A small group of developers are deciding who is a bitcoin Press representative

[aantonop]

New rule: Vetos for existing Press Center members require a pull request

I am about to open one, at which time I expect it will be up for majority vote (not really a veto)..

Seems like anyone who agrees with the three/four devs in control gets a veto. That's what they meant by "everyone gets a veto"


So now I will do a pull request to show how they were lying AGAIN

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[aantonop]

Update for those interested.

The developers who are playing a power grab of bitcoin.org set the rules for nomination - a pull request. Then they changed the rules 15 times in a row, as I met every requirement.

To summarize:

* All I need is a pull request to nominate someone
* But only if I get support with votes
* But only the devs get a vote
* But everyone gets a VETO
* Unless it's me, I don't get a veto (I veto'd jgarzik, since everyone gets a veto)
* For that I have to do a pull request for VETO (30 seconds after I stated my veto)
* But only for existing Press Center members (30 seconds after I said I'd do a pull request)
* "Vetos for real reasons are real. Vetos because you want to create problems are not". @luke-jr get to decide which is which.
* Votes keep coming in (16-6 in favor of expanding the list), with people opposed voting as if the vote matters, but votes in support being ignored.
* Voting will continue until I lose in votes, or I lose by veto, or I Iose by having the pull-request closed.
* "Counting votes, after trolling specific audiences for votes on outside forums, just makes a vote even more meaningless". (ie, getting support from the community at large is somehow suspect- that's YOU everyone!)
* "As we see here, the loudest voice -- i.e. the person who posts the most -- just drowns out everything else". (Before there was no support, now there's TOO MUCH speech in this voting process, once I started getting support)

You may add you comments here - suggest constructive solutions, don't bash the individuals, that's what they want to call it a troll. Nominate more people, offer your own substantiated vetos and stick around to defend your positions.
https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin.org/pull/162

[aantonop]

At 17 for expanding the press center and 7 votes against, @saivann, the appointed webmaster closed the vote declaring it a loss (invalidating the 17 votes)

It was a sham all along, trying to distract from the power grab underway.

bitcoin.org's press page is run by 3 unelected developers with not a clue about press relations. Rejoice!

[aantonop]

Just got a PM from gmaxwell with the following gem, just to double-down on the tone-deaf attitude. He didn't have the brass to post it publicly of course, he's a cowardly weasel through and through:

>counting?
>« Sent to: aantonop on: Today at 11:22:12 PM »
>« You have forwarded or responded to this message. »
>Quote  Reply  Delete 
>At the time you claimed 16/7 my count was:
>
>aantonop
>flix1
>pelle
>masterkrang
>simonk83
>sunnankar
>joecoin
>gbilley
>dgenr8
>cypherdoc   
>junisBell
>msngui


>luke
>gmaxwell
>midnightmagic
>saivann
>emansipater
>someoneweird
>jgarzik
>aardeem


>13 vs 8.

>Not that it matters, doubly so with you hitting multiple threads encouraging people to comment without reading the ?background, and promoting your position on the forum— in threads you didn't bother linking to (and so I'm just now finding) with deceptive statements (e.g. claiming that all of my matonis quotes were other people).


To which I responded:

Wait, so you lost the vote, cancelled the vote and are now telling me that you lost it but BY LESS THAN I CLAIMED?

The you accuse me from gathering community input (Wow!), which is what y'all said was needed.

Have you no shame?

[scintill]

Wait, so you lost the vote, cancelled the vote and are now telling me that you lost it but BY LESS THAN I CLAIMED?

Where did they ever say they were holding a vote?  (Hyperlink to specific vote please.)  As far I can tell you have invented the idea that NACK and ACK are literal binding votes that must be tallied.

As the website maintainer says:

No open-source project I know let his community force changes by votes.

Of course, you will dismiss this as "moving the goalposts."  Please, tell us where your idea of the goalposts was originally set?  (Hyperlink to specific vote please.)

Edit: And before you launch into something about how Bitcoin is supposed to be a utopia for individual freedom or something: yes, the protocol itself is decentralized and run by democracy-like consensus algorithms.  Bitcoin.org is not.  Again, I ask you to tell me where anybody who matters* ever said otherwise.  (*Matters in the sense that they have the power to make it so given the current arrangement of limited # of individuals able to log into the server hosting bitcoin.org.)

More and more it sounds like your idea of "free and open process" is actually just "I get my way."

[jbreher]

Of course, you will dismiss this as "moving the goalposts."  Please, tell us where your idea of the goalposts was originally set?

I'm guessing it started where he was told that the proper mechanism to getting a candidate added to the annointed press members list was by doing a pull request on git.

[scintill]

I'm guessing it started where he was told that the proper mechanism to getting a candidate added to the annointed press members list was by doing a pull request on git.

Again, can I get a link to the post?  As far as I know, that's indeed how you propose a candidate.  There is no binding process for getting a candidate onto the actual "annointed press members list."  Call this an authoritarian power-hungry nazi fascist policy if you like, but please stop shouting about "moving goalposts" and "changing the rules" and "sham" -- there were never any hard rules to begin with, only customs of how open-source projects are run.

I'm open to the possibility that pseudo-"rules" were added after this hullabaloo started (edit: here's one, but notice "perhaps", "maybe", "would" -- this is not a hard rule), by developers speaking off-the-cuff under the pressure of being bullied by aantonop and his sympathizers, but because of that situation they weren't crafted carefully and with deliberation.  They aren't binding anyway because bitcoin.org is still a centralized repository administered, by technical and practical necessity, by only a few people with ultimate veto power.  Finally, rules added "after the fact" like this would be another form of "moving the goalposts", right?!  The only rules that matter are those that were in effect when the press page was started, and I judge there were none.  Feel free to claim otherwise if you have a citation.

Anyway, please cite all claims as thoroughly as possible.  There have been far too many emotional, hand-waving accusations and claims in the many discussions about this issue already.

[aantonop]

It's amazing to me that you keep throwing about this victim mentality and whining.

I was bullying the developers (who have all the power in this debate), by asking for clarity on the rules and given the runaround? I was bullying by collecting votes?

Methinks the lady doth protest too much. In the end, I'm being accused of bullying, but what actually happened?

Oh right... the developers flexed their commit and control and shut me down.

Amazing I bullied the poor wittle defenswess devewopers with words, yet they had the strength to hit Close in the end.

Let me call a WAAAAAAAAAAaahmbulance for your oppressed devs. Look at the mess on the Press Center page (unchanged)!

The truth is that they called for input, started the thread with slander and ended it by shutting down discussion while they kept losing the vote.

[franky1]

when luke JR is involved the communities point of view is meaningless..

luke Jr is a known mental case who wants this his way or no way at all. thats why instead of relying on bitcoin.org as the central point for media relations. having multiple hubs available.

there are many countries out there and many businesses that may want their own idea of a spokesperson. thats why i planned to just let people who are not already famous have their chance to highlight themselves by making a video and then all of those businesses and other websites around the world which may have a press centre section can choose their own people as spokesmen.

using bitcoin.org is called centralisation... especially now its being run by the golden few...

so why even bother stressing yourself over their rules. they are just a hand full of individuals. their rules dont matter. the world is much bigger then luke Jr so just do what most others do, and ignore/avoid them.

instead help out by making a massive list of people that may want to be spokes people that think they will never get a chance. get them to make a little video. im not stating it has to be a mock TV interview or a tutorial, or a rigid set script. the community questions were just examples of things they may want to talk about to atleast get a better idea of the persons mindset.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=190192.0

[aantonop]

I'm with you on the idea of walking away from the steaming pile of crap that is the bitcoin.org management.


I'm going a step further an making a, probably futile, attempt at putting together a more representative user group.

What became obvious from this experience is that we need more speech and more diverse representation. The existing associations and groups are closed and not very transparent.

I want to make it successful, even if it only has 100 members.

It will live on bitcoinusergroup.org as of mid-week. If the group has any press page (up to the members to vote on that), then I will propose a resolution for an open process to select a diverse group of press representatives.

Before that however, the problem to solve is lack of accountability and transparency. There's no reason why these issues can't be voted on directly by thousands of interested people in an association. The only impediment is a complete lack of motivation among those who already have control and don't care to listen to the plebes.

They kept telling me to fork the whole thing (they say that about code changes too). I tried working inside the process, even though it was obvious from the start that it wasn't real. Better to throw the whole lot into the dark pit of irrelevance they belong and start with a fresh and open approach.

Everything wrong about the current organizations can be a value-proposition for the user group:

- No accountability = Open books and independent financial audits every year
- Too exclusive/expensive = Low membership fees pegged to current value
- No visiibility = Completely public operation
- Appointed overlords = Elected board, open voting process
- Too much power at the top = Board has no vote, cannot spend without member vote and are explicitly only caretakers.
- Too many claiming to "represent" = Board explicitly not representing anyone. Only duly passed resolutions "speak" for the users.
- "What have you done for bitcoin" = One person, one vote, no vetos - except board members who don't get votes.


Oh, in case some weasel projects their own power-grabbing desires on me, I'm recusing myself, permanently, from any board position. I will instead donate to seed it and then others can decide how to run it. I'll get one vote, if I pay my membership fees.

It's easy to change things. Just walk away from the unaccountable ones and build direct voting power - representative systems are only necessary when communications are scarce (or when the representatives want to control them). there's no reason why we can't directly vote on any issue in the hundreds of thousands.

Over time, I hope we can incorporate some de-centralized proof-of-stake voting, in the spirit of bitcoin, if that is what people want.

Just walk away

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=190527

[Inedible]

i have not limited it to say that those nominated cannot make videos. i have not set any goal posts or set any conditions that the only way the press will contact them is if they are firstly nominated through one website. and voted for by someguys single decision based on typing "ACK" on a certain page.
 you have set some limiting goalposts by suggesting that the only way though to a press page is through ACK ACK ACK your proposal.

I think you're both in agreement.

It just looks like you're both missing each other's points.

Am I right in saying franky1 thinks having a video is a very good way of weeding out weak candidates and would have no problems if it applied to all candidates?

Am I right in saying aantonop would only accept this additional qualification so long as it's applied equally to all candidates?

I don't think franky1 is suggesting that it should only be applied to new candidates and I don't think aantonop thinks it's a bad idea (to the contrary, he probably things it's a good idea).

I'm just posting this so that you can both move on from it as you seem to have gotten stuck on this distraction of a debating point.

[aantonop]

Inedible,

We are in more agreement than even you saw.

I love "Helps" idea. But the real problem lies deeper and it is in the organization and foundation, not the 3 little devs who keep playing game of thrones.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=190527

[scintill]

Amazing I bullied the poor wittle defenswess devewopers with words

First, my favorite point, because you just literally did some classic bullying, at least if Wikipedia can be trusted.  The above was patronizing baby talk towards the developers, a form of verbal abuse and bullying, "in which the talk is intended to infantilize the victim."  Of course, in your mind, since the developers have commit power, all abuse toward them is somehow justified.  Since you know they have the power to choose things that preclude you getting your way, you have to trash them to feel compensated.  As for your other bullying, let's start with the title of your pull request:

Add several independent voices to the Press Center page, beyond the devs pets.

You're not even masking your contempt for the developers here.  You weren't getting anywhere in your original request for Matonis, so you start it all over again, with an insult in the title.  Bad way to start off a re-hashed discussion, but since your aim isn't really to accomplish anything constructive, that makes sense.  Oddly, you described your newer pull request as a "Do-over for all of us."

Do-over is right.  It's reminiscent of a child being told "no" by his parents, so he just asks again and throws a tantrum.  Another problem with this second pull request is that it's broad.  The title references "several... voices", the actual code so far only includes Matonis.  What are people even expressing support for when they utter your much-vaunted "ACK" in this thread?  Matonis specifically, or just "add some more people"?  Next:

@gmaxwell You ignored all the people who objected to your power grab and capriciously closed pull requests that had support.

This comes off as a personal attack on gmaxwell (edit: It was, but you later apologized because you had mistakenly attributed the closing to gmaxwell.  The following is still factual but less relevant:)  As far I can tell he never personally closed a PR on this matter.  The closed PRs are the original Press Center (it was merged for a first publication), the removal of Press Center, your first Matonis PR (closed by yourself), and your second Matonis PR.  That last one was closed by the webmaster -- in fact, why would he entertain a repeat of a PR whose original was closed by the submitter?  None were closed by gmaxwell.

You'd recuse yourself from the decision if you had an ounce of integrity.

Another personal attack on gmaxwell, telling him he has no integrity.  Love how you grace him with the judicial word "recuse", when in your mind he's not fit to be anything other than a code monkey.

Look at the mess on the Press Center page (unchanged)!

Huh, all I see is a pretty nice display of quite a selection of people.  More than there were when the Press Center debuted.  They've even got a German speaker, and broadening the count and the languages spoken is (ostensibly) the goal of one of your own pull requests!  Maybe you need to clear you browser cache to see the latest changes?  And if it's a mess, maybe you have some browser CSS issue.

The truth is that they called for input, started the thread with slander and ended it by shutting down discussion while they kept losing the vote.

Apparently your idea of accepting "input" is doing what it says, no matter what.  It's called "input", not "dictatorship by the rabble-rousers in the community."  They entertained input and gave their reasons for turning it down.  Again, (you never answered my earlier request for proof that there is supposed to be an official voting system) they had no imperative to even count a vote; you're the one making it up so you can shout about rules being changed and being cheated.

[aantonop]

Since you are pulling quotes out of context from a 3-day discussion, let me quickly address them one by one:

1) Written after the end of the whole pull request and in response to your ad-hominem. Not taken from the actual discussion

2) Title was changed late today, after the @gmaxwell called me a jerk for using the veto he said I had. Before it read "Add more press representatives to the Press Center. Compared to "jerk", I think calling the appointees "pets" is mild.

3) I retracted the part about the @gmaxwell closing the pull request one post later and apologized. I had confused the two user IDs (I mistook him for @saivann). You didn't quote my apology and retraction, even though it was two posts down and less than 30 seconds after the original post. Also, no one else apologized or retracted anything, so mine was the only such act on the entire thread. Even @gmaxwell who misquoted Matonis, didn't apologize to anyone.

4) I stand by the factual assertion that gmaxwell should recuse himself if he had integrity and my opinion that he does not. His second post to the pull request was a misquoted slander and he never apologized for it, or retracted it. He just edited and added two words (the name of the original person who said what he attributed to Matonis, and the word 'retweet' next to the other quote he missatributed to Matonis). But he gets to decide press relations when he can't even quote properly.

5) "Look at the mess in the Press Center" is sarcasm. I was implying that nothing had changed from my pull request or the many many pull requests that preceded it. Status quo is a choice, one that rewards the appointees of the developers at the expense of anyone excluded by decree.

6) Factual

You took apart a 2 day discussion. You saw no problem with the serial slander against Matonis, name calling against me (jerk, git-troll, leech, etc) or the tone of any of the other posters. You just selectively quoted me digging up what you call bullying, and this is all you could find in that heated discussion?

The full record is out there for all to see your selective quoting, notwithstanding.

I'm not going to re-argue the whole process with you. I argued it when I had some hope that the process offered was real and it wasn't. Are you trying to make sure no one offers any more nominations or pull requests? You don't need to worry - no one will play the fool for that charade again.

[Bitcoinpro]

thanks for the updates

[scintill]

Sigh, sorry this is so long.  I'll say my piece and call it quits, obviously nobody is going to have their mind changed here.  I wish you good luck with your bitcoin user group.  Although I think this whole argument is a tempest in a teapot, diversity of organization could do us some good.

Since you are pulling quotes out of context from a 3-day discussion, let me quickly address them one by one:

At least I link them, that's more context than you've been giving.

1) Written after the end of the whole pull request and in response to your ad-hominem. Not taken from the actual discussion

Lol, it's not an ad-hominem when your response does exactly what I accused you of doing.  Also, it was written here where they could read it, unless you intend this to be your "secret" place to organize against them, which is exactly the kind of thing you accuse them of doing.  You are right overall though.  My claim is that you are actively bullying or trolling developers, so I think it still stands as representative of your attitude.  I think there's plenty of other abuse within the actual discussion, and I do concede it comes from both sides, although I would say the developers are not unprovoked.  You came up with ways to insult/"critique" jgarzik solely to further your agenda.  That's not constructive, it's destructive.   You didn't do it to help bitcoin.org's press section, you did it to spit in the devs' faces.

2) Title was changed late today, after the @gmaxwell called me a jerk for using the veto he said I had. Before it read "Add more press representatives to the Press Center. Compared to "jerk", I think calling the appointees "pets" is mild.

Fair enough, but you and your cause will be judged based on what it says now.  I don't even think there's a way to see the historical title in github.  Cue the derision for using github.  I'll take this moment to say it would be well-deserved, but that I don't think it was a very conscious choice in the first place.  People like you pulled github into politics, not the other way around.  There's a 5-week old thread on this forum that was specifically made for the Press Center contacts, but nobody's used it much.  I don't think the website administrators were prepared for the turmoil this would cause, so the initial response was, "Uh, we'll hash it out on github, like we do with all changes to code" (a list of people on a website is made of code; it's not all that bizarre of an idea to do it on github.)  That obviously hasn't scaled well, but no thanks to everyone creating multiple pull requests for their favorite intellectual/political exile and spamming all the threads.

3) I retracted the part about the @gmaxwell closing the pull request one post later and apologized. I had confused the two user IDs (I mistook him for @saivann). You didn't quote my apology and retraction, even though it was two posts down and less than 30 seconds after the original post. Also, no one else apologized or retracted anything, so mine was the only such act on the entire thread. Even @gmaxwell who misquoted Matonis, didn't apologize to anyone.

Sincere apologies, I didn't see that.  I will amend my original post.  You are right, although "one post later" is a little disingenuous, as there are actually several intervening posts from other people and that's why I didn't connect what was going on.  Also, if you hover over the (current) "13 hours ago" text in the two posts, the timestamps are in fact "2013-04-28 15:31:58" and "2013-04-28 15:49:32", meaning it was not "30 seconds later."  This isn't really ironclad evidence (edits could throw the timestamps off?) and it's a nitpick, but you're the one who got self-righteous about how quick you were.  I hope it was mis-remembering and not fabrication.  It's also ironic and hypocritical that you didn't edit your original post once you discovered you were mistaken, since that's what you demand from others:

and yet you have not removed those [erroneous] quotes. You have not used the little edit button.

I guess when they don't meet your arbitrary standards of decency, you're relieved from doing so yourself, eh?

5) "Look at the mess in the Press Center" is sarcasm. I was implying that nothing had changed from my pull request or the many many pull requests that preceded it. Status quo is a choice, one that rewards the appointees of the developers at the expense of anyone excluded by decree.

How "many many" unmerged pull requests?  I count your 2 about Matonis, a still-open one about Roger Ver, and the one for removing the Press Center (which I don't think you can count because you seem to prefer adding to the Press Center).  So, basically the only unique non-merged pull-request made by someone other than yourself are still in the "open" state, which seems to be your standard for whether the devs are "accepting input."  Meanwhile, several additions have been made to the press page since it started.  Call this a "closed" process if you like, but it's definitely not stagnant (the "status quo" if I may read into your words a bit) just because your own changes haven't been accepted.  At least this seems to be somewhat your argument, but I may be reading too much into it.

6) Factual

You took apart a 2 day discussion. You saw no problem with the serial slander against Matonis, name calling against me (jerk, git-troll, leech, etc) or the tone of any of the other posters. You just selectively quoted me digging up what you call bullying, and this is all you could find in that heated discussion?

You're right, I was selective.  I think you are being selective too.  While my reading wasn't all that exhaustive because I was only seeking to show why I believe you to be unfair (I'll admit it), I'll agree there is a tone problem throughout.  I'll still assign a lot of the blame on you, for laying on the inflammatory rhetoric by calling this from the beginning a power-grab by capricious non-transparent authoritarians instituting a "git-literacy" test for their "vote."  Again, nobody said this was a democracy.  You still haven't shown me where they did.  On that basis alone, your entire implicit argument that anybody should give a hoot about what you think, falls apart.  Yes, they solicit suggestions because they know that can be effective, but they reserve the right to turn them down.  Giving a reason for saying "no" or allowing multiple chances to pitch an idea is merely being polite, not required.

I'm not going to re-argue the whole process with you. I argued it when I had some hope that the process offered was real and it wasn't.

Again, what process was offered that turned out to be fake?  I haven't seen anyone with the authority say, "we'll count the ACK's and the NACK's and the ACK's will win."  You're more familiar with all this, so please hyperlink if this has been said.

[mobile4ever]

wouldn't it be good if each person that wants to be a spokes person, makes a short youtube video talking about.

1. how bitcoin works

2. how people can use bitcoin today

3. how people will use bitcoin each day in the future

4. opportunities, for business, customers, investors, individuals within bitcoin

and then post the link here so that people can see it does not have to just be the bitcoin elite being spokesmen but sometimes the best person with a level head might just an average joe guy within the community.

those videos could either be used as introducer to themselves for media to pick who they want to interview, or for the whole community to pick a selection from.

The more people that can do this, the better off bitcoin will be. The solution is being created, even as far as giving each person a personal web site to use. What videos they put there will be their choice, but I am thinking they will want bitcoin videos .

[MPOE-PR]

This thread is epic. Calling all neckbeards (jgarzick, gmaxwell, puke-jr &co): YOU FAIL

This is because you suck. You're not good enough. The only option you have is exactly how much public humiliation comes with your failure.

Knock yourselves out.