Perhaps a project manager's perspective of his staff (especially staff so gregarious and careful to please his sponsors as Damian) is not the most unbiased either?:) It has been years since I was a grad student - but I never would have gone so far to call Damian disingenuous and certainly not greedy. Rather I would repeat that he is focused on himself. Whether that is to the detriment of Perl 6 not mine to state.
I absolutely agree with the cheerleader aspect - but do not understand why Perl needs cheerleaders. Do we really need someone to show us Perl is still a vibrant and fun language? Please - we know that already! It is fun watching one of Damian's wonderful lectures - no one derives more pleasure from them then he does!! But so far I chose not to contribute a second time to a fund that sponsors him. I just do not believe we need someone doing 'that kind of stuff' for yet another year.
The obvious counter argument is 'things are a changing in Perl - we need a cheerleader to support 6.' I do not accept this - everyone is waiting for Perl 6 with such baited breath we all smell like a tackle shop!!
As far as all the unsung work Damian has done - clearly I cannot comment because it is deliberately unpublicized. It sounds like it is incredibly important to the delivery of 6. Why is it deliberately unpublicized? It does not sound like the Damian I know (and love) to do a bunch of valuable work and keep it to himself. If it really does exist, can it perhaps be publicized? If it were my tune (and probably the tunes of others) would change.
Damian is an amazing person. He breathes life into topics that might otherwise be dull. He is a great speaker. He is highly self motivated - has the ability to stay on the road for months at a time. He is one of those people who always seems to be bursting with energy.
IMHO he is far to focused on himself. He has a fine set of tools to sell himself and does so extremely well. Take a look at any interview with him. He is always ranting about how busy he is and how much work he is doing.
I knew Damian from college. Even though he was my supervisor it was impossible to spend any quality time with him. He was always off touring foreign countries for conferences (at this time his obsession was with the then trendy C++), or working on a paper so that he could go overseas again to present it. Otherwise he was at the gym.
I did not learn much from Damian. He did make one thing _very_ obvious though - always look after number one. Also to a lesser extent - the squeaky wheel gets the grease. If you do a good enough job of telling everyone how good you are, eventually it will stick.
Damian is good at determining who to rub shoulders with and whose palms require oil.
I supported him getting the first award because he evangelizes my favorite language so well (and as a side effect himself). I object like that he may be getting another. He is a player. It sickens me that he has managed to big note himself into further support from our community - one that places product above politics.
Larry would be better off working on the design of Perl 6 without him. Larry is a wonderful man - to me he embodies up the language that I love. He is a quiet achiever who does not need to sell himself - his work does that for him. Do we really need to pay someone to churn out another Exegesis?
I say allow showy Damian be an instructor on his own time (and dollar) - or better still a politician. Then he can jet around the globe all he likes. That is what he does best. It would also mean he would have to spend his _own_ time working on those damn Latin modules.....
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Perhaps a project manager's perspective of his staff (especially staff so gregarious and careful to please his sponsors as Damian) is not the most unbiased either? :) It has been years since I was a grad student - but I never would have gone so far to call Damian disingenuous and certainly not greedy. Rather I would repeat that he is focused on himself. Whether that is to the detriment of Perl 6 not mine to state.
I absolutely agree with the cheerleader aspect - but do not understand why Perl needs cheerleaders. Do we really need someone to show us Perl is still a vibrant and fun language? Please - we know that already! It is fun watching one of Damian's wonderful lectures - no one derives more pleasure from them then he does!! But so far I chose not to contribute a second time to a fund that sponsors him. I just do not believe we need someone doing 'that kind of stuff' for yet another year.
The obvious counter argument is 'things are a changing in Perl - we need a cheerleader to support 6.' I do not accept this - everyone is waiting for Perl 6 with such baited breath we all smell like a tackle shop!!
As far as all the unsung work Damian has done - clearly I cannot comment because it is deliberately unpublicized. It sounds like it is incredibly important to the delivery of 6. Why is it deliberately unpublicized? It does not sound like the Damian I know (and love) to do a bunch of valuable work and keep it to himself. If it really does exist, can it perhaps be publicized? If it were my tune (and probably the tunes of others) would change.
Damian is an amazing person. He breathes life into topics that might otherwise be dull. He is a great speaker. He is highly self motivated - has the ability to stay on the road for months at a time. He is one of those people who always seems to be bursting with energy.
IMHO he is far to focused on himself. He has a fine set of tools to sell himself and does so extremely well. Take a look at any interview with him. He is always ranting about how busy he is and how much work he is doing.
I knew Damian from college. Even though he was my supervisor it was impossible to spend any quality time with him. He was always off touring foreign countries for conferences (at this time his obsession was with the then trendy C++), or working on a paper so that he could go overseas again to present it. Otherwise he was at the gym.
I did not learn much from Damian. He did make one thing _very_ obvious though - always look after number one. Also to a lesser extent - the squeaky wheel gets the grease. If you do a good enough job of telling everyone how good you are, eventually it will stick.
Damian is good at determining who to rub shoulders with and whose palms require oil.
I supported him getting the first award because he evangelizes my favorite language so well (and as a side effect himself). I object like that he may be getting another. He is a player. It sickens me that he has managed to big note himself into further support from our community - one that places product above politics.
Larry would be better off working on the design of Perl 6 without him. Larry is a wonderful man - to me he embodies up the language that I love. He is a quiet achiever who does not need to sell himself - his work does that for him. Do we really need to pay someone to churn out another Exegesis?
I say allow showy Damian be an instructor on his own time (and dollar) - or better still a politician. Then he can jet around the globe all he likes. That is what he does best. It would also mean he would have to spend his _own_ time working on those damn Latin modules.....