Re: Moratorium on the spec-splitting discussion

On Jan 28, 2009, at 3:27 AM, Sam Ruby wrote:

>
> Philip TAYLOR wrote:
>> Jonas Sicking wrote:
>>> What is the purpose of not having the discussion here? I'm not  
>>> really very exited to join the www-archive list in order follow  
>>> discussions regarding the HTML5 spec(s).
>> I agree completely with Jonas : a discussion as important as
>> to whether the WG should publish a monolith or a series of
>> discrete documents should be conducted within the WG on the
>> WG's own list, not on a list unrelated to the WG's business.
>
> I can request a new list that is specific to this Working Group's  
> business if that is what people prefer...

This list is for all of the Working Group's business. Declaring the  
Working Group's business to be off-topic on the Working Group's list  
is nonsense.

> The current spec is a deck of cards, arranged in a particular order,  
> first the Aces, then the deuces, all the way up to the Kings.
>
> There are people on this list who would like to do the work of  
> arranging the cards into four piles: a stack of hearts, a stack of  
> spades, etc. At this point, the analogy breaks down, because there  
> are many who feel that such an arrangement is not feasible, but lets  
> ignore that for a moment.  I must confess that I'm skeptical myself.
>
> Meanwhile, there are people who want to discuss whether or not  
> certain people should be allowed to touch the cards.

And you'd like to resolve this by dealing from the bottom of the deck?

> And then there are people who want to complain about elephants.
>
> I would like to reserve *this* list to discussions about actual  
> specs. And about concrete proposals to improve such.  It doesn't  
> mean that other discussions can't happen, but I would very much like  
> to increase the signal to noise ratio in *this* mailing list for  
> those people who endeavor to do the business of this working group:  
> writing specs.
>
> And if I can't succeed at diverting the meta and meta-meta  
> discussion elsewhere; I will simply do the reverse: request a list  
> specifically for discussing concrete proposals for improving the  
> spec.  An express lane, as it were.

This does not seem to be in the spirit of the original moratorium.  
First, a moratorium is by definition temporary. It sounds like you are  
extending it to a permanent ban on discussing issues of spec  
splitting. Second, at the time the chairs said the moratorium was  
until they thought of a better way to constructively move the  
discussion forward. But it sounds like you would like to bypass all  
the discussion, thus precluding the possibility of the Working Group  
ever making an informed decision on this issue.

I would be happy to see a structured discussion led by the chairs, but  
I don't think permanently banning discussion topics that are relevant  
to the work of the group is an appropriate use of the chairs'  
authority. Certainly having things we officially must not speak of is  
not in the spirit of the Bazaar environment you said you want.

Regards,
Maciej

Received on Wednesday, 28 January 2009 12:05:12 UTC