Posted on by Olav Vitters

What a day!

While trying to show that perhaps some things could be interpreted a ‘assume people mean well’ way, stated something very poorly. Then got a huge thread as result because people assume I didn’t mean well. Oh the irony of this 😛

6 Replies to “What a day!”

  1. Oh btw: I’m pretty sure people will misinterpret the post I linked to even though I already said one bit is stated very poorly. So just to warn up front: If you want to repeat the desktop-devel-list discussion, do it there. I’ll remove any such comments from my blog.

    1. I feel your pain.

      I try to go out of my way to make sure that I never make direct technology recommendations to people, especially not linux distro choices. I try to be upfront about stating what I use or have had experience with, and tell people I will most likely be able to assist them effectively if they used what I use. And for certain technology choices I tell them I cannot assist them due to my lack of experience. But I never make a recommendation that they make a specific choice.

      And I try very hard not to tell them a particular technology is a bad choice for them, if I’m not speaking from a place of personal experience using that particular technology. It’s a fine line when it comes to dealing with emotional attachment to technology, but if I find that I always make sure I am speaking only from a perspective grounded in personal experience things go much smoother. If I have to reference someone else’s experience I provide authoritative citations to that experience, not my reinterpretation as an observer.

      Just my experience from the times when I put my helper hat on, from my Ximian bolt-on desktop usage days onward. Make of it what you will, even if its just deleting the comment.

      -jef

      1. I was concentrating on trying to hopefully show that IRC comments could be misinterpreted as negative that I didn’t look too much at what I said myself. So what is stated is not what I meant to say exactly.

        Of course, I still get the various comments accusing me of things eventhough I said ‘poorly worded’ and ‘assume people mean well’. Bit unfortunate.

        1. I totally get it. I’ve been there. I still end up there from time to time. I’ve learn to accept I’m going to have human failings like everyone else. And I wake up every morning thinking the same hopeful thought….

          skynet will save us from ourselves

          -jef

  2. Yes, well… I think a big part of it is that there’s been so much heat lately around Ubuntu vs community. And as you say, your comment *was* poorly worded, easily interpreted as being anti-Ubuntu rather simply referring to technical difficulties in doing Gnome development on that particular platform…

    1. Totally agree on the poorly worded. When I read it again I 1) had a “oh damn” moment and 2) understood why I got so many reactions on it.

      Unfortunately the one person who pointed it out nicely did so in private, and I missed it in the avalanche of mailing list CC’s.

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