Ian Murdock: Debian "Missing a Big Opportunity"

Natester writes "While Debian struggles to get its next release (Etch) out the door, the project's founder, Ian Murdock, has spoken out about politics, the lack of firm leadership, and Ubuntu's meteoric rise in prominence. Murdock believes that Debian is "process run amok" — nobody feels empowered to make decisions, leading to the sluggish rate of progress."

Comments

It's sad

[Bruce Perens]

Unfortunately, Debian has suffered from a concatenation of problems this year. Dunc-tank (a scheme to pay some developers) sapped a lot of good-will and motivation, and made some developers actually work to hold back the release in protest, and as a result it's another "who knows when it'll happen" Debian release. There has been a lot of bickering on other topics - Debian should never hold face-to-face meetings, something bad always happens - and unfortunately the current DPL hasn't been able to rally the troops or lead effectively in any way I can see. I hope they recover, I think they are still our best hope among Linux distributions.

Bruce

Re:Firm Leadership

[networkBoy]

Dam I wanted to mod in this thread but I can't mod you fairly: "fair point but I really disagree" (underrated I suppose?)

Anyway, I feel that a benevolent dictatorship is actually the prize winner in the dev cycle. Once you get into the "please everyone, get a majority vote" mode of operation you run into endless debate as one side tries to convince the other side of the merits of their idea(s). Now I want a unanimous decision on a jury, but for a distro I want a clear path and direction. The dictatorship forces that path to exist. While I may want the path a different color, so long as it's going the same general direction I am then I'm OK with it.

The direction I'm interested in is a mainstream linux that I can deploy on joe sixpack's computer. I want a linux that is as friendly as OSX, and as compatible with hardware as Windows. I want a distro for the masses, and thus while you are entitled to fork it and tweak it, I think the main tree should be ruled by an authoritarian, rather than a committee.

I also think that the "open market" will decide this for us. Suppliers (donors of code and money) will "sell" to their ideals and buyers will install to their needs.
-nB