> I don’t know much about voting systems, but I know someone who does. Unfortunately he’s currently banned. Maybe we can wait until his 3-month ban expires and ask him for advice?
Currently, the text reads:
> This post was flagged by the community and is temporarily hidden.
Since it has been hidden for more than 24 hours, this suggests that a moderator action has marked it as permanently hidden. Due to a recent decision, this means no one outside of the moderators or admins can view it: https://discuss.python.org/t/moderated-posts-are-no-longer-p...
Edit 2: Some comments suggest that Guido was banned from posting, but this is not accurate. I have edited the title from "Guido van Rossum's Post Removed for Violating Python Community Guidelines" to "A Post by Guido van Rossum Removed for Violating Python Community Guidelines" to clarify what actually happened.
I'm an outsider who only knows Guido van Rossum by way of interviews his writing.
Assuming your quote is what the original text said (I don't disbelieve you-- but nobody can see it to confirm) why would this have violated community standards? Is there some rule about not mentioning "un-persons" or something?
It's very confusing.
Edit: Answering my own question. There appears to be a kerfuffle afoot. Apparently the Steering Council has suspended a core developer for 3 months[0] but isn't naming the suspended developer or citing specific reasons why (per [1] and sparking a call for a vote of no confidence in the council which did not succeed).
Apparently even mentioning the suspended person (without naming them) is enough for even Guido van Rossum to be censored. Wow.
Edit 2: The suspended developer is Tim Peters[3].
Edit 3: Altered paragraph "Edit:" from "...or the reason why[1] (" to "...or citing specific reasons why (per [1]".
Edit 4: Added "which did not succeed" after "...vote of no confidence in the council".
That's kinda nuts, but kinda absolutely in line with all trends of the last 5 years. I remember similar shit happening in Linux community (the shit won, naturally).
But, anyway, who is the "Steering Council" and how come they have more influence than the 2 people who basically created python the language and python the community?
Wow, just wow. Reading all these makes me really worried about supporting anything built on Python long term. This creates an impression of a self-destructing dying community.
What the hell, has everyone caught and gone gung-ho on censorship? What the actual f*** is this?
How in the hell do you have the balls or ovaries to ban the creator --for something so inane. It's like a highscool supe who gets no respect and will at every chance show you the little power she has in such a classless way. So utterly petty defying belief.
I hope those dweebs get voted out pronto. That's an absurd abuse of power.
People who trip like that have no business having any power or control.
Re: the vote of no confidence [1]. Looks like most devs disagreed with the vote and have opted to let the council continue but transfer the "HR" Code of Conduct duties to the PSF.
> why would this have violated community standards? Is there some rule about not mentioning "un-persons" or something?
Flags may be cast by anyone, and this will eventually result in automatic hiding - flags on Discourse are weighted according to the "trust level" of those raising them.
Wonder if the moderators heard about the Streisand Effect. It’s a good time to learn about it.
> I don’t know much about voting systems, but I know someone who does. Unfortunately he’s currently banned. Maybe we can wait until his 3-month ban expires and ask him for advice?
So he was banned for asking about someone who knows about voting. Transitive meta banning? I guess anyone asking about Guido’s post will also get banned.
> this means no one outside of the moderators or admins can view it
Imo that kind of deliberate intransparency is a massive red flag. Here for example I can choose to see hidden comments and make up my own mind about the content, which is excellent. Even if I don't use the feature, the fact that I could if I wanted to is a massive plus for trust in the process.
The same cannot be said for in-numerous other acts of flagging and hiding. Almost all posts from Clay in this thread has been flagged and hidden; you can't even make sense of Guido's replies to him because of that.
These are not "Python community guidelines". These are the guidelines of a tyrannical clique who have grabbed power and control the access to the infrastructure.
They abuse their power by banning any opposition and then using said infrastructure to libel and defame their opponents.
Google already fired one or two of them. I do not know what is required to restore the health of Python.
Similarly (un)funny how the technology behind blockchains, formal verification, and decentralization is ridiculed on the basis of inefficiency etc., Every. Single. Time. given such a governance structure would be so much harder for the legalese power trippers to regulatory capture...
This is Guido. I can assure you there was nothing nefarious. The incident is best described as moderation automation misfiring. The post was restored and a moderator has apologized for the mishap.
FYI, Python is named after Monty Python , who got into all kinds of trouble making fun of and saying things that upset basically everyone (religion to LGBT), which is ironic considering the circumstances.
My spidey sense first got tingling a few years ago when the Python powers decided they were going to rename their git master branch to something else. Caused them unnecessary work and to this day it's not certain any developer or user actually asked for it. The word has multiple meanings of course; yet felt like a symbolic gesture to alleviate guilt totally unrelated to Python.
I didn't complain without a dog in the hunt, but I noticed those that did were implied to be monsters, and told that their mild disagreement "would not look good to history." Unfortunately a few years later I can say the opposite.
Well, Guido made his bed, now it's time to lie in it. ;-)
>Unfortunately a few years later I can say the opposite.
It's your contention that people getting up in arms about not changing the name of the 'master' branch specifically look good now, with hindsight? Can't say I agree.
Very sad to see this happening to the Python community. Maybe we need a fork with only technical discussion allowed. This CoC/vote stuff seems to poison every community it touches.
I think the politics of power is unavoidable no matter how well you silo your technical work from your people work.
Ten years ago, Debian saw three well respected members of the Technical Committee resign — including two former project leaders, one of whom designed the .deb packaging system — during what I see as a similarly heated vote/counter-vote power struggle. This Python saga feels similar.
BDFL model seems to have worked pretty well for so many decades. Guido should have just transferred power to someone he trusted. Now look at him, he can't even comment freely.
I believe if things get too heated, all the parties involved should be forced to meet in person for a weekend to talk things out. I'm sure it would solve like 90% of these stupid conflicts, because people rarely get _that_ riled up when in the same room.
Written communication, especially asynchronus ones like email or forums, are just unsuitable to capture all nuances of human behaviour. Someone is tired or hungry and makes a bad joke; next thing you know there's a witchhunt…
(I also don't think they should be allowed to cite things said 5 years ago as a reason to ban someone today. How could that still be relevant?)
This type of behavior is abusing the members of the community.
Code of conducts should contain language to dissuade bureaucrats from
participating and especially from attempts at grabbing power.
As well as a straightforward way to report bureaucrats
and have them removed from the community.
Based on the same process as other abuses that may already be
included int the code of conduct.
You can vote your way into a CoC but you need to fork your way out.
When Codes of Conduct were first introduced, they sounded like a benign concept. But now it's becoming increasing clear that they're the Trojan horse that allows the inmates to take over the asylum.
Readit News
> I don’t know much about voting systems, but I know someone who does. Unfortunately he’s currently banned. Maybe we can wait until his 3-month ban expires and ask him for advice?
Currently, the text reads:
> This post was flagged by the community and is temporarily hidden.
Since it has been hidden for more than 24 hours, this suggests that a moderator action has marked it as permanently hidden. Due to a recent decision, this means no one outside of the moderators or admins can view it: https://discuss.python.org/t/moderated-posts-are-no-longer-p...
Edit: I meant to post slightly more direct link in title: https://discuss.python.org/t/should-we-consider-ranked-choic...
Edit 2: Some comments suggest that Guido was banned from posting, but this is not accurate. I have edited the title from "Guido van Rossum's Post Removed for Violating Python Community Guidelines" to "A Post by Guido van Rossum Removed for Violating Python Community Guidelines" to clarify what actually happened.
Assuming your quote is what the original text said (I don't disbelieve you-- but nobody can see it to confirm) why would this have violated community standards? Is there some rule about not mentioning "un-persons" or something?
It's very confusing.
Edit: Answering my own question. There appears to be a kerfuffle afoot. Apparently the Steering Council has suspended a core developer for 3 months[0] but isn't naming the suspended developer or citing specific reasons why (per [1] and sparking a call for a vote of no confidence in the council which did not succeed).
Apparently even mentioning the suspended person (without naming them) is enough for even Guido van Rossum to be censored. Wow.
Edit 2: The suspended developer is Tim Peters[3].
Edit 3: Altered paragraph "Edit:" from "...or the reason why[1] (" to "...or citing specific reasons why (per [1]".
Edit 4: Added "which did not succeed" after "...vote of no confidence in the council".
[0] https://discuss.python.org/t/three-month-suspension-for-a-co...
[1] https://discuss.python.org/t/calling-for-a-vote-of-no-confid...
[3] https://chrismcdonough.substack.com/p/the-shameful-defenestr...
But, anyway, who is the "Steering Council" and how come they have more influence than the 2 people who basically created python the language and python the community?
Originally discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41234180
How in the hell do you have the balls or ovaries to ban the creator --for something so inane. It's like a highscool supe who gets no respect and will at every chance show you the little power she has in such a classless way. So utterly petty defying belief.
I hope those dweebs get voted out pronto. That's an absurd abuse of power.
People who trip like that have no business having any power or control.
[1] https://discuss.python.org/t/calling-for-a-vote-of-no-confid...
Flags may be cast by anyone, and this will eventually result in automatic hiding - flags on Discourse are weighted according to the "trust level" of those raising them.
My guess is that people perceived this as a passive-aggressive objection to Tim Peters' suspension. It has definitely been permitted up until now to refer to this (although everyone seemed to be avoiding the name on principle), but there seems to be an expectation that people should "read the air" now and stop talking about it - hence posts like https://discuss.python.org/t/moderated-posts-are-no-longer-p... and https://discuss.python.org/t/pr-disaster-surrounding-recent-... .
> and sparking a call for a vote of no confidence in the council which did not succeed
The call was retracted, which is not surprising. The Steering Council isn't the root of the problem, anyway. That would be the Code of Conduct Work Group (https://www.python.org/psf/workgroups/#code-of-conduct-work-...), which is not elected (https://wiki.python.org/psf/ConductWG/Charter#Membership), has membership overlapping other important groups (4 of them are on the PSF Board of Directors - https://www.python.org/psf/board/#id3 - and Brett Cannon and Łukasz Langa are Discourse forum moderators) and enforces the Code of Conduct according to hidden rules that betray the neutrality of that document (https://policies.python.org/python.org/code-of-conduct/Enfor...) counter to the wishes of one of the original drafters of said document (https://discuss.python.org/t/why-i-am-withdrawing-fellowship... ; https://discuss.python.org/t/why-im-leaving-discuss-python-o... etc.).
It's also noteworthy that the Steering Council - consisting of 5 core devs - apparently also now requires a "communications liaison" (https://www.notion.so/46aec24028fd4e8dbdba003097c18b5b?pvs=2...) who gets a glowing write-up in official updates on the forum (such as https://discuss.python.org/t/steering-council-updates-for-ju...) - which are not posted by said liaison. I have no idea why this should be necessary, nor is there anything in PEP 13 (https://peps.python.org/pep-0013/) about this position existing. It seems that this person was selected entirely out-of-process.
Dead Comment
> I don’t know much about voting systems, but I know someone who does. Unfortunately he’s currently banned. Maybe we can wait until his 3-month ban expires and ask him for advice?
So he was banned for asking about someone who knows about voting. Transitive meta banning? I guess anyone asking about Guido’s post will also get banned.
Imo that kind of deliberate intransparency is a massive red flag. Here for example I can choose to see hidden comments and make up my own mind about the content, which is excellent. Even if I don't use the feature, the fact that I could if I wanted to is a massive plus for trust in the process.
The same cannot be said for in-numerous other acts of flagging and hiding. Almost all posts from Clay in this thread has been flagged and hidden; you can't even make sense of Guido's replies to him because of that.
https://discuss.python.org/t/approval-voting-vs-instant-runo...
Would be happy for admin to do so, if that's something that's done on this site.
They abuse their power by banning any opposition and then using said infrastructure to libel and defame their opponents.
Google already fired one or two of them. I do not know what is required to restore the health of Python.
I would appreciate more information about this.
Dead Comment
https://youtu.be/X2xlQaimsGg?feature=shared&t=13
FYI, Python is named after Monty Python , who got into all kinds of trouble making fun of and saying things that upset basically everyone (religion to LGBT), which is ironic considering the circumstances.
I didn't complain without a dog in the hunt, but I noticed those that did were implied to be monsters, and told that their mild disagreement "would not look good to history." Unfortunately a few years later I can say the opposite.
Well, Guido made his bed, now it's time to lie in it. ;-)
It's your contention that people getting up in arms about not changing the name of the 'master' branch specifically look good now, with hindsight? Can't say I agree.
Something substantial perhaps, say promoting under-represented folks within psf would be something. You can’t eat branch names.
Turns out it's a slippery slope, who would've thunk.
Ten years ago, Debian saw three well respected members of the Technical Committee resign — including two former project leaders, one of whom designed the .deb packaging system — during what I see as a similarly heated vote/counter-vote power struggle. This Python saga feels similar.
(I also don't think they should be allowed to cite things said 5 years ago as a reason to ban someone today. How could that still be relevant?)
As well as a straightforward way to report bureaucrats and have them removed from the community.
Based on the same process as other abuses that may already be included int the code of conduct.
When Codes of Conduct were first introduced, they sounded like a benign concept. But now it's becoming increasing clear that they're the Trojan horse that allows the inmates to take over the asylum.