should be put in place, so things are not made worse and the inevitable happens again. But what system?
There is no technological middle ground between forums and IRC.
Forums have the pro of being a visible (somewhat) easily searchable record, but the con of being slow and hard to sift through. IRC has the pro of being a snap response to any specific questions, but the con of becoming an unbearable mess to sift through once too many people start talking at once.
Throw in github being a seperate location to post about changes, and everything becomes a mess only the very dedicated can keep track of.
Based on this, I reccomend a standard procedure be made based off of the system that NT uses, with a emphasis that coders ask BEFORE doing major systems so they do not spend time on a change that would end up getting voted no.
Should any compromises be reached in order to make sych a procedure, care must be taken to prevent extreme of the tyranny of the majority over coderbus and the other extreme of coderbus silently (to non coderbus) imposing its (or even individual's) silent will upon the majority.
In the end the limiting factor is time.
SoS does not have the time to deal with every single thing. that goes on and remains the most impartial person on these forums. The headmins have all done their jobs but have become burnt out and should be replaced with a vote in due time. The headcoders are almost invisible outside of IRC, where they actually do their jobs, however ill defined it is. Coders want to spend time coding instead of bitching with players over why their stuff should be reverted, or worse, getting their changes denied after all their hard work. Players just want to have some say in the matter.
The people on both sides of the divide we have seen do not have time to make all the efforts to bridge the gap with each other. This means following such a procedure.
There is hope however. The fact that the forums are now in control of the coders means the balance of power has shifted. Errorage's rage is no longer a factor. Despite coderbus making this forum, and that the could of easily just ignored NT, space was made for NTstation on this forum. I was told this was the doing of SoS and if this is true he truly is the most impartial person here and few, if any, would of made a better host.
The existance of NT itself begets needless work. Between porting things from one side to another and all the inevitable incompatibilites between coding standards (due to a lack of oversight more than anything else). All this effort could be put to making ONE codebase better, and it will only cost more effort as the branches beocme more distinct.
I ask of you, can we not put in a bare minimum procedure for all coding in order to satisfy the needs of both parties?
Can we not make a system which wont fall completely apart as soon as a few people leave? Where people are free to come and go with their contributions? While hosts are a bigger issue, i mean everything from the humble potato player with their misinformed ideas as to the capabilites of byond who may have one single poorly phrased but useful idea; to the worldshaping coder who was came knowing nothing but with babys first code, and the help of coderbus, over time became competant in programming?
Can we not make a single unifed system that wont fall apart every few months from constant drama? A system that focuses on whats important, making content for a 2d spaceman game where you can bash a clowns face in with a toolbox for slipping you into a disposals loop?
TL;DR, nobody talks to each other across the divide between forums and IRC (unless its bitching) and unless this is fixed its only a matter of time until another split happens. Do we want to let this happen or make a system where it wont?
NT comprises of ~70% forumites who never get on IRC (and ~10% people who were ostracized from coderbus for various reasons and ~20% people who are straddling the gap between the two branches). Coderbus prefers to do its work on the IRC for reasons explained later on. I believe this is the fundamental issue.
What happens when the forumites get mad? They make a spincycle thread of venom that coderbus might skim later and post things on IRC out of context.
What happens with coders get mad? They make a spincycle IRC chat of venom until they tucker themselves out and get back to talking about normal stuff. Forumites might get some logs posted to the forum at one point or another, most likely in a mess or something of shock value out of context.
I am not trying to say anybody is innocent. We are all apes and shitflinging comes naturally to us all. I am saying that with such an institutional divide between the parties involved, it is only a matter of time until another such event happens again.
A mutually agreed upon system of transparency should be put in place, so things are not made worse and the inevitable happens again. But what system?
There is no technological middle ground between forums and IRC.
Forums have the pro of being a visible (somewhat) easily searchable record, but the con of being slow and hard to sift through. IRC has the pro of being a snap response to any specific questions, but the con of becoming an unbearable mess to sift through once too many people start talking at once.
Throw in github being a seperate location to post about changes, and everything becomes a mess only the very dedicated can keep track of.
Based on this, I reccomend a standard procedure be made based off of the system that NT uses, with a emphasis that coders ask BEFORE doing major systems so they do not spend time on a change that would end up getting voted no.
Should any compromises be reached in order to make sych a procedure, care must be taken to prevent extreme of the tyranny of the majority over coderbus and the other extreme of coderbus silently (to non coderbus) imposing its (or even individual's) silent will upon the majority.
In the end the limiting factor is time.
SoS does not have the time to deal with every single thing. that goes on and remains the most impartial person on these forums. The headmins have all done their jobs but have become burnt out and should be replaced with a vote in due time. The headcoders are almost invisible outside of IRC, where they actually do their jobs, however ill defined it is. Coders want to spend time coding instead of bitching with players over why their stuff should be reverted, or worse, getting their changes denied after all their hard work. Players just want to have some say in the matter.
The people on both sides of the divide we have seen do not have time to make all the efforts to bridge the gap with each other. This means following such a procedure.
There is hope however. The fact that the forums are now in control of the coders means the balance of power has shifted. Errorage's rage is no longer a factor. Despite coderbus making this forum, and that the could of easily just ignored NT, space was made for NTstation on this forum. I was told this was the doing of SoS and if this is true he truly is the most impartial person here and few, if any, would of made a better host.
The existance of NT itself begets needless work. Between porting things from one side to another and all the inevitable incompatibilites between coding standards (due to a lack of oversight more than anything else). All this effort could be put to making ONE codebase better, and it will only cost more effort as the branches beocme more distinct.
I ask of you, can we not put in a bare minimum procedure for all coding in order to satisfy the needs of both parties?
Can we not make a system which wont fall completely apart as soon as a few people leave? Where people are free to come and go with their contributions? While hosts are a bigger issue, i mean everything from the humble potato player with their misinformed ideas as to the capabilites of byond who may have one single poorly phrased but useful idea; to the worldshaping coder who was came knowing nothing but with babys first code, and the help of coderbus, over time became competant in programming?
Can we not make a single unifed system that wont fall apart every few months from constant drama? A system that focuses on whats important, making content for a 2d spaceman game where you can bash a clowns face in with a toolbox for slipping you into a disposals loop?
TL;DR, nobody talks to each other across the divide between forums and IRC (unless its bitching) and unless this is fixed its only a matter of time until another split happens. Do we want to let this happen or make a system where it wont?
